The previous post (Romania in World War I) ended with the defeat of Romania by the Central Powers’ armies. By early 1917, there was a threat that, while pursuing the fleeing Romanians, enemy troops would invade the southern regions of Russia. The Russian army had to save the situation; a huge number of troops were transferred to the Romanian front, halting the Central Powers’ advance in Romanian Moldavia. The urgent transfer of massive numbers of troops and supplies—especially during the winter—led to an overload of the Russian railway system and even caused it to partially break down. What the Russian command had feared came to pass—and this was precisely why it had opposed Romania’s entry into the war: the entry of such an ally would only stretch the Russian front and bring not help, but major problems.
The King of Romania (left) and the commander of Russian forces in Romania
The defeat and occupation of most of the country were, of course, a terrible shock to the Romanians. This was not at all what they had expected when they entered the war. Their response was a determination to continue fighting for their country. The Romanian army had not, after all, disappeared. About 200,000 soldiers retreated to Moldova, along with 80,000 conscripts who had been mobilized but not yet armed. In the chaos of defeat, many could have deserted, but they did not. An additional mobilization was carried out in the unoccupied territory. With the Russian army providing a buffer behind them, the Romanians reorganized, trained, and equipped their army with the help of the Entente. By the summer of 1917, it numbered 460,000 men.
While the men are at the front (or in captivity), Romanian women are keeping agriculture going
And then 1917 brought new problems. In February, a revolution broke out in Russia, after which the Russian army began to fall into a state of progressive disintegration. Thanks to this, the Austro-Germans won the battle on the Russian front in the summer of 1917, after which they decided it was time to deal with Romania. Their offensive began on August 6. But the Romanian troops put up quite a stubborn resistance. Defeating Romania, as it turned out, came at a considerable cost—more than the Central Powers were willing to pay on a front they considered secondary. Their losses mounted, and they were forced to halt the offensive. A lull set in on the Romanian front. The Germans began shifting their troops to the Western Front.
But Romania faced not only the onslaught of enemy armies from the west, but also a social upheaval from the east. The Bolsheviks, having triumphed in Russia, expected the revolution to spread to other countries. Romania seemed like the ideal link in the chain of the world revolution—war-torn, with the Russian army already spreading its propaganda on its territory, and long suffering from poverty and social inequality.
Romanian statistics from 1903 recorded the following situation: 7,780 large landowners owned 51% of the country’s agricultural land, while more than 1,250,000 peasant families owned the remaining 49%. Another 300,000 peasant families owned no land at all. Thus, the agrarian question in Romania was no less acute than in Russia. And, just as in Russia, the peasant soldiers harbored a deep-seated hatred for their officers.
The revolutionary committees of the Russian units stationed in Romania called on Romanian soldiers to join the revolution. If the revolutionary unrest had spread to the Romanian army, the Bolsheviks’ seizure of power in Romania would have been a foregone conclusion.
Revolutionary rally among Russian troops in Romania
The Romanian elite demonstrated resolve and unity during a difficult time. Unlike in Russia, there was no split. Romania’s political system differed from Russia’s, with its tsar clinging to absolutism. Romania had a constitutional monarchy with an already well-established parliamentary form of government. In reality, of course, it was a typical oligarchy. But there was still the appearance of a legal avenue to bring about change through elections, rather than by destroying everything.
The king, the government, and the parliamentary parties agreed on the following resolution: “We will tell the peasant that by fighting for Romania, he is also fighting for his own political and economic liberation.” On April 5, 1917, King Ferdinand addressed the soldiers (most of whom were peasants), promising to carry out radical reforms immediately after the war ended: to grant universal suffrage and redistribute landowners’ lands in favor of the peasants (without specifying the terms—redemption).
The Romanian rulers managed to preserve their army. There were a huge number of deserters, saboteurs, and defectors—but against the backdrop of the collapse of the neighboring Russian army, the Romanian army nevertheless remained combat-ready and under control. Either the Romanian soldier proved to be more nationally conscious and resilient than the Russian, or the Romanians had simply sat out the first two years of the war—and their soldiers were less worn down by it. Moreover, the Romanian command was much harsher in its repression than the Russian command. Another factor was at play: for most Romanian peasant soldiers, their homes and land lay behind the front lines—in occupied territory. For the Russian soldier, his home and land were behind the front lines; his longing for peace, for his native village, for his family, and for his farm contributed to his susceptibility to propaganda, desertion from the front, and the collapse of the front. For a Romanian soldier to return home, his homeland first had to be liberated. Hatred of the occupiers and the desire to liberate their homeland prevented demoralization, as these goals required organization and discipline.
Romanian military exercises
In early December 1917, the Romanians concluded an armistice with the enemy—immediately after the armistice between Russia and Germany. The Romanians then turned their army in a different direction. In December 1917, they began seizing Russian army supply depots; they also surrounded Russian units, confiscating their weapons and immediately executing anyone who resisted. The Russian units did not expect an attack, and due to the collapse of the state, organized resistance was out of the question. The Romanians disarmed the Russian army on Romanian territory and seized the enormous stockpiles it had amassed there. And in January 1918, the Romanian army invaded Bessarabia. It crushed the resistance of scattered detachments, and this region of the Russian Empire was occupied.
In January 1918, the Germans demanded a peace treaty on their terms, Romania’s separate withdrawal from the Entente and the war, and a de facto surrender. In February and March, the Germans concluded such a peace in Brest with Ukraine and Russia. In May, the so-called Treaty of Bucharest between the Central Powers and Romania was concluded. But the king delayed signing it.
The Final Victory
It was the fall of 1918. The situation for the Central Powers was rapidly deteriorating. The Entente forces launched a successful offensive in the Balkans. The Bulgarian army collapsed, and Bulgaria surrendered. The Austro-Hungarian army was falling apart, and its units withdrew from Bukovina. The Romanians hastily moved their troops into Bukovina, as Ukrainian units had begun to take the place of the Austro-Hungarians there. Germany began withdrawing its troops from the occupied part of Romania. Yet Romania still hesitated to re-enter the war, even though there was no longer any threat of a major clash with enemy forces. On November 10, 1918, the Romanians announced their renewed entry into the war—just one day before it ended.
Romania formally retained its status as an Entente ally at the Paris Peace Conference. At first, this brought it no benefits. The conference hosts—the French and the British—simply ignored the envoys from Bucharest. The Romanians discovered that the 1916 agreements with the Entente were meaningless. But then their standing improved amid events in Eastern Europe—the revolution in Russia, followed by the one in Hungary. Romania was granted control over all the territories that its troops had, in fact, occupied.
Romania before the war (green) and the provinces annexed as a result of the war
The Romanians were fortunate to be rescued by the Russian army in early 1917. After that, they managed on their own to preserve their army and state under difficult conditions. As a result, by the end of the war, they emerged with a significant advantage, having doubled their territory. In March 1918, the “State Council” of occupied Bessarabia declared unification with Romania. In occupied Bukovina, too, some kind of assembly was organized, which voted in October in favor of unification. After the collapse of Austria-Hungary and the dissolution of its army, Romanian troops entered Transylvania—and as early as December 1, they declared themselves part of Romania. At the Versailles Conference following World War I, all Romanian annexations were recognized, with the proclamations of annexation interpreted as manifestations of the right of peoples to self-determination.
The Triumphal Arch in Bucharest, erected in honor of Romania’s victory in World War I
