MINERVA - Journal of History and Philosophy - Volume 3, Issue 1, September 2022
Journal of History and Philosophy
Volume 3, Issue 1, September 20200
SZATHMARI'S PHOTO ALBUM ON THE DANUBIAN PRINCIPALITIES IN 1853
At the origins of war photoreportage in the nineteenth
century
Ph. D. Hernán Rodríguez VARGAS Italian Institute for Historical Studies
Introduction
Many years before Tsar Nicholas I ordered his troops in Bessarabia in June 1853 to cross the Prut to occupy Moldavia and Wallachia, feelings of phobia towards Russia had been fuelled throughout Europe, mainly in France and England. Since the territorial expansion of the Russian Empire in the eighteenth century and, subsequently, by its demonstration of military strength against Napoleon, an image between fear, rejection and hatred had been created in oral, written and iconographic culture, which would be amplified with time, under the epithet of "Russian threat". In the mid- nineteenth century, to increase the feelings of Russophobia on the part of the British there was support for the Polish cause; while, to fuel these feelings on the part of the French and the rest of Europe, it was the violent Russian reaction to the revolutionary waves of 1848. 1/2
Even more important for the impact on public opinion was the fact that this military invasion by the Tsar represented the end of a long cycle of conflicts between two empires (the Sublime Porta and the Russian one) and became a European conflict capable of definitively splitting the
1The documented foundation of the "Russian threat" was the so-called "Testament of Peter the Great," widely cited by Russophobic writers, politicians, diplomats, and military as incontrovertible evidence of Russia's ambitions for world domination. The "Testament", in reality, was a fake, created in the early eighteenth century by various Polish, Hungarian and Ukrainian figures connected to France and the Ottomans and passed through various editorial offices before arriving at the final version, which arrived in the archives of the Foreign Ministry French in the sixties of the eighteenth century. O. Figes, Crimea, l'ultima crociata, Torino, Einaudi, 2011, pp. 75-76.
2 Ibid.
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structure established in Vienna in 1815. 3 Immediately after the invasion, the British and French mobilized their armies in the event of a possible war and since before these armies arrived in support of the Turkish ally, the first to land in the Danubian principalities, in Constantinople and on the Russian-Turkish front in the Caucasus, were the reporters of important newspapers such as The Times, Le Moniteur Universel, The Illustrated London News and L'Illustration Journal Universel, as well as satirical- informative newspapers, among the most relevant Le Charivari French, and the Punch or The London Charivari.
From the beginning, Russian hostilities and the stance of the French and British empires, were the focus of attention of these newspapers, attracting more and more the interest of the public. From this point of view, the publications of July 1853 by The Illustrated London News and the L'Illustration Journal Universel are particularly relevant. The Illustrated London News, on July 2, published on its front page an article entitled "The English and French camps", in which it highlighted, in addition to the cooperation between the Allies against the common enemy, the cultural- national differences between the two armies. The illustrations, in addition to Queen Victoria's visit to chobham's field staff, depict the military types and equipment of both armies preparing to go to war. 4/5
Subsequently, on July 16, a detailed report on "les fortifications de Constatinople" appeared in the Illustration Journal Universel, which presented readers with an important historical excursus on Constantinople from the fifteenth century. On July 23, this same newspaper reported on the most important event of the week6, namely "la réponse de M. le ministre des affaires étrangères à la deuxième circulaire de M. de Nesselrode, publiée dans le Moniteur du 17 julliet". Réponse which the newspaper considers to be worthy, since 'le ministre français réfute victoriusement la partie de la circulaire de la chancellerie russe tendant à reporter sur la France et l'Angleterre l'ocupation des principautés du Danube comme représailles de l'envoi des flottes dans les eaux libres de Bésika'. 7
3 W. Baumgart, The Crimean War, 1853-1856, London-New York, Oxford University Press, 1999; T. Royle, Crimea. The Great Crimean War 1854-1856, London, Brown & C., 1999; H. Small, The Crimean War. Queen Victoria's War with the Russian Tsar, Stroud, 2007.
4 The Illustrated London News, 2 July 1853, p.537.
5 The Illustrated London News, 2 July 1853, p. 541.
6 L'Illustration Journal Universel, July 16, 1853, p. 33.
7 L'Illustration Journal Universel, July 23, 1853, p. 55.
iconographic activities of colonial enterprises36, and which are continually found in Szathmari's later photographic works. Such is the case of the multiple genre photographs dedicated to the typical subjects and traditional costumes of Romanian culture. Examples are the photographs presented with great success at the Universal Exhibition of 1867 in Paris and in 1873 in Vienna. The photograph dedicated to a group of women in regional costume of 1866 (fig. 4) was one of the many representations that Szathmari dedicated to enhance his culture, showcasing clothes, customs and cultural practices.
Returning to the album dedicated to documenting the beginning of the conflict, this can then be defined as "une oeuvre artistique dans laquelle le peintre, le poète et l'historien trouveront un égal intérêt; c'est, déplus, une des productions les plus remarquables que la photographie ait enfantées, si l'on tient compte des difficultés de l'exécution»37. Examining all three aspects named, one can see how they are also the result of Szathmari's various aesthetic interests as a painter: portraiture, battle paintings and genre scenes, as well as his great skills in social practices associated with photography and his fascination with nineteenth-century society. In this sense, his ability to re-propose these motifs as new subjects of the photographic gaze, in a context of war, can also be interpreted as a reference point for photographers who after him would dedicate an important part of their work to war photography. Considering the proximity of an artist like Roger Fenton, the most important and remembered photographer of the war, to the British crown, it is not difficult to imagine that this came to know about Szathmari's work, even if at the time of the delivery of the Romanian artist's album to Queen Victoria and the participation of it in the Universal Exhibition, Fenton had already left for the Crimea. In fact, in the Victorian court's enthusiasm for photography, the British government felt the need to send its own photographers to the Crimea as well, in order to derive the results before the Universal Exhibition ended in November 1855. Since this is also the exhibition that started the industrial development of photography, further expanding its relationship with the public, it is clear the desire on the part of the British to be the first, if not to document the conflict, to leave artistic registers of great quality and destined for posterity.
36 M. Warner Marien, Photography A Cultural History… op. cit., p. 127
37 E. Lacan, Esquisses Photographiques…, op. cit., p. 165.
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While Roger Fenton worked in the Crimea between March and June 1855, Szathmari became a great celebrity during the Universal Exposition and became, first, a guest of Napoleon III in private audience in June of the same year and, in the following month, of Queen Victoria. On both occasions, the artist offered the two sovereigns his album as a gift, and on the second occasion he was awarded by the queen with a gold medal38. The visits were followed and documented by the newspaper La Lumière, revue de la photographie39, and on Fenton's return to England, both photographic works were the great protagonists of the exhibition, becoming models to follow for the most important international photographers who had been part of the exhibition and who would play a leading role as war artists in subsequent conflicts40.
2. From the reportage of C.P. Szathmari to that of R. Fenton
Although it is difficult to investigate the extent to which Szathmari's album and the codes of representations he employed during the invasion of the Danubian Principalities directly influenced the work of English photographers such as Roger Fenton, James Robertson and Felice Beato, and French photographers such as Charles Langlois and Léon Méhédin, who went to the site in order to make their own photographic reportages41, it is essential to consider some points in common with these important artists, especially with Roger Fenton, whose task, in the service of Queen Victoria's government, consists, in addition to improving the hostile attitude of the English public towards the conflict, in confronting and in many ways overcoming the work carried out by his Romanian colleague.
Before Fenton's arrival, the British crown had already sent some photographers to crimea. One of the first to hold this position was a photographer named Gilbert Elliott, who in early 1854, made callotypes of
38 E. Lacan, La Lumière, revue de la photographie, Samedi 29 juillet 1853, année 23, p. 118.
39 E. Lacan, La Lumière, revue de la photographie, Samedi 9 juin 1853,
année 23, p. 89.
40 Szathmari's photographic work can be consulted online on the website of the Romanian Academy Library: https://biblacad.ro/catonline.html?fbclid=IwAR3SvUx65JZEZ4sDKYa2TMHY4esnq mvW5ZrmKNmRMJyKmr6XmI3DG1gnNOE
41 B. A. Henisch & H. K. Henisch, «James Robertson and his Crimean War Campaign», History of Photography, 26/4, 2002, pp. 258–268.
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Russian fortresses, in order to measure the defensive strategies and weapons of which the tsar's military forces were provided, in order to organize the plans of attack. Along with Elliott, two British soldiers named Brandon and Dawson were appointed photojournalists, who, prepared in a hasty manner by the expert photographer Jonh Jabez Edwin Mayall, were not able to create good quality images. Finally there was the unfortunate Richard Nicklin, who, unlike Brandon and Dawson, was a photographer by profession, but his equipment and callotypes drowned with him in the port of Balaclava, during the storm of November 14, 1854.
The Nicklin incident gave the final impetus for Fenton to sail for the Crimea aboard the Hecla in February 1855, travelling under royal patronage and with the assistance of the British government. Roger Fenton's choice for the post was well deserved. In addition to his knowledge of photographic art, he was a fellow of the Royal Academy and first secretary of the Royal Photograghipc Society, founded in 1853. In 1852, he had also stayed in Russia to document the construction of a suspension bridge over the Dnieper River in Kiev, Ukraine. So both from a technical and political point of view, he was the most suitable artist to document with the camera the events in Crimea.
From the point of view of the unfolding of the conflict within public opinion, the arrival of Roger Fenton in Sevastopol coincided with one of the most critical moments. To the carnage that turned out to be the battle of the Alma, beyond the eventual victory of the allies, were added the testimonies of the terrible sufferings of the sick at the front. More men died in hospitals from infectious diseases and cholera than from wounds in battle. To this were added the poor conditions and the lack of preparation of the British to face the winter of 1854-5542.
In this way towards the end of winter and the beginning of spring 1855, Fenton was faced with a great political-iconographic challenge. Proof of this is that since his arrival he had numerous opportunities to photograph the dead and wounded. In fact, among the victims of the fighting was his brother-in-law, Edmund Maynard, but the Crimean photojournalist decided not to make overly realistic representations from the point of view of the horrors of war. In this sense, one can think of three reasons why Fenton decided not to make this type of images. The first of all was political: with the support of the royal family and the British government, he had to help
42 S. Cavicchioli, Crimean War: National Memories and Democratization Processes, «Contemporanea», XXIV/2 (2021), pp. 177-209.
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counter, through his photographic compositions, the discrediting campaign that some media such as The Times or the satirical newspaper Punch had carried out. The second, concerned a commercial motivation, since Fenton also counted on the financial support of a publisher, Thomas Agnew, who hoped to publish the set of photos and put it up for sale, and for this reason there was a need to make a series of images that depicted a more romanticized version of the conflict; among other things, because in this task he had to surpass in terms of quality and composition of the images the work done by Szathmari. As a result, in addition to the five photographs of the cemeteries in Sevastopol and the elaborate scene in which a foodie and a Turkish soldier recreate the moment of assistance to the wounded, Fenton avoided any form of re-enactment of suffering and death, such and as Szathmari himself had done at the beginning of the conflict.
