Vasily Ivanovich Petrov was born on 15 January 1917 in the village of Chernolesskoye, Stavropol Governorate, the son of a white-collar employee.

He graduated from secondary school in 1935 and studied for two years at the Ordzhonikidze Pedagogical Institute until 1937.

He then succeeded Sergey Sokolov as First Deputy Minister of Defence until his retirement in 1986 due to ill health.

[6] From 1992, Petrov served as a military advisor to the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation.

Petrov died on 1 February 2014 at the age of 97,[7] and was laid to rest at the Federal Military Memorial Cemetery in Moscow Oblast.