23 August 1944, 61 years ago...

Zayets, the terms offered by the Soviet Union at Stockholm to the Antonescu regime are well known today (see Romania in al doilea razboi mondial by Dinu Giurescu, ALL Istoric, 1999 for example). They aren't "covered up" by certain parties. Patrascanu on the other hand was not part of the pre-23 August diplomacy and wasn't exactly in a position to cast such judgments. You will find that they are equally unfortunate.

Regarding King Mihai I and your obvious bad opinion on him. You are definitely nor the first, nor the last one to bring up this line of thinking in a discussion on 23 August 1944. You claim King Mihai I was a traitor to Germany, yet it was Antonescu who brought Romania into the Tripartite Pact and who took the decision to attack the Soviet Union alongside Germany. How could King Mihai "betray" Germany when he had nothing to do with it? Furthermore, why is it a betrayal since Romania wasn't actually tied to Germany in the war against the SU by a signed treaty, only by Antonescu's word? One could very well bring up the argument that since Germany was unable to guarantee the Romanian frontiers (as it had agreed after the 2nd Vienna Award) Romania didn't owe allegiance to Germany anymore. Inter-state relations aren't modeled after personal relations, but according to interest. Romanian interests could no longer be secured by Nazi Germany.

You ask why did the King dismiss Antonescu and ordered the Romanian Army to cease fighting against the Allies and to fall back to Wallachia. The answer is more than obvious: on 23 August, Army Group South Ukraine was practically defeated by the offensive of the 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts.

You also seem to make a common confusion. The Romanian soldiers weren't ordered right away to engage German forces. They were given a chance to evacuate Romania. The declaration of war against the Axis came after the first Luftwaffe raid in Bucharest.

Your claims that the King went for "personal glory" are nothing more than "PURE SPECULATION" (using your own logic). I am curious as to how you will back this up with facts, not your obviously biased personal opinions. You have no way of knowing what the King felt, except if you or someone in your family was close to the royal family. You are also mistaken when implying that it was he who sent younger Romanians that himself to die off in the Tatra Mountains. Romania was compelled to take part in the fighting against the Axis by the Armistice treaty itself. Even if Antonescu would have signed the armistice, it would still have been part of it, because it was a sine qua non condition imposed by Stalin.

Another claim of yours, that the King is the "only responsible (even if manipulated) for the disaster after August 23rd 1944" is simply stunning. Even if simplifying facts to the extreme, I fail to see how someone with a good knowledge of the events and conditions of 1944 can come up with such a conclusion. Somehow the simple fact that Romania was defeated militarily on the Eastern Front is still unknown. The same the fact that Romania was already in the Soviet sphere of influence and that Stalin reserved a new Communist regime for it. This is not my opinion. These are well-documented facts. History usually make use of them, when available, not personal opinions.

,it is not nice.

I am sorry if I misunderstood what you said, but the following:

(in reply to Imperialist)

led me to think that you considered Romanian soldiers to behaved "more than ok", which was not always the case. I may have misuderstood.

With regards to the 130.000 soldiers captured shortly after 23 August (mentioned in this thread a few times), the following letter posted below makes reference to them at least twice. It is the scan of a letter sent by General Mihail to Marshall Malinovsky, dated October 3, 1944.

Surprisingly, it results from this letter that those Romanian soldiers were not quickly transported to the Soviet Union, but, rather, as of October 3, 1944, they were still held in internment camps in Moldavia. It results that this was a well-known fact, at least to the Romanian General Headquarters, who protested about this as well as about the confiscation of Romanian artillery pieces.

Letters along the same lines were also written by General Avramescu and General Radescu on repeated occasions.

Source: National Archives, MAPN.









This post has been edited by mabadesc on August 29, 2005 09:22 pm

Hi Victor,
There are a lot of papers,books and documents covering this event. I have the greatest respect for Mr. Giurescu but I will not take everything on what he wrote in the book you mentioned.
You are ,by mistake , reffer to events on August 23rd when indeed , Patrascanu had nothing to negotiate.What to negotiate? Even the Russians had no idea what it will happen.But anyway,I was speaking about the terms established in Paris.