On the basis of these premises, Fenton's aesthetic choices are even more important, which helped to consolidate a real aesthetic of war photographs, already begun by Szathmari and which focused on four types of subjects and scenes: portraits of the leading figures of the Allies, landscapes and views, group photographs, and finally, compositions on the daily activities of soldiers or some individuals that may be of interest to the public. All four elements in common with the registers made by Szathmari and similar to the sensitivity of nineteenth-century spectators. The first three were part of the existing iconographic genres; the last category, on the other hand, adapted to the new sensitivity towards individual soldiers, seen as compatriots and, in some cases, to the ethnographic interest in fighters belonging to other types of cultures, such as the Zouaves, Croats, Turks, Montenegrins or Tatars.
In establishing some points of comparison between Fenton's work and that of Szathmari, a series of similar compositions emerge between the two photographers. A clear example is the similarities between the scene of Szathmari Turkish Cavalrymen (fig.3) and photographs The Pipe of Peace43, or Reverend Mr Butler and officers of the 47th Regiment44 (fig. 5) by Fenton. As for the ethnographic interest in fighters not belonging to the
43 R. Fenton, The Pipe of Peace or 'Costume of the Camp', print on salt paper, 13.9x13.2cm, Fenton Exhibiton Catalogue, no. 2., 1856. https://www.rct.uk/collection/search#/8/collection/2500423/the-pipe-of-peace
44R. Fenton, Reverend Mr. Butler and Officers of the 47 Regiment 1855, paper on albumin, 14.4x18.9cm, Fenton Exhibiton Catalogue, no.9 1856. https://www.rct.uk/collection/search#/8/collection/2500443/reverend-mr-butler-and- officers-of-the-47th-regiment
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British or French armies, there is the photograph Group of Croat Chiefs, also published on December 29, 1855 in The Illustrated London News (fig. 6). In the newspaper's commentary on the image one can appreciate both the ethnographic interest and the continuous promotion and exaltation of Fenton's work:
CROATS AT THE SEAT OF WAR
The characteristic group engraved upon preceding page is from one of Mr. Roger Fenton’s beautiful photographs in the Crimean Exhibition. One of the most striking attractions of this collection is the great variety of national character which it presents, arising from the multiplicity of people engaged in the great war. Had the contest lain between two individual nations, the impersonations or portraitures would neither have been so varied not numerous as in the Crimean Collection, from wich we have taken several Illustration. Croats, it will be remembered, have been variously employed at the Balaclava, were vividly sketched by our Artist and Special Correspondent, in his letter at page 310 of the present volume. In the photograph her engraved is a family in the trenches; where the superior Croat has “the badge of authority – a stick”, which is mentioned in our Correspondent’s letter45.
As for the numerous portraits of political and military personalities, the works of both photographers are complementary: Szathmari created the register of the most important leading figures of the Russian and Turkish armies, Fenton instead, of the English and French ones, and as in the case of the photography of Gortschakoff (fig. 2) and the Group of Croat Chiefs many of Fenton's photographs were used by The Illustarted London News , in order to produce the illustrated chronicles of the conflict. Among the many examples is one of the photographs of General French Pierre François Joseph Bosquet (fig. 7) published later in a reportage of October 6, 1855, in which the photographer exalts, as in the entire series of shots taken of this general, his leadership. It is no coincidence that there are two famous photographs in which General Bosquet himself strives to remain still while the photographer captures the exact moment in which he gives an order (fig. 8). In the staging we appreciate the great commitment of the general and his men in maintaining the position during the realization of the photographic process46.
45 The Illustrated London News, 29 December, 1855, p.754.
46The Illustrated London News, October 6, 1855, p. 405th
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It is from this effort to produce moving images that an important difference emerges between Szathmari's photographs and Fenton's. While the former in some moments strove to reproduce very lively scenes (fig. 1), preferring the documentary character on the final result, Fenton proved to be much more careful in preferring the quality of the images and to elaborate even more calculated scenes for the purpose of winning consensus. In following Fenton's example, in subsequent conflicts photographers will avoid any effort to try to process moving images, thus leaving the task of creating the scenes full of movement: explosions, charges, hand-to-hand clashes, etc., to designers and painters.
It was then Fenton's aesthetic choices, in his effort to configure scenes suitable to earn the favor of the public and to give the greatest protagonism to the two Western allies, to bring him a step forward compared to the work of Szathmari, who had made his album taking as a starting point the origins of the conflict, then the Turkish and Russian armies. In this dynamic, Fenton had also left a large heroic register of future victors, exalting even more the collaboration between the Allied powers, as in the famous photograph depicting the council of war – the morning of the successful attack on the Mamelon – between the three great allies Lord Reglan, Marshal Pélisser and Omar Pacha, made on June 7, 1855. The aim of the photograph was to depict, in addition to the symbolic and effective union of the three great allies, the precise moment in which the decision to attack Mamelon Vert was made. The shot was actually made later, but was celebrated by Queen Victoria herself as one of Fenton's most successful photographs in which "Lord Raglan, Pélissier and Omar Pacha, sitting together on the day of the capture of Mamelon" appear (fig. 9). In addition, in his album, Fenton had celebrated the collaboration between the soldiers and the cohesion of the group, leaving some scenes of daily life in the camp, he had also exalted the nursing work and, finally, he had left a register of ruins, desolate landscapes and cemeteries, capable of evoking death and sacrifice, while avoiding the real horrors of war.
In summary, if Szathmari had left the register of the first enthusiasm for the war, Fenton had contributed through an important corpus of images to counter the great environment of pessimism and anger towards the multiple losses and sufferings experienced by the British, while he managed to bring the images produced closer to the perception of immediacy and documentary quality of information with respect to
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conflicts.47. Hence the continuous and greater exaltation of many of his contemporaries, including Ernest Lacan:
Elles ont un intérêt historique qui suffirait pour les désigner à l’attention du publie d’artiste; il voulait se rendre en Orient et reproduire, par la photographie, les grandes scènes que les premières phases de la guerre faisaient prévoir. Ce projet, il l’a exécuté ; sans s’inquiéter des fatigues, des privations et des dangers que ses amis lui prédisaient, il partit au commencement de celle année pour la Crimée, et, pendant cinq mois, il est resté devant Sébastopol, partageant la ration et la couche du soldat. Aussi, lorsqu’il revint, il y aquelques semaines, à Londres, il rapportait environ trois cents vues et portraits composant une des plus intéressantes collections que l’on puisse citer48.
In this dynamic, a final difference between Szathmari and Fenton, concerns an aspect that goes beyond their artistic work of both photographers. Although interest in Szathmari's work remained in the years following the conflict, and further copies of the album came into the hands of Emperor Franz Joseph, Tsar Alexander II and Grand Duke Charles Alexander of Saxony, the international publicity that supported Fenton's work was much more robust and systematic. Beginning with 49The Illustrated London News itself, which during the years of the conflict and in the following ones, published more photographs of Fenton than of any other English photographer of the time and claimed on several occasions his presence in Crimea as that of the greatest artist photographer who had participated in the conflict. Effort in which Fenton himself took part. One of his most famous self-congratulatory photographs, the one concerning the Photographic Van (fig. 8), later published on November 10 in The Illustrated London News and in other illustrated newspapers of the time, such as the Italian newspaper Il Fotografo50, it is a clear example of the way in which it was the artist himself who drew the way he wanted to be remembered.
47 In any case, it is essential to point out that beyond this enthusiasm shared by a part of the public, within the broader war of opinion experienced by the great allies of the Turks in the West, a mostly pessimistic and negative opinion prevailed, as well as a high general contempt for the conflict, especially in England where, unlike the control that the Second Empire maintained over the media, disheartening and unpleasant information circulated more freely..
48 E. Lacan, Esquisses Photographiques…, op. cit., pp. 98-99.
49 A.S. Ionescu, «Szathmari: from a War Photographer..., op. cit. cit., p. 83.
50 Il Fotografo, Giornale Illustrato, Milano 1855 (Year 1). The newspaper was also distributed in Tuscany, Modena, Parma and the Papal States.
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Similarly, while Szathmari's album circulated between the narrower circles of the aristocracy and the courts of powerful Europeans, the photographs of Fenton's album circulated beyond these spheres and in a broader and somewhat more popular way became part of the bourgeoisie of the most important European capitals, starting from London and Paris. As a result, although it was Szathmari who was the true pioneer of war photography in the context of the conflict between the Russian and Turkish Empires, it was Fenton's photographs and his artistic work that eclipsed this early participation and made crimean photoreportage the first photoreportage in history.51.
3. Szathmari was the first war photojournalist in history?
Of the early use of daguerreotype and calotype in relation to war events, and of the renewed interest of artists in the use of these techniques during conflicts, conceived as great historical events, are an example: the aforementioned cases of the daguerreotypes of the war between the United States and Mexico, between 1846 and 1848, the daguerreotypes of the barricades during the revolution of 1848 in France, those made by the hobbyist doctor and photographer John McCosh during the Second Anglo- Sikh War (1848-1849), the callotypes after the defense of the Roman Republic of 1849 by the photographer Stefano Lecchi and, subsequently, those of the Burmese war, even closer to the conflict in Crimea, between 1852 and 1853, always made by McCosh himself52. In fact, these conflicts dispute each other for the place among the first photoreportages in history, just as their artists dispute each other for the place of the first photojournalists in history.
But before establishing one of these photographic registers as the first war photo reportage, one must take into account the elements that during the Crimean War make the work of their war artists, starting from that of Szathmari, if not the first examples of photo reportage, certainly a very modern version of the relationship between photography, dissemination of
51 G. Cojocariu, Carol Popp De Szathmary, The First War Photo Reporter, A Pioneer Of Photojournalism, «Economics, Management and Financial Markets»; Woodside 6, N.º 2, (Jun 2011): pp. 907-915.
52 Some of these photographs are kept in the online collection of the National Army Museum in London: https://collection.nam.ac.uk/detail.php?acc=1962-04-3- 294
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news and the growing interest of the public in obtaining the news and images directly from the battlefields.
Diffusion. Regarding the relationship between the production of photographs and the diffusion of them in other visual media, such as lithographs and albums53, but above all in the illustrated newspapers able to involve a very large audience, it must be remembered that it was the conflict in Crimea «the first war in which journalists and photographers had attempted to capture events in ways that had not been possible before and which set a new pattern for reporting war»54. In volume 27 of The Illustrated London News, which includes the issues from July to December 1855, there are numerous shots taken by Roger Fenton, adapted in the London Staff through the technique of woodcut on head wood. Along with each of these images is the text that explains Fenton's work and the importance of the character depicted. After that, some of these photographs were part of the exhibition dedicated to the Wars of the Orient of the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1855.55, and in the following year an exhibition was again held in London dedicated exclusively to Fenton's work, "under the royal patronage of Her Majesty and with the approval of the commanders- in-chief", and the illustrated album of the war went on sale.56. This phenomenon is intertwined with another contemporary, namely the relationship between the illustrated means and the telegraph, a communication tool that from the beginning of the war, after a few months, significantly improved the speed in circulating the news, giving that sense of immediacy of information, which until now had never existed.
During the Crimean War the news traveled even faster, thanks to the telegraph lines built from time to time to connect the zones of the fighting to the European capitals. At the beginning of the Crimean
53 M. Bianchi (curated by), Arte e arti. Pittura, engraving and photography in the nineteenth century, Milano, Skira, 2020.
