Romania in World War II

On April 13, 1939, France and Britain pledged to ensure the independence of Romania,
but negotiations on a similar Soviet guarantee collapsed when Romania refused to allow the Red
Army to cross its frontiers. On August 23, 1939, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany signed a
nonaggression pact containing a secret protocol giving the Soviet Union the Balkans as its sphere
of influence. Freed of any Soviet threat, Germany invaded Poland on September 1 and ignited
World War II. The Nazi-Soviet pact and Germany's three-week blitzkrieg against Poland
panicked Romania, which granted refuge to members of Poland's fleeing government. Romania's
premier, Armand Calinescu, proclaimed neutrality, but Iron Guards assassinated him on
September 21. King Carol tried to maintain neutrality for several months more, but France's
surrender and Britain's retreat from Europe rendered meaningless their assurances to Romania,
and therefore Carol needed to strike a deal with Hitler.
Romania suffered three radical dismemberments in the first year of the war that tore away
some 100,000 square kilometers of territory and 4 million people. On June 26, 1940, the Soviet
Union gave Romania a twenty-four-hour ultimatum to return Bessarabia and cede northern
Bukovina, which had never been a part of Russia; after Germany's ambassador in Bucharest
advised Carol to submit, the king had no other option. In August Bulgaria reclaimed southern
Dobruja with German and Soviet backing. In the same month, the German and Italian foreign
ministers met with Romanian diplomats in Vienna and presented them with an ultimatum to
accept the retrocession of northern Transylvania to Hungary; Carol again conceded. These
territorial losses shattered the underpinnings of Carol's power. On September 6, 1940, the Iron
Guard, with the support of Germany and renegade military officers led by the premier, General
Ion Antonescu, forced the king to abdicate. Carol and his mistress again went into exile, leaving
the king's nineteen-year-old son, Michael V (1940-47), to succeed him.
Antonescu soon usurped Michael's authority and brought Romania squarely into the
German camp. His new government quickly enacted stricter anti-Semitic laws and restrictions on
Jewish, Greek, and Armenian businessmen; widespread bribery of poor and corrupt Romanian
officials, however, somewhat mitigated their harshness. With Antonescu's blessing, the Iron
Guard unleashed a reign of terror. In November 1940, Iron Guards thirsty for vengeance broke
into the Jilava prison and butchered sixty-four prominent associates of King Carol on the same
spot where Codreanu had been shot.
They also massacred Jews and tortured and murdered Nicolae Iorga. Nazi troops, who
began crossing into Romania on October 8, soon numbered over 500,000; and on November 23
Romania joined the Axis Powers. Hitler now cast Romania in the role of regular supplier of fuel
and food to the Nazi armies. Because the Iron Guard's disruptive violence no longer served

Hitler's ends, German and Romanian soldiers began rounding up and disarming ill-disciplined
members. In January 1941, however, the Iron Guard rebelled and street battles erupted. During
this fighting, Iron Guards murdered 120 helpless Jews and mutilated their bodies. German and
Romanian troops finally crushed the Iron Guard after several weeks.
On June 22, 1941, German armies with Romanian support attacked the Soviet Union.
German and Romanian units conquered Bessarabia, Odessa, and Sevastopol, then marched
eastward across the Russian steppes toward Stalingrad. Romania welcomed the war. In a morbid
competition with Hungary to curry Hitler's favor and hoping to regain northern Transylvania,
Romania mustered more combat troops for the Nazi war effort than all of Germany's other allies
combined. Hitler rewarded Romania's loyalty by returning Bessarabia and northern Bukovina
and by allowing Romania to annex Soviet lands immediately east of the Dniester, including
Odessa. Romanian jingoes in Odessa even distributed a geography showing that the Dacians had
inhabited most of southern Russia.
During the war, Antonescu's regime severely oppressed the Jews in Romania and the
conquered territories. In Moldavia, Bukovina, and Bessarabia, Romanian soldiers carried out
brutal pogroms. Troops herded at least 200,000 Jews from Bukovina and Bessarabia--who were
considered Soviet traitors--across the Dniester and into miserable concentration camps where
many starved or died of disease or brutality.
During the war, about 260,000 Jews were
killed in Bessarabia, Bukovina, and in the camps
across the Dniester; Hungary's Nazi government
killed or deported about 120,000 of Transylvania's
150,000 Jews in 1944. Despite rampant antiSemitism, most Romanian Jews survived the war.
Germany planned mass deportations of Jews from
Romania, but Antonescu balked. Jews acted as key managers in Romania's economy, and
Antonescu feared that deporting them en masse would lead to chaos; in addition, the unceasing
personal appeals of Wilhelm Filderman, a Jewish leader and former classmate of Antonescu, may
have made a crucial difference.
Romania supplied the Nazi war effort with oil, grain, and industrial products, but
Germany was reluctant to pay for the deliveries either in goods or gold. As a result, inflation
skyrocketed in Romania, and even government officials began grumbling about German
exploitation. Romanian-Hungarian animosities also undermined the alliance with Germany.
Antonescu's government considered war with Hungary over Transylvania an inevitability after
the expected final victory over the Soviet Union. In February 1943, however, the Red Army
decimated Romania's forces in the great counteroffensive at Stalingrad, and the German and

Romanian armies began their retreat westward. Allied bombardment slowed Romania's
industries in 1943 and 1944 before Soviet occupation disrupted transportation flows and
curtailed economic activity altogether.