About King Mihai I. I do not have the worst oppinon on him.My grandfather really loved the guy and he would go anywhere if he was told to.But when always came the fact what was after 45 he stops speaking about him.I guess he was utterly dissapointed.I pointed out that if there is a defector,then this one must be the king and his henchmen,counselors etc.

Secondly,I didn't brought up the subject of a signed treaty with Germany because some will treat Antonescu's decision to fight along the Axis powers the equivalent of such a treaty.Which,by the way,is at least insane.Anyway,you are right,how would be a treason without a treaty? Tell that to Denes which considers that in fact that was happened back then.

As you see,I speak less about Antonescu,wether he was a traitor or not.Fact remains that he was the only one to pay in the aftermath of August 23rd "defection".Why,when the Eastern Front was going well for the Axis and Romania had back the Eastern territories,the king didn't stopped Antonescu as he did in 1944? I tell you why,because then he was not yet the Soviet puppet and because he had enough personal glory gave by Germans.Sold for a medal,Pobeda Order,that was the one,isn't it?

You said that Romanian interests could no longer be secured by Germany.That's true,but I ask you,wasn't the same case in 1940?Forget for a moment that Soviet Union and Germany signed the Ribentropp-Molotov treaty.Who secured Romania's interest then?Certainly not Germany.Yet,we gave Bassarabia,Herta,Bucovina,then Northern Transylvania and to complete the chaos,why not a big chunck from Dobrogea?Well,I had to admit,the last one was a bad idea from start but it added to the sentiments people had when all this news fell on them.

Yes, Army Group South Ukraine was defeated,hence my question,why not surrender?You said Germany could not secure our interests?Why not either surrender or fight to the bitter end?Why send,voluntarly,thousand of men to die after the defeat was a fact?Was that a crime?What did we gained?Northern Transylvania?That was already (vague) promised by Hitler when he found out Horthy prepares to defect (see ,they had a treaty,that's treason).What else?Social system?Bah,no question.Romania was already 100% under SU sphere of influence and everybody knew it.

Furthermore,that's what I am saying: Romanian soldiers heard the proclamation on the radio and they wondered: now what? The order is to cease fire against the Russians,but not to fight along the Germans.About the presumed chance to leave Romania that's simply ridiculous.You don't expect that the whole German machine would get out of country by night.As far as I know the raid against Bucharest came the next day.And what raid was that? A Stuka squadron bombarding most of the Royal Palace,wrongly identified Psot Palace and so on.

Victor,like you,I am biased toward my own logic if I can use such a term.I just enumerated some events and shown why I think that way. You are most probably right,king was not the only responsible but definitely the most responsible one.That sounds stunning for you,is alright,is just my oppinion and you are not forced to share it.When I said (if I said) the fact that he sent the younger people to die in the Tatra you know very well what I meant.Otherwise,next time I will write precisely what I want to say.I was,obviously(at least for me) ,saying that the youngs "sent"(a direct consequence of August 23rd) to die in Tatra.. Romania was compelled to take part in the fighting against Axis based on September 12th treaty,and NOT immediately after August 23rd.Probably Antonescu wouldn't sign that treaty preffering to shot himself.At least that's what historians say: he was not a bright mind in politics but definitely a man of honour.

Yes,usually history make use of well documented facts as you said.When available.So true.Our history is rewriten once again.Until everybody reach a common conclusion regarding this event,allow me to make use of my personal oppinion.One avantage you have is that you can freely dismiss it as it is a non historical document.

Have a good day

I do consider that romanian troops behaved more then ok, this does not BY ANY MEANS make them angels, I am sorry if it wasn't clear but I thought it is common sence. They "behaved more then ok" means: "given the situation (everything related to ww2, atrocities on eastern front, romania/basarabia) and the fact that romanian units WERE NOT ordered to pillage/kill/rape local population (if there was anything to pillage which I highly doubt) also given the fact that military priests and doctors WERE ordered to take care of the local population, I consider that romanians behaved more then ok."