54 Janina Struk, Private Pictures Soldiers’ Inside View of War, London, Routledge, 2011, p. 41.
55 Ernest Lacan, Esquisses Photographiques a propos de l’Exposition
Universel et de la guerre d’Orient, Paris, Grassart, 1856.
56Exhibition of the Photographic Pictures taken in The Crimea, by Roger Fenton-Under the especial patronage of her MOST GRACIOUS MAJESTY and with the sanction of the Commanders-in-Chief, The Gallery, 53, Pall Mall, printed for Thomas Agnew and Sons, 1856. Royal Collection Trust.
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campaign the quickest news could reach London in five days: two for the crossing on steamboats in Balaklava in Varna, three to arrive with messengers on horseback to Bucharest, the nearest telegraph station. From the winter of 1854, after the French built a telegraph in Varna, a news could reach its destination in two days; at the end of April 1855, when the British laid a submarine cable between Balaklava and Varna, the information arrived in London in a few hours57.
The relationship between photographs and the public. The numerous formats and public spaces in which the photographs circulated, not only of Fenton, but also of the various English and French photographers, contributed, on the one hand, to the increase in public interest, and on the other, to configure their memories. In addition, he conditioned the attitude of viewers towards clichés, directing their gaze towards the understanding of every single photograph as a faithful copy of reality and what happened. This helped to affirm photography as an "autonomous visual support with extraordinary power in evoking vague and powerful expectations of progress and in dynamizing the processes of industrialization, commercialization and massification of visual consumption.»58.
In this context it is important to underline that the Universal Exhibition of 1855 was an opportunity for the most important American and European photographers to present their works and to confront the singularity and novelty of the photographs of Szathmari and Fenton, including Jean Batiste Louis Gros, Gustave Le Gray and André Adolphe Eugène Disdéri59. Among them, also the French, rooted at that time in Italy, Alphonse Bernoud60; the
57 Although, as Figes himself observes, "the telegraphs were intended for military use; journalists were not allowed to clog the lines with long reports, so a time interval was created between the receipt of the titles of a report, which arrived in the editorial office by cable, and the complete reportage, which would arrive by steamship. This often caused fake news». O. Figes, Crimea…, op. cit., pp. 316- 317.
58 G.L. Fruci, A. Petrizzo, Visuality and great media transformation in the long nineteenth century, in V. Fiorino, G.L. Fruci, A. Petrizzo (eds.), Il lungo Ottocento e le sue immagini, Politica, media, spettacolo, Pisa, Edizioni ETS, 2013, p. 12.
59 Ernest Lacan, Esquisses Photographiques…, op. cit., p. 43.
60 Ivi, p. 146
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Italians Pietro Dovizielli and the Alinari brothers61; finally, the American photographer Levi Hill62.
In this way, the English and French illustrated newspapers, spread throughout much of Europe, and the first exhibitions, soon revealed themselves as fundamental spaces in which photographs circulated and artists exchanged forms of observing reality through the lens. A set of elements articulated in this way is not traceable in previous conflicts. As for the war between the United States and Mexico, some sources report an anonymous photographer who managed to shoot a series of fifty daguerreotypes covering a wide range of subjects, from portraits of generals and infantrymen to landscapes and scenes of places intended for the burial of the dead after the fighting. Some of these images are available in the Amon Carter Museum of American Art, such as that of the General Wool and staff in the Calle Real in Saltillo, Mexico, where you can see the effort by the photographer to capture moving images63. But in any case, it is difficult to know the degree of circulation of these daguerreotypes, since there are no records of additional lithographs or lithographic albums, in which they may have been disseminated. In addition, the first American illustrated newspapers such as the Frank Leslies Illustrated News Paper and Harper's Weekly Journal of Civilization, date back to 1855 and 1857 respectively, thus restricting the possibilities of circulation of these photographs. A similar case was that of the callotypes concerning the Second Anglo-Sikh War (1848-1849) and the Burmese War (1852-53), whose images once made by McCosh, did not have a great circulation either in other formats, or in illustrated newspapers, remaining as silent iconographic vestiges and subsequently as important visual registers of a documentary nature.
On the other hand, there are the photographs in Rome in 1849 made by Stefano Lecchi, a pupil of Daguerre, and which circulated in some lithographic albums. Among these, the one composed of the "forty-one salted cards bound in an album and originally belonging to Edward
61 Ivi, p. 108.
62 Ivi, p. 52.
63 S. Oliver Debroise, Mexican Suite: A History of Photography in Mexico, Texas, University of Texas Press, 2001, p. 164.
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Cheney»64. In general terms, however, "there are no precise data on the number of photographs that made up the reportage nor on their diffusion and their economic evaluation: only a few but significant indications on the circulation of these images in a precise Garibaldian context thanks to the memory of Jessie White Mario and thanks to the discovery of the photographs that belonged to two men of '49: Agostino Bertani and Alessandro Calandrelli»65.
Indeed, Lecchi's photographs were taken in the aftermath of the fall of Rome, on July 3, in such a way that rather than making a widespread reportage during the conflict, he notes the intention to keep the consequences in light through the ruins and to leave a testimony of what was the defense of the republic66, unlike the daguerreotypes in the aftermath ofthibault's barricades perceived, by the many people who had in their hands the July 1, 1848 edition of L'Illustration Journal Universel, as a more immediate account of what happened67. So, more than in the genre of reportage, and beyond the documentary ambitions, these images are then part of those first efforts that would have shaped the ways of recording the war and interacting with the public only after the events that involved first Szathmari and then Fenton to take the role of the first war photojournalists in history. Szathmari was the first to elaborate an accurate collection of photographs, the circulation of his album during the following years and his participation in the Universal Exposition had that impact on the public of immediacy and storytelling in real time. Fenton, completed that work in the
64 M.P. Critelli, «Roma 1849: Stefano Lecchi The first war reportage", Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Tourism Activities, Library of Modern and Contemporary History, The Getty Research Institute, in: https://www.movio.beniculturali.it/bsmc/stefanolecchi/it/22/il-reportage.
65 Ibid.
66 C. Bertolotti, «The ruins of the Republic. Reportage, view and religion of the tombs", Mélanges de l'École française de Rome - Italie et Méditerranée modernes et contemporaines, 130-1, 2018, pp. 97-104. In this article readers will also find the numerous iconographic documents made with the occasion of the defense of Rome, the motif of the "ruins of Rome" made in the aftermath of the end of the republican experience, and the subsequent multiplicity of iconographic devices made after 1870 that connected that past with the present of the new pan- Italian political reality.
67 M. Pizzo, «Risorgimento ruins: images of the Rome of the 1849», in https://stage.modaliamedia.it/gds/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/05_PIZZO-Rovine- risorgimentali-immagini-della-Roma-del-1849.pdf
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Crimea and through the dissemination of his photographs on the pages of European illustrated newspapers, as well as on the various photographic exhibitions that contributed, moreover, in the following years, to configure the memory of the conflict, especially among the English public and French of the second half of the nineteenth century.
Hernán Rodríguez Vargas - PhD in Literary, Linguistic and Historical Studies of the University of Salerno. Colombian lecturer trained at the Pontifical Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá, where he completed two degree courses and a master’s degree course. He graduated in Philosophy (2013) and literature (2014). He then obtained a master’s degree degree in History (2016) and the thesis was published in April 2018. The book Siete Mitos de la Independencia de la Nueva Granada (Editorial Javeriana) is being published. He is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the Italian Institute for Historical Studies Benedetto Croce.
Figure 2. The Illustrated London News, «Prince Gortschakoff commander in chief of the Russian army in Crimea-from a photograph by M. Szathmari» novembre 3, 1855, p. 528.
Figure 5. Royer Fenton, Reverend Mr Butler and officers of the 47th Regiment, carta su albumina, 14.4x18.9cm. Fenton exhibition catalogue, no. 38, 1855.
London, Royal Collection Trust. https://www.rct.uk/collection/search#/8/collection/2500443/reverend-mr-butler-and- officers-of-the-47th-regiment
Figure 4. Carol Pop Szathmari, Tranchtengruppe in Campulung, 1866, carta su albumina,29.7x36.4cm, Colonia, Agfa Photo Historama, http://www.zeno.org/Fotografien/A/Szathmari,+Carol
Figure 6. A sinistra: Royer Fenton, Group of Croat Chiefs, carta su albumina, 19.3x15.6cm. Fenton exhibition catalogue, 1855. London, Royal Collection Trust. A destra: The Illustrated London News,
«Croats» 29 dicembre 1855, p.754.
Figure 7. The Illustrated London News,
«General Bosquet-From the Exhibition of Photographic Pictures Taken in Crimea, By Roger Fenton» 6 ottobre1855, p. 528
Figura 8. Roger Fenton, General Bosquet giving orders to his staff, 1855, carta su albumina, 15.8x15.5cm, London, Royal Collection Trust.
https://www.rct.uk/group/421/content/collections/photographs-collection/record-of- historical-events/general-bosquet-1
Figure 9. Royer Feton, Council of War held at Lord Raglan's Headquarters the morning of the successful attack on the Mamelon, carta su albumina, 14.4x18.9cm. Fenton exhibition catalogue, 6 giugno 1855. London, Royal
Collection Trust. https://www.rct.uk/collection/themes/exhibitions/roger-fentons- photographs-of-the-crimea/the-queens-gallery-buckingham-palace/council-of-war- held-at-lord-raglans-headquarters-the-morning-of-the-
Figure 10. Royer Feton, Photographic Van, carta su albumina, 17.4x15.9cm.
Fenton exhibition catalogue, 1855. London, Royal Collection Trust.
https://www.rct.uk/collection/2500439/photographic-van
UN POINT D’HISTOIRE VÉCUE,
DANS SOCIETAS ACADEMICA DACOROMANA,
ACTA HISTORICA, TOMUS I, 1959
Nicolae PETRESCU-COMNEN
Abstract: This article represents the presentation of a text written by Nicolae Petrescu-Comnen, diplomat, politician and sociologist. To highlight the nuances and preserve the author's unmistakable style, the editorial board of the publication decided to deviate a little from the established rules, and publish the original text, in French, so that the discerning reader can extract the details and savor every word of the content. The text is accompanied by images of the original article, courtesy of university professor Dr. Viorica Moisuc. It is a unique documentary treasure, to which the general public has not had access until now.
Nicolae Petrescu-Comnen (1881-1958), specialist in law, diplomat, Romanian politician. During the years of the First World War, he campaigned in Switzerland for the Romanian cause (see Notes sur la guerre roumaine); collaborated with President Edvard Beneš in the Czechoslovak National Council, with leaders of the national liberation movements abroad. He participated as a delegate of Romania at the Paris Peace Conference from 1919-1921. In 1919, during his mission in Hungary, he was contacted by Count Banffy who advanced the proposal of a "dual" Romanian-Hungarian monarchy under the scepter of King Ferdinand. In diplomacy, he stood out for his special qualities as a negotiator, analyst, clairvoyant, always animated by strong feelings for his country. In an official mission in Germany in the years 1927-1937, a period of affirmation of the far-right movement, National Socialism (Nazism), he worked for Romania's interests in terms of economic, political and diplomatic relations with Germany. It is worth noting the attention he gave to counteracting, through the means at his disposal, the support given by Nazi Germany to the Iron Guard, personally to Corneliu Zelea-Codreanu and other guards leaders.
