The political situation changed in late June 1941, when the Nazi German and Romanian troops began the sudden attack on the Soviet Union, occupying Bessarabia ("see Romania during World War II"). Robot was declared missing, and presumed dead, in August of the same year, his last known whereabouts being near Odessa, Ukrainian SSR. According to one account, he had been conscripted into the Red Army and died under arms. However, according to Vladimir Prisăcaru, Robot was a shipwreck victim, who died alongside other Bessarabian refugees, when their ship, sailing from Odessa to Crimea, sank in the Black Sea.