So basicaly you can read what I said like: "given the conditions ... our troops behaved more then ok", which does not mean "our troops behaved like angels".

This post has been edited by D13-th_Mytzu on August 29, 2005 11:06 pm

Again, since you've referred to my name, I will answer this single point, leaving to the others to enlighten you on the other matters.

FYI, Rumania was part of the Axis Alliance. The treaty was signed on November 23, 1940. This was unilaterally disavowed with the royal proclamation of Aug. 23, 1944.

I never said the royal coup of August 23, 1944 was a treason, which is a rather biased term. It was perceived as such by most German soldiers, incl. the commanding officers, as well as Hitler (who, by the way, directly ordered the Luftwaffe to teach a lesson to the Rumanian King by bombing the Royal palace among other targets - the mentioned Stuka attack of August 24, 1944).
What I wrote was that Rumania defected the Axis camp, which is a neutral term.

As for the article published in the 'Adevarul' daily, which started this very thread, I did not translate it or quote it, as you insinuated.
I simply drew the forumites' attention to it, adding a short introduction for the non-initiated.
That was all.

Gen. Dénes

This post has been edited by Dénes on August 30, 2005 12:17 am

Hi Denes,

That is very well known.

If you have the text of the treaty I would be most happy.And also it will be interesting which authority signed it.

That and "defection" led to my interpretation of "dezertare".Or it was not what you meant?Because if it was not,then please accept my appologies.See below that I am not talking out my ***. This is the dictionary I have:

I did not insinuated absolutely nothing.If that was your impression then I am terribly sorry.

Zayets, it is your choice to believe whatever you want. It's a free country. But when you engage it a discussion on historical events, you need to take the facts into consideration, not your own opinions. We aren't talking about football. History isn't mythology (well, only if you don't approve with Lucian Boia's questionable theories).

The use of written sources is IMO indispensable to a serious discussion on history. There has been enough amateurism on the subject of 23 August and it's time to stop judging the events with the soul instead of the head. I am very curious as to why you choose to ignore the terms offered to Romania in Stockholm by Mrs. Kollontay, which are published in the book I mentioned (for example). Basically every information in that book is sourced, which is not something that can be said about your claims.

I did not misunderstand you. You yourself wrote:

This clearly refers to the conditions offered by the Soviet government in Stockholm in April 1944.

I know you didn't bring up the treaty with Germany. I was just explaining why I don't think of Mihai I as a traitor.

You ask rhetorically why King Mihai I didn't dismiss Antonescu in 1941-42, when things were going relatively well, probably in order to try to justify your opinion that he "was not a Soviet puppet and he had enough personal glory". I personally find it very hard to understand this logic. I also don't see any facts that you brought up to back this claim. The King stepped in when the situation was lost and Antonescu didn't seem to keen on requesting an armistice. Romania needed for a new government was clear as daylight in August 1944, which was not the case in 1941-42. Did it ever occur to you that he did what he thought was necessary for Romania?

You continuously bring up the tasteless cliché regarding the Pobeda Order. I wonder why those pseudo-historians (usually pro-Antonescu or pro-Iron Guard characters that fled to the West) don't also think that he did it for the US Legion of Merit. I think that I have to point out how insulting is to insinuate that a person with the wealth and education of a King can be motivated in his actions by such "shiny trinkets". Obviously you are welcome to back up this claim also.

The "Soviet puppets" you are searching for are called Petru Groza, Ana Pauker, Vasile Luca etc. These people have well documented ties with the Soviet Union, having spent quite a while there (some of them) during the war. They acted according to Moscow's wishes and steered Romania towards Communism. The King didn't appoint a Communist government on 23 August 1944. He appointed gen. Sanatescu and then gen. Radescu, none of which were "Soviet puppets".