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After the Anschluss (annexation of Austria to Germany), he was appointed Foreign Minister. He dominated through his actions, his personality, his firmness, the policy of stopping the Nazi offensive against Czechoslovakia, of mutilating the territory of this country, considering that maintaining the independent and sovereign Czechoslovak State, with untouched borders, is an imperative for stability, security and peace in the Center and South-Eastern Europe is an imperative for the peace of the continent, threatened by the revisionism and imperialism of Nazi Germany and its allies. This major objective of that time led him to carry out a diplomatic activity of unusual strength for the observance by France, England, the USSR of the obligations assumed by them through the Covenant of the League of Nations which, through articles 10 and 16, obliged its members to the mutual respect of the territorial status quo and the solidarity assistance of the member state that would have become a victim of an aggression by any state.
Apart from the revisionist and revanchist states, the other European states, including the USSR, had signed the London Convention of July 3 and 4, 1933 defining aggression and territory, the Briand-Kellogg Pact outlawing war, many other treaties and bilateral and multilateral conventions that included clearly defined obligations of political, diplomatic, military assistance of Czechoslovakia in case of threat of force or use of Force. The policy of releasing the great powers - France, England, USSR, USA - from all existing contractual commitments and abandoning this state to aggressive German, Hungarian and Polish plans, was harshly sanctioned by Romania through the voice of Petrescu¬-Comnen, the official statements of the king Carol II, by the Romanian press, by public opinion.
As proven by countless documents of the era - diplomatic, memorial, historiographical, journalistic -, Romania was then the only country that supported Czechoslovakia, beyond all its official commitments. After the abolition of this state by the German-Hungarian coup of March 15, 1939, Romania sheltered thousands of refugees from Czechoslovakia on its territory, which caused a serious crisis in relations with Germany and Hungary. The troops massed at the western border and the ultimate pressures of the Reich determined the signing of the economic treaty with Germany that had been being negotiated for months in Bucharest, the Romanian side delaying the works to avoid this act that seriously affects the interests of the country. Anyway, the treaty signed on March 23, 1939, was not applied, the prime minister, Armand Călinescu and the new foreign
36
minister, Grigore Gafencu, considering that the signing, which took place under the mentioned conditions, was "a diplomatic act" to remove the danger of aggression from the Western border (on March 20, partial mobilization was decreed in Romania, given the gravity of the situation). In the period that followed, Grigore Gafencu continued the foreign policy line of his predecessor; the combined German-Soviet attack (September 1 and 17, 1939) against Poland and the dissolution of this state posed new and serious problems for Romania.
In January 1939 Petrescu-Comnen was appointed ambassador to Rome; the last period of his life was spent abroad, together with other Romanian diplomats, such as Viorel Tilea, (former minister of Romania in London during the same period of the Czechoslovak crisis). Grigore Gafencu (his last position in diplomacy was as minister of Romania in Moscow - after May 1940) and many others.
Attentive to the evolution of the situation in Romania, Nicolae Petrescu-Comnen remained the same person dedicated to the interests of his country, harshly criticizing the abuses and policies of the new regime established by the Soviet occupier. From this period date his works of recent history such as Preludi del grande dramma, I Responsabili... and others.
The present study, published in 1959 in Rome, demonstrates once more the deep attachment for his country, for respecting the historical truth, against the denigration of Romania by the acolytes of the new pro-Soviet regime.
I add at the end of this short note about the Romanian diplomat Nicolae Petrescu¬-Comnen, two pieces of information:
1 / After the "dark decade of the 1950s" - which actually lasted until after the "Declaration of April 1964", when there was a certain "liberation" from the tutelage of the Soviet culturalists, of the pro-Soviet Roller's line in historiography, the first book published by Romanian Academy Publishing House in which the Czechoslovak crisis was analyzed based on documents, highlighting the truth about Romania's diplomatic action to support this country, the prodigious activity of Petrescu-Comnen, as well as the situation of Romanian-German economic relations, the economic treaty of March 23, 1939 and its consequences, was Romania's Diplomacy and the problem of defending national sovereignty and independence in the period March 1938 - May 1940, Academy Ed., 1971, 324 pages. The book, written by the undersigned, was blocked by the censorship (still dominated
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by "illegals" and polytricks) for a year, it was published with great difficulty, the circulation was only put on sale to a small extent; the book was sold after about ten years at a "reduced price" on the street corner. In the meantime, she had been awarded the "Nicolae Bălcescu" award by the Romanian Academy.
2 / In conditions of "revival" of the defeatist line in Romanian historiography, denigration of the historical past, labeling of nationalism and patriotism as variants of chauvinism and products of "nostalgia" for the times gone by in 1989, I managed to create the only volume of diplomatic documents dedicated to the Czechoslovak crisis and the activity of Romanian diplomacy, but the immensity of the documentary material collected not only from the Romanian archives, but also from those of France, Germany, England, etc., only allowed me to present the events of September 1938. And this volume of documents was pursued by the unfortunate excessive politicization of history, so that it became, from the very beginning, a "rare book": Romania and the Czechoslovakian crisis. Documents, September 1938, Historia, Bucharest, 2010 (820 p.).
Viorica Moisuc June 2021, Curtea-de-Argeş
Footnotes to N. P. Comnen's article – Un point d'histoire vécue.
I have included in the Appendix all the notes, specifying which ones belong to Comnen himself.
Endnotes
1. Orenstein – Benditer Janeta, born Botoşani, March 12, 1917; member of Romanian Communist Party since 1944. Arrested and deported to several labor camps for political prisoners. Professor at the University "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" from Iasi, Faculty of History. Author and co-author of works and studies on the history of Romania and universal history in the Soviet vision.
2. The 1950s constitute the saddest and darkest period of Romanian historiography. Dominated by the pro-Soviet orientation represented by Mihail Roller's "school", Romania's history was falsified, distorted, so that theses such as Romanian "imperialism", the "aggressiveness" of Romania's foreign policy, its anti- Soviet character, the exploitation and discrimination of "cohabiting nationalities ", the "multinational" character of the Romanian state and everything that derives from these theses, were supported in a large number of works, elaborated not by specialists, but by tehnicians, such as J. Benditer, Angara Fedotova Niri, Maia Kertesz, Nicolae Goldberger, Vasile Liveanu Olivenbaum and others. During this time, the Universities experienced the action of "purging" Romanian scientists, prestigious specialists (many of them arrested, interned in labour camps, sent to the famous "Danube – Black Sea Canal", or in prisons where many died) who were replaced by all kinds of "illegals", polytricks, uneducated people brought in - it is not known from where.
3. Léon Noël (1888–1987), French diplomat. High Commissioner of France in the Rhineland (demilitarized zone under the provisions of the Versailles Peace Treaty with Germany). Minister Plenipotentiary in Prague (1932–1935), ambassador in Warsaw (1935–1940). Member of the French Academy.
4. André François Poncet (1887–1978), French diplomat. After the war, he represented France in the International Economic Mission in the USA. Delegate of France to the League of Nations. Ambassador to Germany (1931–1938). Arrested by the Gestapo during the occupation and imprisoned for three years. Commissioner of France in Germany (1949–1955). Member of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences.
5. Georges Étienne Bonnet (1889–1973), French politician, leader of the Radical Socialist Party. Minister in several cabinets. In April 1938 he was appointed foreign minister by the new prime minister Ed. Daladier. Involved in the Czechoslovak political crisis, Bonnet promoted and supported a policy of disengagement of France from its contractual obligations to help Czechoslovakia in case of aggression. He accepted the mutilation of the territory of this country in favor of Nazi Germany, being co-author, along with Daladier, of the Munich Dictatorship of September 30, 1938. He was investigated after the war within the Commission established to analyze the foreign policy of France in those years.
6. J. Toynbee, The crisis over Czechoslovakia, Oxford University Press, London, New York, Toronto, 1951. (Note Comnen)
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7. Edward Beneš (1884–1948), Czechoslovak politician. Leader of the liberation movement of the Czechs and Slovaks, he collaborated with Take Ionescu, the president of the Romanian National Committee based in Paris, as well as with the other leaders of the subjugated nations of Austria-Hungary. Involved in the 1919 war against the Hungarian Red Army. Minister of Foreign Affairs, he signed the bilateral treaties with the Kingdom of Serbo-Croatian-Slovenian and with the Kingdom of Romania - treaties that formed the basis of the establishment of the Little Entente. President of the Republic 1935-1938.
8. Ferdinand Veverka, Czechoslovak diplomat, minister plenipotentiary in Bucharest. He signed the bilateral treaty with Take Ionescu in 1921.
9. Vojtech Mastny, Minister of Czechoslovakia in Berlin. See N.P. Comnen, Anarchie, Dictature ou Organization Internationale, Genève, 1946, Perret-Gentil, p. 127 et suiv.; Sugggerimenti per la pace, Milano, Bompiani, p. 128 et suiv.; Preludes del grande dramma, Rome, Sansoni, 1947, p. 212, 215 et suiv.
10. Kamil Krofta (1876–1945) Czechoslovak historian, politician and diplomat, as foreign minister during the political crisis of 1938-1939, supported President Beneš in the defense of his country against Nazi and Horthy aggression. He collaborated closely with Romania. Among his works: Short History of Czechoslovakia, Czechoslovakia and the Little Understanding, Hungarian Revisionism, etc.
11. Halifax (Edward Frederick Lindley Wood, Viscount of) (1881–1951), British politician. Viceroy of India, Foreign Minister in N. Chamberlain's cabinet. He promoted and supported the "appeasement" policy, translated into the sacrifice of Czechoslovakia to "safeguard" peace in the West.
12. Wilhelm August Julius Fabricius (1882–1964), jurist, German diplomat. He represented Germany in various capitals. In the years 1936 - December 1940 he was minister plenipotentiary in Bucharest.
13. Adrien Thierry (1885–1961), French diplomat. Minister Plenipotentiary in Romania during the Czechoslovak crisis 1938–1939. He demonstrated against the conciliatory policy promoted by Bonnet. He collaborated with the foreign minister N. Petrescu-Comnen in diplomatic actions to support Czechoslovakia.
14. Cf. mes. Preludi del grande dramma.., p. 55-56. (Comnen's Note)
15. Idem, p. 57. Voir aussi Georges Bonnet, De Washington au Quai d'Orsay (Comnen's Note)
16. Cf. Georges Bonnet, de Washington au Quai d'Orsay, Genève, Bourquin, 1946, p.126 et suiv. Idem, La politique extérieure de la France en 1838-1939, Milano, Angelicus, p. 9 et 15. Ainsi que mes Responsabili... p. 24, 26 et suiv. (Comnen's Note)
17. Raoul Bossy (1894–1975), jurist, career diplomat. Minister Plenipotentiary in Helsinki, Budapest (1936–1939), Rome, Bern, Berlin, Copenhagen, etc. After 1943 he took refuge in Switzerland. He published numerous works on the history of Romania, the history of international relations and diplomacy. As a minister in Budapest during the Czechoslovak crisis, he collaborated closely with Foreign
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Minister Comnen to counter the aggressive policy of Horthy Hungary against Czechoslovakia and Romania. He was one of the most brilliant Romanian diplomats from the interwar period.
18. The draft of this treaty proposed by Hungary to Romania and Yugoslavia had the purpose of isolating Czechoslovakia from its allies. Neither Romania nor Yugoslavia followed through on this offer.
