In early 1941 Strik-Strikfeldt was interviewed by an Army Staff Officer in Posen and asked to undertake an interpreter's examination in Berlin where he was awarded a certificate as "Interpreter Class A". Due to his service in the former Russian Imperial Army he was only inducted into the Army as a Captain. He was initially attached to Field-Marshal Fedor von Bock's HQ in the Warthegau, where he met and worked with "Generalmajor" (Major-General) Reinhard Gehlen and "Generalmajor" Henning von Tresckow. Gehlen encouraged him to lecture to other officers during the war on "Der Russische Mensch" ("The Russian Man") and even helped distribute Strik-Strikfeldt's lecture as an official OKW Propaganda Department paper to intelligence officers along the front line.