You also ask why Romania didn't just surrender and why did it "voluntarily" send troops all the way to the Czech Republic. Here you are grossly twisting the facts or simply you don't know what happened. Romania did surrender (it sued for peace). After Antonescu was arrested, gen. Hansen and gen. Gerstenberg were announced that German forces are allowed to evacuate Wallachia unharmed. It was gen. Gerstenberg that afterwards talked on the phone with Hitler and said that he could take Bucharest and overthrow the government. What followed it is well known. Gerstenberg's small force ran into more numerous Romanian defenses and failed in its mission. Luftwaffe bombers attacked Bucharest. This obviously attracted the Romanian declaration of war. Obviously the Romanian General Staff also considered a German counter-coup and was prepare for it, but Romanian troops did not start to attack the Wehrmacht after it heard the radio announcement. In some places German forces retreated, in others they fought with the former Allies. Surely Romania didn't intend to leave the Soviets do all the fighting in Transylvania, just like it didn't want the Germans to do the same in Bessarabia in 1941, but the idea was to at least do the honorable thing and allow the Germans to leave the country if they could escape the Soviets. It wasn't "ridiculous" as you describe it. IIRC the time interval allowed for the Germans was 15 days, more than enough to evacuate the second line troops in Wallachia. I believe this explains why the fighting started on 24 August and not on 12 September.

Getting back to the "voluntarily" part, I see that I have to repeat myself. The participation alongside the Allies in the war against the Axis was included in the Armistice Treaty. It was an obligation imposed by the Soviet side and they made sure it was fulfilled. Gen. Mihail, the chief of the General Staff, didn't want to continue the war beyond the 1940 frontier and that is why he resigned after this frontier was surpassed. Romania eventually gained Northwestern Transylvania, which, btw, even if Hitler promised it to Antonescu during their last meeting (although I doubt there is a written record of this statement), he wasn't around in 1947 to actually do it. The frontiers were going to be decided by the Allies, not by Hitler.

Your claim that everybody knew we were 100% in the Soviet sphere of influence is false. Don't bring up the benefits of hindsight. We may know today what was already established in early 1944, but the people living then didn't. The general feeling was that the Western Allies wouldn't abandon Eastern Europe to Stalin. Even after Communism was firmly installed in Romania, the "Americans will come" myth survived. There are many protests forwarded by Romanian authorities to the Allied representatives (including Soviets) in 1944 aren't a sign of people who knew that they were already been assigned to the Soviet sphere of influence. The same are the [real] results of the elections, the resistance in the mountains. You, obviously, can bring up any proof that everybody knew.

There will never be a common consensus on all historical events. The idea is to get as much as the facts right and draw the conclusions as objectively as possible. A personal opinion, especially when it comes in contradiction with facts or omits some of them, is without value.

Mabadesc, thank you for posting the documents. I do not have within my reach at this moment all of my bibliography due to the strengthening work on my house, so I was talking mostly from memory.

If you have the text of the treaty I would be most happy.And also it will be interesting which authority signed it.

The Treaty was a defensive Alliance. Romania and Germany were supposed to act together in case one of tehm were attacked. It did not mention the case in which Germany and Romania were aggressors themselves. You can find the text of the treaty in an older topic on the forum, posted by Curioso.

http://www.worldwar2.ro/forum/index.php?showtopic=1007&st=15

Hi Victor,
I see that you like to take out phrases out of their original context and use them as base for your oppinions.I talk about this:

My question to you is : when did Molotov negociate with Patrascanu,Groza and the like? Please don't twist my words. There's only one answer at this question: Paris treaty.And this is waaaaaay later than August 23rd.