19. Voir a ce sujet les citations publiées dans mon livre Anarchie, Dictature ou Organisation Internationale, Genève, Perret-Gentil, 1946, p. 128. (Comnen's Note)
20. Lord Walter Runciman's "mission" to Czechoslovakia, in the midst of a political crisis, initiated by London and Paris, had the stated purpose of "mediating" the conflict between the government in Prague and the German minority in the Sudetenland. In fact, it was about new and strong pressures on President Beneš and the government to accept the demands of the Sudeten Germans, that is, the dismemberment of the territory of Czechoslovakia.
21. J. Paul-Boncour (1899–1986), law specialist, politician and French diplomat. Deputy from 1909, then senator, he got involved in foreign policy and international relations. A formidable orator. Member of several cabinets, minister of foreign affairs, he promoted and supported the collective security policy as well as France's participation in bilateral and multilateral alliances to stop the revisionist and revenge policy of Nazi Germany. He was replaced at the Quai d'Orsay, in April 1938, by Georges Bonnet, the follower of the "appeasement" policy, in the government led by Ed. Daladier.
22. Edouard Herriot (1872–1957), French leftist politician. Entered politics in 1919. Prime Minister in 1924-1925. In 1940 he was arrested by the Gestapo and deported to Germany (1942–1945).
23. Joseph Beck, colonel (1894–1957), Polish politician. In 1930 he became head of Foreign Affairs, leading Poland's diplomacy until 1939. Raising territorial claims against Czechoslovakia (Teschen region), Poland did not accept collaboration with the Little Entente. Through his policy, Beck tried to keep the balance between Germany and the USSR, concluding a non-aggression treaty with the eastern neighbor in 1932 and, in 1934, accepting a declaration to the same effect from Germany. Beck believed that through these documents, Poland's security is ensured from those two dangerous neighbors. Taking advantage of the Czechoslovakian crisis, Beck joined with Hungary to acquire the claimed region. In November 1938, Hitler and Mussolini won the territorial claims of Hungary and Poland. The attack of Nazi Germany and the USSR on Poland on September 1 and 17, 1939, respectively, resulted in the division of this country between the two invaders and the erasure of the third independent and sovereign state from the map of Europe. The Polish government, led by the President of the Republic, Ignacy Mosciki, as well as the army and a large number of civilians took refuge in Romania.
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24. Milan Stojadinovič (1888–1951), Yugoslav politician. Prime Minister in 1935–1939 and Minister of Foreign Affairs. With pro-German views, Stojadinovič distanced himself from France and the allies of the Little Entente and the Balkan Entente, concluding, in 1937, treaties of "eternal" friendship with Italy and Bulgaria. Stojadinovič was dismissed from his position by Regent Paul and exiled to the British colony of Mauritius.
25. Richard Franassovici (1883–1964), law specialist, Romanian diplomat. Collaborator of Ion I.C. Brătianu. He represented Romania in different countries. In 1938-1939, as minister plenipotentiary in Warsaw, he carried out a sustained action to convince Beck not to join the Horthyist Hungary's game of attacking Czechoslovakia. In 1947 he settled in France.
26. Cf. I Preludi ... p. 212, 215, note officielle du 3 octobre 1938. (Comnen's
Note)
27. Il en était de même la France, qui fut obligée plus d’une fois de faire de
remontrances à Varsovie. Cfr. à de sujet les Mémoires de l’ambassadeur Léon Noël, passim. (Comnen's Note)
28. Cfr. I Preludi … p. 216. (Comnen's Note)
29. Voir aussi, entre autres, les articles de l’ancien ambassadeur de France,
M. Thierry, dans „Le Monde” du 18 nov. et 11 déc. 1947. (Comnen's Note)
30. Pour plus de détails, voir mon article L’entrevue de Galatzi, dans „Les Écrits de Paris”, no. 44, Juin 1948, p. 30 et suiv., ainsi que mes I Responsabili …,
p. 298. Cfr. aussi les très importants articles publiés par „L’indépendance Roumaine” du 21 octobre 1938, par „Universul” de Bucarest du 22 oct., et ceux parus entre 22 et 24 octobre dans „Viitorul” , le „Neamul Românesc”, le „Prager Presse”, „Le Temps”, „Le Figaro” , le „Times”, „Daily Telegraph” etc. (Comnen's Note)
31. Cfr. I Preludi... p. 363 (Comnen's Note)
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150 YEARS SINCE THE BIRTH OF POLISH MARSHAL JÓZEF PIŁSUDSKI
(Part II)
Andrzej DUBICKI Associate professor, University of Łodz, Poland
Marshal Piłsudski was one of those people who, giving everything to his people, rises above what is the special essence of a nation and thus integrates into the vastness of humanity.
Nicolae Iorga, May 1935
Abstract: Part two of an extremely well-documented and exciting study of the life and political work of the great statesman Józef Piłsudski. Certainly, due to the unfortunate historical situation in which the second great world conflagration ended, from 1945 to 1989, neither in Warsaw nor in Bucharest about Pilsudski and the Romanian-Polish alliance was spoken much too little or biased. This, especially for fear of disturbing the "big brother" of the East, it is known that from his youth Tsarist Russia had punished the young Pilsudski with exile in Siberia. Analyzing his activity today, we can easily conclude that Piłsudski was the one who fully contributed to the building of close, mutually beneficial Romanian-Polish relations. We can say with certainty that even so far the fundamental documents in the archives, libraries and newspapers have not been highlighted on the subject.
The new head of foreign affairs on the Polish side
On July 22, 1920, after the portfolio of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was occupied by Take Ionescu, a politician with rich experience and well trained, Alexandru G. Florescu reports to him how: "The armistice conditions set by Mr. Lloyd George, as a result of the intervention of Poland in addition to the Supreme Council, produced here an impression of stupefaction and special irritation. The line of withdrawal that was imposed on Poland is the one that had been established by the Supreme Council since December 8, 1919 and in which the Allies allowed Poland to establish its administration (...) The armistice also provided for an area of 50 km.
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between both armies in a word along this line, but only up to the border of Eastern Galicia".
Florescu also informed his superior that in Warsaw it was considered that England - everywhere else - was decidedly hostile to Poland. A conference was to be convened in London to examine the Russian question in its entirety with delegates from Finland, Latvia, Lithuania and Galician envoys listened as informants.
In case of non-acceptance of the terms of the armistice by the Soviets, the Allies declared themselves obliged to come to the aid of Poland.
I mentioned above the impression of amazement and irritation caused by these conditions - mentioned the Romanian diplomat. The start against England was still huge. England at Gdantzig, England in Eastern Galicia, England in Lithuania, England seeking to thwart Poland's attempts to go hand in hand at the Warsaw Conference with Finland and Latvia, England not quite partial in the plebiscites in Warmia and Masuria, England lifting the blockade of Russia Sovietists, England being forced in the first months of the year to give advice either to conclude peace or to end the war, England not sending ammunition, England talking to Litvinov and Krasin,
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England everywhere more decidedly opposed to Poland came this time with proposals of truce unbearable for the pride and aspirations of the Poles.
All of the above raised a great and justified concern for the minister plenipotentiary Al. Florescu. Those opinions, he said to the Bucharesters with some anxiety, but in time, must have been retained by Take Ionescu, who will realize, even better, the dangerous dimension of Bolshevism in this area and will pronounce without any ambiguity on the side Poland. This time in the direct dialogue he had in London a short while ago. At the same time, all the elements that Florescu learned from his counterparts quickly arrived in the country, where the Romanian leaders learned from this source that France, having to recognize the Soviets, had not accepted the proposal of Mr. Lloyd George, but still he had taken part and rallied in its elaboration.
"Poland was thus considered completely without support"
The respective state of affairs made Romania's intentions count in Warsaw, where they wanted their intentions to be known. Florescu wrote that there would be "many of those - politicians and people from society - who seek to touch us on Romania's intentions, to show the danger of Bolshevism for the whole of humanity, but especially for the immediate neighbors of the anarchic outbreak and keep asking us with a pained voice why don't we come to their aid". He also recalls that: "you could feel discouragement and hopelessness everywhere", which overwhelmed the Poles. The description of these facts, before the decisions that will be taken in Spa regarding Poland, helped Take Ionescu to formulate Romania's position - understandably favorable to Warsaw - and for the implementation of which he asks Titulescu to act as such on the spot, where he is.
The Romanian diplomat also reported to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that in Warsaw there were three currents that manifested themselves in the press and in the Diet: "some -- the extreme left -- (who) preferred direct negotiations with the Soviets; those on the right maintained their opinion of entrusted everything to the fate of the Allies, approving Grabski's approach, they also admitted accepting the conditions -- and between these two currents, the strongest manifestation was the rejection of the conditions and continuation of the fight to the extreme".
"The blow was very painful for those who dreamed of the borders of 1772 and who suddenly woke up with the headlands of the Niemen, the
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Bug and the Zbrucz! And despite all this, with all the expressed desire to reject England's proposals, if would have penetrated into everyone's soul, most would have discovered the secret hope of a swift acceptance by the Soviets of the conditions, in order to avoid the advance of the Red armies, to save Warsaw from the occupation of the enemy and Poland from Bolshevism".
Blame for the defeat of the Polish armies
It did not throw himself on the insufficiency of the Command, on the decrease in morale of the fighters, but on England, which had dared to propose such conditions, and on Mr. Grabski, who had not been shy to accept them.
"Prince Sapieha gave the press the order not to attack England and (the) Allies from whom, thanks to a more moderate attitude, perhaps better peace conditions could be expected at the London Conference. Some newspapers presented the terms of the armistice more as simple military stipulations, which would not prejudice the final part, and demanded that the political parties and public opinion show decency, in order to be able to usefully influence, through this testimony of political maturity, the decisions of the Great Powers".
"However, not all the newspapers observed the same moderation - noted Florescu. Mr. Lloyd George was not spared, not least the President of the Council. The attacks against Mr. Grabski were as many indirect attacks against England. The President of the Council was accused of receiving terms of the armistice, had weakened Poland's situation both externally and internally. This was the argument of the left-wing newspapers, and those on the extreme left added to this accusation brought against the previous government for not having concluded the peace a few months ago, when it could have been concluded on terms better".
The right-wing forces attack the Head of State with particular vivacity
With undisguised sadness, the Romanian diplomat informed Bucharest that: "The right-wing newspapers in Poland retaliated that, if Mr. Grabski had to obey the decisions of the Allies, it was due to Mr. Piłsudski's reckless policy in Ukraine in particular. The head of state was thus attacked with a special vivacity".
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"However, time was not to be lost in sterile discussions about the past. I will not fail in a close report to seek, only as a document of retrospective policy, to establish the answers that press upon everyone in this drama that could have endangered the very existence of Poland". Amazing and rare concern for a foreigner, be he a diplomat. And here is what followed. "After a week and more of waiting, the Soviets' answer was finally known. The answer had been intercepted in Warsaw, but not quite well deciphered. At first it was believed here that it was not really the Soviets' answer, but some kind of message, as they are used sometimes to send some of the leaders of Bolshevism to the proletariat".