I am no regalist yet you compare me (even if vaguely) with the legionars.That's ok.Is the first time I heard that about me.I guess I should hear them all.And you are right,I forgot about US Medal of Merit (which I believe I writen about it in one of my early post).I , sometimes, spare some time to write related to the subject.I am not judging the event with the soul.I can't have favorites.I was not born then,I have no friends in the royalist club,I have no friends in the Iron Guard group . The last thing I'd do is to judge with soul. I have exposed a succesion of facts here,so simple was that.
You said puppets were only Groza,Pauker etc.Then why the US said that Romanians have chosen for communism by themselves since they formed a communist government under the rule of king? And probably you will reply that he was influenced that way. I tell you what,was enough for the king to say,this is what happens and he will imediately gain popular support.No,he didn't.The fact is that August 23rd is just the begining.Things could be done totaly different immediately after that date.There is a word : never start something you can't finish.And usualy it is used when somebody screws up pretty bad the things.
About king's education neverthless,one can say many things.He had received lot of teachers.Whether he learned anything from them,is another story.I don't have to prove the fact that the king went for personal glory.What happened after is more than any proof.You say it is insulting,I say these are facts: he was the king of all Romanians.Where was he,what actions did he took when ,for example , Romanian officers who fought on the Eastern Front went to gulag or judged and shoot and their families forbidden to have a minimum pension.This is just a tiny example.I can give you thousands.
And I ask you again,because you said I am insulting the king: if he was not supposed to take care of these things then why interfere in the first place?As I said:never start ...
Yes , we should at least surrender and stop there.Was enough bad that we passed our borders leaded by Antonescu.
About the voluntarly act of troop supplying,yes,it was part of the Armistice,then again,who was there when the Armistice (September 12) was signed?Yep,same people the king brought to power.
You are telling me that Romanians (both camps) were not aware that they will not fall in Soviet sphere of influence?Then I pitty both and they deserve what they endured after.
However,there is this thing which bothers me.If they didn't knew that Romania will fall into Soviets hands,why signing the armistice?You know what happened.Russians were so surprised that they were whithin days in Bulgaria,ready to cross into Greece whenever they wanted because the biggest ally on the Eastern Front was ordered not to fight anymore.That shifted the whole balance of power toward Stalin.
Sorry for the long post again.I am enjoying my coffee and since the laptop was open ...

If you have the text of the treaty I would be most happy.And also it will be interesting which authority signed it.

The Treaty was a defensive Alliance. Romania and Germany were supposed to act together in case one of tehm were attacked. It did not mention the case in which Germany and Romania were aggressors themselves. You can find the text of the treaty in an older topic on the forum, posted by Curioso.

http://www.worldwar2.ro/forum/index.php?showtopic=1007&st=15

Yes,I remember the thread.Romania was not mentioned in that treaty.Actually was a bit earlier for that to happen.

First, how an uncoditional surrender could have been better than the armistice with the Soviet Union?

"Why not ... fight to the bitter end? Why send,voluntarly,thousand of men to die after the defeat was a fact?". Fighting to the bitter end was not the same thing with sending men to die after defeat was a fact? And most probably with worse consequences. Are you promoting the useless slaughter commanded by the Nazis in the last days of the Third Reich, in the name of honor?

This is absolutely nonsense, and outrageous too.

This is absolutely nonsense, and outrageous too.

I am talking,obviously, about the negociators (before 23 and after) ,but you choose what you wanted , of course. Thanks for warning me for weighing with dual standards.
Now that I find outrageous.I see no point in bothering your quotes.

Yes,somebody mentioned earlier "honor". I can see that this is not top priority for you.We are different person,we don't have to agree one with each other.

This post has been edited by Zayets on August 30, 2005 08:43 am

First, how can you talk about the "useless slaughter" "commanded" by the Nazis in the last days of the war? Why useless, and why commanded by the Nazis? When the russians entered Germany proper can you even differentiate between germans fighting for their country and those fighting for the regime? How?
As for the first question, since when did the preoccupation with men's lives became such a political fetish during WWII? Werent men sent to die way beyond Basarabia's border, way towards Stalingrad? So sending men to fight and die outside the country's borders is acceptable, but for them to die in defense of the country itself is an unacceptable cost, with unacceptable consequences? So better change sides and fight over the borders in the opposite direction, while the country is garrisoned by yet another "ally"?
Sorry, this logic is detrimental to both honor, self-respect and morale of a nation, IMO. Sometimes a fight to the end is needed. The nation will not perish out of it.
Also the question today in 2005 AD, looking back at both WWII, 50 years of communism and the post-89 situation, one would ask -- so what exactly did 23rd August save?

take care