This time the Soviets challenge England's right to intervene as an intermediary between Poland and Russia. He challenges - at the same time
- Mr. Lloyd George's "right to speak on behalf of the League of Nations, of which Russia is not a member. He declares himself in favor of negotiating peace directly with Poland, assuring that "they will show better dispositions than the Allies, as they they will recognize more advantageous confrontations than those established in 1919 and which feel the influence of the Russian reaction". The Soviets rejected the proposal of the London Conference, the peace with Lithuania is concluded, and with Finland and Latvia it is to be concluded soon. In the given situation , Sir Horace Humbold advised the Polish Government to make a direct appeal for an armistice and peace to the Soviets. Warsaw's response was delayed not only by internal political disputes, but rather, Florescu aptly observes, because:
The old fame of Polish willpower was expected to appear
"Then the military circles still hoped for an improvement in the situation at the front. They stubbornly did not see the morale depression of the troops, the panic that had gripped some units, the insufficiency of reserves, the incompetence of the Command in some places, the lack of officers, the delay the arrival of the munitions. They did not see that even the fiery appeal of the Head of State, of the political parties, of the various associations had not produced the contingents of volunteers that the first start allowed to be glimpsed. The closer the red troops got, the less the enthusiasm. And the troops the Reds kept advancing, and they didn't advance after who knows what grueling battles, but without encountering even opposing troops in front of them. The Romanian diplomat's conclusion
- issued on that date - was that the morale was broken in the ranks of the Polish army.
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"And that's why a lot was counted - he wrote in Bucharest - on the reserves of volunteers, in order to be able to reawaken the enthusiasm and the old fame of Polish valor. During this time, Wilna, Lida, Brodno fell one after the other. The country's prominent leaders they feared that Red troops would soon pass through Lithuanian territory and attack the Poles in the rear. Well-informed foreign diplomats in Warsaw confirmed that regular Bolshevik troops had indeed entered Lithuania. The foreign chief regarded them as gangs, contradicting l the English minister accredited to Poland".
Next comes the formation of the Witos government which had in its composition the head of the socialists Daszyński, Sapieha for foreign affairs, Skulski for internal affairs, Grabski for finance plus specialists from different parties. France and England sent a diplomatic-military mission to Warsaw with the task of studying the political and military situation in Poland. The mission was composed of Lord Abernon, the English ambassador in Berlin, Mr. Henkey and General Radcliffe on the English side, and Jusserand, the French ambassador to Washington, Signon and General Weygand, Marshal Foch's Chief of Staff, on the French side. Florescu's opinion was that: Poland especially needs the makeover of its soul because: "the foreign mission, apart from emboldening the Poles and sending a warning to the Soviets, could do nothing".
Without being a trained soldier, like some of the Florești people of the last century and from which he was drawn, the Romanian diplomat considered that: "Poland needs men, ammunition, equipment, planes, tanks. And more importantly, it needs need to transform the souls of the
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fighters. Time passes and in a few days the enemy may be at the gates of Warsaw and with him Bolshevism in the line of Poland". And the golden mouth that he proved to have more than once, made everything happen soon as he predicted.
The sacred union was made - under the given conditions - around the Head of State
"A few days before, in a meeting of the National Defense Council, the Head of State, (became) the target of many passionate attacks, asked for a vote of confidence, and he got it unanimously. It is true that he would have been it is inadmissible that, in addition to the difficult problem of Poland's very existence, a presidential crisis should also occur. What happened to Dmowski under the given conditions? He withdrew from the Council and remained <aside>". Specifying the difficult situation in which Poland was internally, from which only strikes were not absent, Florescu believes that if "from the final confrontations that were expected to take place and from which she would be victorious, Bolshevism would hardly penetrate the country. With a defeated Poland, low in her pride, reawakened from her dreams of aggrandizement, this security loses its power".
In the few pages of this report, the diplomat captures the entire struggles of Polish society seen - from the inside - worth as much information as the tens of thousands of pages that were written about the prologue to the outbreak of the historic battle on the Vistula, then continued with the miracle that took place and which the Romanian diplomat lived at the highest tension. We are surprised - even today - by the foresight with which Minister Florescu (inter)saw in the person of the supreme commander the turn that he continues to give him, reporting to Bucharest that Pilsudski is the one who bore the brunt of the war of non- independence, there is a suspicion that he will be the one which will stop everything at the edge of the precipice. Nothing to take away, nothing to add in this . The words judgment. The words of the Romanian diplomat constitute a medallion to be framed, including by Polish historians, especially by those who only today find out that these thoughts were put on the page, in Warsaw, during the fiery days of July 1920, by a Romanian, wonder they are still untapped today.
Although Mr. Piłsudski has recently been the object of passionate attacks, I still believe that his presence at the head of the State will be a sign that Poland will stop on the edge of the precipice. His popularity,
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indeed very great still among the lower classes, will be able to be a strong bulwark against the dangerous currents. Very low in the upper classes, it represents for the lower ones the memories of a still recent revolutionary past and will perhaps be able to channel the unhealthy beginnings in the name of which the red armies seek to penetrate as deeply as possible into the heart of Poland1.
The desperate situation of August 1920 in Poland The enemy at the gates of Warsaw
One of Minister Florescu's credible Warsaw interlocutors was Prince Sapieha, the head of foreign affairs, to whom the Romanian diplomat appreciated, among other things, his stubborn optimism - which was not true in any way regarding the stopping of the Bolshevik attack. From the reports of the military missions in Warsaw, it appears that where the Polish troops wanted to fight, they managed to keep the enemy in place, even drive him away. Where not, they advanced. His conclusions at the time were that: "the Polish soldier is indeed good, but the officer is often weak." "The escapes from military service are very numerous and sanctions are not taken" - the report mentions.
"First the need to pass it on to others, then the need to retain as much as possible the Diplomatic Corps in Warsaw, where the situation not only internal but also of the Government - due to its special currents - forces it to
1 AMAE, Fond 71-1920, Dosare Speciale (AMAE, Fund 71-1920, Special Files) vol. 35, pp.247-250
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stay until the last moment". he gave assurances that "he will inform us of the moment from which the Government further declines its responsibility for our safety. We also find out what the atmosphere was like among the diplomats. These - in the great majority "would have liked to take shelter as soon as possible", the most lacking in courage being those of the neutral countries, the allies having concrete tasks in the communication between the governments, acted like brave men. As for Alexandru Florescu, he considered it appropriate, as a minister of a neighboring and friendly country, that his place is next to the allied heads of mission. But unlike his French, English, Italian and American colleagues, the Romanian minister not only did not have their logistics, but he did not even have a truck or a car, let alone a personal guard or his own soldiers: "like the English or the French" that he had taken as an example. And, when the French and English military missions decided to hasten the departure of the Diplomatic Corps from Warsaw, the Papal Nuncio (Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti - Pope Pius XI, from February 6, 1922 to February 10, 19392 - Pope Pius XI,
- from June 7, 1929 Sovereign of the Vatican City State until February 10, 1939, as well as the Minister of Italy (to whom Florescu felt closer), stayed further in Warsaw in order not to leave it together with the Polish government until the last moment.
"Prince Sapieha was in no hurry to facilitate the departure of the Diplomatic Corps to Posen (Poznan) due to considerations related to the situation in the government. As I had the honor to telegraph to Your Excellency, there had been talk at the beginning of the possible stay of the government in Warsaw. It was assumed that Mr. Piłsudski had whose situation has become very difficult, he might be tempted, in order to improve it, to remain in the Capital with the elements of the left and extreme left and to set up, even with the Red armies in Warsaw, a government of peasants and socialists that would be could wrest from the Bolsheviks more advantageous peace conditions".
The dangers turned out to be quite high, especially through attacks planned even by the communists themselves. "Finally, the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Finance, Railways and some services of a more scientific nature, of the Ministry of War, were moved to Posen (Poznan), the others were moved to Krakow. Among the initiated it was known that Mr. Piłsudski and Mr. Daszyński will never come to Posen, where various combinations aimed at overthrowing not only the government, but also (the) Head of
2 http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%81acina
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State were being planned. Understandably, these intentions were subordinated to the military situation."
"The conquest of Warsaw by the Bolsheviks - Alexandru G. Florescu also considered - would give Poland three governments, one communist in the Capital, another of the left and the extreme left, in Krakow, and a third more right-wing in Posen. In the latter city the foundations were laid for the formation of three divisions under the guise of the civic guard, but in reality with a purely military character, intended to defend Posnania against the Bolshevik invasion and possibly go to the aid of Warsaw, intended to defend perhaps other purposes as well. Dmowski who for a long time in Posen he was at the head of the movement to overthrow both the government and Piłsudski".
In contact with the head of the opposition, he allegedly told Florescu: "Quand nous aurons fini avec les bolschevistes, il faudra balayer totute la maison". To the reply of the Romanian diplomat that such a move would be dangerous, that it would shake Poland's situation even more and would perhaps delay the process of achieving Polish unity, Dmowski insisted: "Il faut absolument balayer la maison", a measure considered by Florescu a kind "delenda Carthago". In Dmowski's eyes, the Head of State was burdened with all the sins of Israel. In the sense that he would not be a perfect friend of the Allies because he looks at them through the prism of his hatred against Russia, that he would also be a partisan of the rapprochement policy between Poland and Hungary, respectively that he manifested himself as a protagonist of more extreme ideas in internal politics, that he would not have collaborated well with the French, etc.
Florescu did not hesitate to consider that "some of these accusations" would be accurate. And he refers to: "The resistance to give more effective leadership to the French officers, and that it contributed much to the disaster of the Polish armies. What a capable command means can be seen from the new turn which, at least for the time being, the course of operations around Warsaw seems to have taken , thanks to the more active initiative that was left to General Weygand in drawing up the city's defense plan".
"Prince Sapieha felt that Mr. Pilsudski's resistance could be defeated no matter how strong the opposition of the organizer of the Polish legions and the winner of Kyiv acclaimed by a delirious population."
"The Prince's belief was that the Poles must rely only on their own strength. Before appealing to others, a people must find within itself the
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power to defend its existence, and the Poles had not given this proof. The strength of the national feeling had indeed recorded regrettable declines".
Hungarian help or intrigue?
Exactly at the time when the English prime minister "had thrown the heaviest accusations against Poland, two or three Hungarian people appeared in Warsaw who had come here to promise Hungarian help. Florescu proved to the Polish interlocutors that this was nothing but a intrigue, because the peace treaty of Versailles limited the Hungarian military forces, and Budapest did not take into account the opposition of Romania and Czechoslovakia. The intrigue was perhaps little said because, due to the lack of a common border, "help" was a word in the wind or a "suggestion strange", the Romanian diplomat also appreciated.
Florescu is not shy to propose to the Romanian Minister of Foreign Affairs that more work should be done on the Hungarian issue both in Paris, in London, in Rome, in Washington, including in Warsaw - where political circles and public opinion: "must be enlightened on the danger that it offers the illusion of being able to attract Hungary to the side of the Allies. The Allies have already committed the great mistake of the World War of imagining that Bulgaria will go with them. The mistake is repeated with Hungary". Moreover, the distinguished diplomat notes the fact that: "in Poland, the dogma of the need for a common front between this country and Hungary has penetrated deep into all layers of society, an aspect that in the years '38-'39 will be a kind of olive branch on which Beck he also presented it to King Charles II at the meeting he had with the Romanian sovereign in Galaţi, an approach that for a while affected bilateral relations, the failure of which the Polish minister blamed on his counterpart, Petrescu- Comnen, who would not have understood him the message.
Germany will never resign itself to its shrinking
It was one of the conclusions reached by the Romanian diplomat at that time and which will be maintained forever, when talking about the Polish-German dispute. At the time, it was also linked to the Russian and German danger to Poland. He wrote at the Sturdza Florescu Palace: "Russia can forget over time the rounding of its borders, especially if the rounding is done ethnically. There would be no solutions of continuity in its territory otherwise, while Germany will not resign itself to the cut that was
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practiced by the Treaty of Versailles in her territory (emphasis mine - N.M.), leaving East Prussia cut off from the rest of the Reich. It is precisely the cause that started the Second World War. All her (Germany's) efforts will tend to bring it together again these two pieces. What foresight! A common border with Hungary would therefore not be a benefit, but rather a disadvantage for Poland". Let's not forget that this happened in 1939, Colonel Beck who ardently wanted to achieve that objective - immediately after Munich - Poland acting decisively in this direction, without even informing his Romanian ally, practically abolishing the Little Understanding.
The Romanian diplomat warned the Romanian authorities saying: "But the more Poland feels that the Allies also see the possibility of attracting Hungary to their side, the more difficult it will be to remove this fixed idea from the minds of the Poles".
Minister Florescu - in frontline conditions - on duty
Facing the Bolshevik attack, the first extraordinary envoy and Romanian minister plenipotentiary in Poland, Alexandru G. Florescu, did not leave the mission (he could easily return to Bucharest, where his family was, his life not being in any way threatened here). The Romanian diplomat decided to remain on duty, together with members of the Polish government, and acted for a better knowledge of the facts also from Poznan (Posen), where the members of the state leadership and the diplomatic corps were transferred, fulfilling his exemplary mission. He and the apostolic nuncio had the most modest living conditions, compared to his French or English colleague, the two of them lacking both a car and aides, professional companions, etc., etc. At the end of the military hostilities, Florescu returned to Warsaw, and on August 26, he will write three anthological reports that he will submit to Minister Take Ionescu. In them, the "analyst" describes what he experienced, with the feather of a shaved writer. At the same time, he captures some essential elements from the guidelines (directions of action) of the Polish leadership, which he renders with great finesse:
a). Poland needs peace (foreign minister Sapieha had told him that he would have been "very moved by the sympathy that Romania had shown to Poland throughout the war".
And also from Prince Sapieha, he learns about Warsaw's sincere desire to conclude peace with the Soviets, as Poland needed peace,
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namely that this would also be the desire of the Allies, of all Allies. He also learns that "Poland has reduced its territorial claims under the condition that the Allies settle the question of Eastern Galicia and Danzig. Poland needs definitive confrontations and a well-clarified international situation in order to be able to consecrate itself in complete peace and safety in its economic and social organization and strengthening".
b). Danzig and Eastern Galicia would be the equivalent with which, in exchange for the sacrifices made, the Polish Government could present itself to public opinion. He reminds that Prince Sapieha does not admit a provisional government and a plebiscite for Galicia, although he would not be afraid of an electoral consultation. The atrocities committed by the Bolsheviks in the regions they temporarily occupied so deeply revolted the inhabitants, regardless of nationality, that they would certainly demand their annexation to Poland. There is even talk of a delegation of Zionists soon going to London to set forth their determined desire to see Eastern Galicia remain with Poland.
c). Regarding Gdantzig, "The Polish Government demands compliance with the Treaty of Versailles, that and nothing more. Sir Reginald Tower would be far from working in accordance with that Treaty. Since he has been Allied High Commissioner, he has worked more to make Danzig a free city of a free State. Now, the Treaty of Versailles gave Poland the external representation of the city, and gave her the post and railways and the use of the port. Danzig is also part of the Polish customs territory. Danzig has the same currency like Poland. But nothing of these precise stipulations has been carried out. And the Allies still have military contingents at Danzig."
d). The advance of the Polish troops would stop on the former line of defense of the Germans, as being a good strategic line, and which would begin about below Vilna, and, passing through Baranowicz, would go along the river Stopod, descending straight into Eastern Galicia. The question of Vilna and Grodno will not be discussed with the Bolsheviks, but directly with the Lithuanians.
e). The Russians abroad are stirring again. "This is since, with the Polish advance, the Russians in Paris, London, Rome began to stir again, insisting with all their heart that we should not be allowed to penetrate too deeply into the interior of Russia. These Russians, enlivened again by of General Wrangel's successes, they want him alone to have the credit for having cleansed Russia of the Bolsheviks, and they are now beginning to
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count on his imminent entry into Moscow. A collaboration with the Poles could give a reinforcement to the territorial claims arising from the advance of their troops. And this not the Russians want it".
"You didn't want to help us for the establishment of Ukraine, Prince Sapieha told me, and now this State that could have defended us against the Russian danger will go over to the other side."
f). In connection with the "territorial conditions imposed by the Soviets" (in Minsk), Sapieha stated that "they are indeed better than Lord Curzon's and that the Russians would be determined to recognize to Poland a fairly extensive region east of Brest-Litowsk and by Cholm (Chełm). This region is very sparsely inhabited, and might just serve for a systematic colonization easily accomplished thanks to the excess of an excessively prolific population like the Polish population." Also through the August 26 courier, Alexandru G. Florescu sends Take Ionescu the "retrospective look" regarding the consequences and lessons learned from the events that took place in Poland in the reference month.
The confrontation between the Polish right and the left is permanent "Dmowski and the right-wing parties wanted - after the August battle in Warsaw - for Poland's borders to be ethnically determined and to establish future close friendly relations with Russia, a precursor to a political alliance". Piłsudski and the left-wing parties "saw in Russia a dangerous neighbor of Poland, recalling the sufferings of the past, the tyrannical tendencies of the Muscovites. Hence the desire to build between Poland and Russia a "curtain of intermediate states", intended to defend Poland against expansion Russian. This policy, whose most prominent supporter is the Head of State himself, Mr. Piłsudski, is especially embraced by the left- wing parties. This policy was "the most popular".
"The two policies placed face to face contradict each other. Mr. Dmowski's contains a contradiction in itself. On the one hand it extends the Polish ethnic claims to a line that includes parts of Podolia, of Wolynia, of White Ruthenia, of Lithuania, i.e. Kamenec Podolski, Dubno, Rowno, Pinsk, Minsk, Wilna. And on the other hand, with all these territorial claims, Mr. Dmowski believed that friendship with Russia was still possible".
"On his side were mostly landowners whose domains are in regions with mixed populations. They rejected the idea of creating a Lithuania, a white Ruthenia, a Ukraine." Partisans of this policy demanded that all white, Catholic Ruthenia should belong to Poland, leaving the entire Orthodox region to Russia. From Lithuania, this group demanded the part where the Polish element was more compact, although it did not constitute an absolute majority anywhere, leaving the rest of Lithuania to stick to Russia, being condemned to remain: "a kernel of latent enmity between Russia and Poland, a irredentism at every moment, by splitting both Lithuania and White Ruthenia into two pieces".
The ethnic side of Piłsudski's politics: less pronounced
Commander Piłsudski's ethnic claims were much less, Florescu believed. The concept of the reborn Polish Head of State was not to annex the old Eastern lands of Poland, but to "let them govern themselves, but united with Poland, if not through a federative system, at least through political alliances. The difficulty was also here to establish the limit up to which the borders of Poland went. More modest at the beginning, they gradually expanded, as the chaos in Russia continued, as the Polish
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armies also advanced. But in no case these fronts did not touch the Dmowski line. Poland was indeed ready to cede Wilna to a Lithuania united with it by federative or political ties, but not to an independent Lithuania or re-united with Russia." "Poland's borders narrowed the more closely these countries connected with her". "Even from Eastern Galicia, Pilsudski would have been ready to give a piece of land if through this sacrifice he could definitively win Ukraine for his part." The Romanian diplomat Alexandru Florescu considered that: "If all Lithuania, White Ruthenia, Ukraine, not to mention the Baltic States and Finland together, wanted to remain independent, Piłsudski realized that they were individually too weak, even if they were united, they would not they could still live like this, except by leaning on Poland". Some of the leaders of these states believed that Poland was called to help rebuild Russia, through a wise economic penetration, seeking to take the place of Germany. In other words, in Florescu's view Piłsudski was strengthening Poland's position to resist Russian enmity, disregarding the allogeneic element leaning towards Russia
Piłsudski's thesis came very close to Wilsonian principles, not removing Russia's enmity, but strengthening Poland's position to better withstand that enmity.
The Romanian minister in Warsaw also notes that the proposed policy did not sufficiently take into account the allogeneic element with a significant and conscious role: the Jewish element. The Jewish population was very numerous in Lithuania, White Ruthenia and the Ukraine, which had a greater inclination towards Russia than towards Poland. Poland managed, thanks in part to the Polish emigrants returned from America, to establish a class of industrialists and traders who over time partially eliminated and will be able to eliminate the Jews, Florescu believes. Also, through the agrarian reform, the Polish peasant, in turn, will be able to resist more successfully the "predatory tendencies of the Jews". Florescu emphasizes that the Allies' proposals of December 1919 regarding the front line between Poland and Russia, that of the Kingdom of Congress, which left Wilna, Grodno, Minsk, Pinsk, Rowna, Dubno outside Poland's borders, would not have been accepted by either a Pole. At the same time, the allies did not say anything as long as Poland did its own justice. The Poles were wrong because they did not demand by documents the reward of the Allies for the services rendered against Bolshevism
This is the conclusion of the analyzes of the Romanian diplomat, Alexandru G. Florescu, current even today. He also captured the unfolding
- in their intimacy - of the relations established between Paderewski, Pilsudski and Dmowski, respectively the envy with which the prime minister and the head of foreign affairs looked at Piłsudski's popularity but also the need to achieve by force of arms what Dmowski had not achieved diplomatically in Paris. "The big mistake that the Poles made then is that they did not stipulate in precise agreements the reward they were due for the service they also rendered to the Allies. (Following the same line, such a reward should have also been demanded Romania at the moment it saved Hungary and Europe from Bolshevism! - N.M.)
Mister. Paderewski was then in power. He considered himself to be the man above the parties, but in reality he was more inclined towards the right-wing ideology. "About that time, indeed, he began to look with some distress at the too great popularity of Mr. Piłsudski, the man of the left, and to smile with some complacency at the high dignity with which he was invested." "Mr. Paderewski was thus seeking to accomplish by arms what Mr. Dmowski had failed to accomplish through diplomacy in Paris. Mr. Dmowski had therefore tried to show that White Ruthenia and the Ukraine could not live as national entities, and that Lithuania on which England take control, unjustly claim regions where Poland was in the majority".
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And a totally new fact: "And when, on the order of Mr. Ion Brătianu, I was reading to Mr. Paderewski the statement that the Ukrainian mission in Bucharest had given to the former Prime Minister to confirm Ukraine's friendly intentions towards Romania and to recognize the Dniester as the border definitive agreement between our country and Ukraine, Her Majesty was advising me that the Allies should not find out about this declaration and was paying particular attention to all the arguments against an independent Ukraine". "But Mr. Paderewski fell."
Foreign Minister Patek – considered to be a third-rate lawyer
"In the place of Prince Sapieha at Foreign Affairs, Mr. Patek was installed, a third-rate lawyer, more left-leaning, whom nothing showed fit to occupy the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, not even his previous appointment as Poland's representative in Prague. Mr. Patek quickly became Mr. Piłsudski's man and put his policy into practice."
In his policy towards Russia, Piłsudski tried to invite Romania as well
"I have shown above what was the policy of the Head of State towards Russia. I will add that no matter how much Poland followed the policy of the Allies, Mr. Piłsudski considered that outside of this policy Poland could pursue a policy of its own towards Russia. To such a policy the Head The state sought to invite Romania as well. He realized that the Allies had no policy in Russia or that they had several, and that thus our countries were called upon or in a position to impose their policy on the Allies."
"What an even greater temptation for Poland was to be able to carry out the policy of the intermediate states from now on in complete agreement between the Head of State and his Ministry, which the advancing Polish armies were calling to an independent life!"
And one more fact revealed by the Romanian diplomat and which historians don't really remember. "The Soviets had made a first peace proposal to the Polish government on December 22, 1919, but the proposal was conceived more in the form of a world manifesto and in such imprecise terms that it had not been taken into account." This in the situation where:
"Ever since then, the Soviets sought to lull the Poles' vigilance. The vagueness with which this call was surrounded is one of the evidences showing that, faced with the shaken situation of General Denikin and
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Admiral Kolczak, the Soviets were trying to gain a respite in order to prepare the attack today against Poland".
England stopped helping counter-revolutionary Russian generals only on January 28, 1920, when the peace proposals were specified.
It was a few days after Mr. Patek's trip to Paris and London. It is known that after the defeats of Denikin, Judenici and Kolceak, England stopped helping the counter-revolutionary Russian Generals. The exigencies of his domestic politics and his economic needs imposed upon him a new policy. "Mr. Lloyd George had answered Poland's requests for help with a refusal. And when asked for advice, either to continue the war or to conclude the peace, the English Prime Minister maintained a perfect reserve which many interpreted as an exhortation to to make peace". England did not want to get involved even with an advice, thus declining any responsibility. "England, which had started the talks with Litfinov, therefore observed the expectation. Mr. Bonard Law in the English Parliament did not hesitate to even inform Poland that England wanted not even a single advice to be asked of him on the question of peace with the Soviets"."While Poland therefore sought to solidarize the Allies with the decision they would have taken, the Allies, on the other hand, sought to decline any responsibility regarding any directive to be given."
"In particular, the Inter-Allied Conference in its meeting of February 24 (1921) had decided that "if the States neighboring Soviet Russia whose independence or autonomy were recognized by the Allies, would turn to them to ask for their advice on the attitude they would have- to be taken towards Soviet Russia, the allied governments would reply that they could not take the responsibility of advising them to continue a war which might harm their own interests". Indirectly, at those moments the Bolsheviks were being helped. "Of course, the urge to conclude peace arose more from all of this. However, alongside such an urge, these talks, the official declarations, the lifting of blockades, the refusal to send any more ammunition either on credit or even with payment, all were not than indirect aid given to the Soviets. We were quite far from a strictly neutral attitude. France was forced, in order not to cause a breach in its understanding with England, to follow his lead". Poland accepted the Soviet peace proposals according to Wilsonian principles
"Did the Poles listen to the call to conclude peace? Yes, because the Polish government responded to the peace proposals of the Soviets by
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accepting them. But the Poles believed that the Allies, by not interfering in the matter of peace and war, were also denying their right to to interfere in that of the terms of peace. Non-intervention in the first question implied non-intervention in the second. Reasoning in this way, the Polish government thought itself at liberty to fix its conditions in complete freedom."
Furthermore, Florescu believes that: "the chief mistake that the Polish government had made is that the use in establishing these unfortunate conditions formulated: "of erasing the traces of the crime of the partitions of Poland and renouncing all territorial rights arising from the acts of violence committed since 1772 against Poland." "The formula was wretched. The fact itself did not imply the restoration of Poland within the limits of 1772. Within these limits the Polish government wanted, in accordance with Wilsonian principles, the peoples to have the right to decide their own destiny. Poland's enemies they exploited this formula, these tendencies presented in an imperialist form. Everything that was socialist and even liberal thinking in the whole world did not hesitate to denounce to public opinion these exaggerated expansionisms".
A sign of chaotic politics: the Allies claim the right to secure Poland's eastern frontiers
"In the interval between the receipt of the peace proposal and the communication of the conditions to the Allies, they, once more forgetting their declarations of non-interference, thought they had the right to remind the Polish Government of Article 87 of the Treaty of Versailles, which gave them and only them the right to fix the eastern frontiers of Poland". "A more chaotic policy could not be conceived" - emphasizes Minister Florescu. And, justifiably, he wonders: "What else today, when even the Allies leave the Poles face to face with the Soviets, does the threatening declaration with Article 87 matter? Will the Allies intervene today to reduce to the limits set by Lord Curzon the more broad that the Soviets want to recognize Poland?" "However, from all these contradictions and hesitations, the Polish government then unjustly concluded that the fait accompli would perhaps be the best policy with which even England, a country above all realistic, could come to terms."
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The Allies would bow to the accomplished fact only through a conspiracy of silence
As I pointed out at the beginning, General Rozwadowski, returning around February 1920 from Paris, communicated to the head of the Romanian diplomatic mission in Warsaw his impression that the Allies would allow themselves to be beaten and that they would bow before the fait accompli. And when, by order of your Excellency's predecessor, I asked Mr. Patek, if she was aware of the impression made on the Allies by the peace conditions offered by the Poles to the Soviets, conditions communicated to them in advance, she gave me the haughty textual answer: "I don't even want to know about it (them)."
"I had myself sought from my fellow Allies the impression which these conditions had produced on their governments. None, but absolutely none, would give me an answer. Each told me that he did not know it: it was a conspiracy of silence perfect". "What encouragement given to Poland further to put the Allies in front of the fait accompli!". "At this time the Polish government had set to work to carry out its plan. As it had made a deal with White Ruthenia, granting her full autonomy within the Polish Republic, so it was making another deal with Petlura and his government." .
"The question of the eastern fronts of Poland thus seemed settled, without the intervention of the Allies and without a plebiscite. All that was needed was the consent of the Soviets; but here it was believed that a strong offensive, followed by a blow on the green table of negotiations, was of a nature to subdue the resistance of the Bolsheviks". It was clear to the Polish leadership that the Soviets did not seriously consider making peace. It was proved by the discussions that followed on the choice of the place as well as on the armistice, and the offensive that followed put the lid on any doubt".
The weakening of Poland also weakens Romania
"Poland had taken a great step into a momentum unbecoming of her powers. She tried to take advantage of the chaos in Russia to somehow revive the Poland of the past. In her fight against the Soviets, in her attempt to achieve a Ukraine she would have wanted to have partners".
"As much as Romania had worked openly in the matter of its relations with Ukraine, taking care not to offend Poland and clarifying their character,
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Poland was working mysteriously. I showed this in special reports, as I pointed out how necessary at that time not to give the impression to the Ukrainians that they could only count on the support of Poland. In those moments, indeed, Poland sought to establish a State and an alliance with that State. By carrying out such a program Poland would have could think herself justified in passing over us, and not appreciating the importance of our friendship at its true value, or she would have tried to force us into this friendship by the fear we would have had of seeing too close a connection established with Ukraine. And since the necessity of Poland's friendship with Hungary was indulged in most Polish newspapers as well as in most thoughts of political men, I thought myself bound to point out the danger which a possible understanding between these tr those States would have had it for us, with whom each had an open issue: Transylvania, Bucovina, Bessarabia".
It is true that Florescu saw the respective danger as overcome, but he considered it necessary to "examine the consequences that the new state of affairs in Poland could have had on Romania's relations with this country, in the sense that a political connection is not desirable and this without any tension.
The miracle happened
It is the title of the first report from which we will present essential fragments, in fact the main ideas that Florescu wanted the Romanian decision-makers to know, being aware of the usefulness of correct knowledge of the events that had taken place on the Vistula and that they had personally experienced to the full. As external testimony, these reports can play an important role for Polish historians as well. Regrettably, until now they have not done it, they have not resorted to these texts. Suffocated, somehow, by pain, the Romanian minister in Warsaw reveals from the beginning: "The Polish army, beaten, fugitive, often without even a glimmer of hope to see themselves fighting again, retreating in disorder and hastily across hundreds of kilometers to the outskirts of the Capital, leaving men and material in the hands of the enemy, this army was nevertheless revived, brought back to new positions, began to defend itself, and even chased the enemy over the same hundreds of kilometers with the same speed, caught him on the pincer allocation, he takes tens of thousands of prisoners, cannons, ammunition and escapes not only a Capital, but an entire country, maybe even general peace".
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Sapieha recognizes that a part of the Romanian gold from Kremlin was offered to Poland
On October 13, 1920, Alexandru Florescu informs the prime minister and interim minister of foreign affairs, General Averescu, about Poland's participation in the Little Understanding, following a conversation on this topic with Prince Sapieha, minister of foreign affairs. From the perspective of more than 90 years since the meeting took place, in the context of the signing of the Polish-Soviet peace treaty after the Battle of Warsaw, the formulation expressed by the Polish head of foreign affairs seems extremely important to us: "Regarding the gold that will be paid of Russia to Poland, the Foreign Minister told me that it was a gold that he would not touch with too much pleasure, for the parcel is also a little of our gold, and that he had even given instructions to the Polish delegation, should any difficulty arise in this regard, don't insist on acquiring the gold. I don't know how much sincerity such a statement can contain - the Romanian diplomat showed Bucharest - in any case if the Polish Government had the scruples to touch stolen gold, this matter presents a principled face, and it did not appear to be a possible precaution". It could be understood from Sapieha's statement that since then the Bolsheviks had started alienating the Romanian gold deposited in the Kremlin in 1917. Florescu further specified that it was "interesting the detail given to me by Prince Sapieha on this occasion, that according to the news that (he) has them, the Russians would have no more than 150 million available as gold, which would mean that our treasury was no longer complete as some believed"3.
Friendship between Poland and Hungary and the Little Entente
In relation to the topic he wanted to elucidate, in the perspective of a visit that Minister Take Ionescu was going to make to Warsaw, it follows that "the great friendship with Hungary distances Poland from the objectives of the Little Understanding" to which was also added the unchanged antipathy against the Czechs.
From the report on the subject of the Little Understanding, written by Alexandru Florescu, it follows that the interlocutor (Sapieha) did not hide
3 AMAE, Fond 71-1920, Dosare Speciale (Special Files), 1920, vol 35 p. 397
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from him: "the sympathies of the Poles for the Hungarians, due to the chivalrous qualities of this people, the bravery of the Hungarian soldiers, the social relations of the past, as he did not hide from me nor the lingering resentment of the Poles against the Czechs. In these resentments, it would seem, however much the Poles have the right to complain about the behavior of the Czechs towards those of their countrymen who remained under their domination, that the whole feeling of the territory of Teschen is more alive felt".
From this part of the conversation, the Romanian diplomat was left with the vague impression that: "principle Sapieha would perhaps rely on Romania as the mediator better able to resolve this disputed territorial issue with the Czechoslovaks", gaining the conviction that as long as the state of mind from that time "The Little Understanding will hardly be able to gain the adhesion of Poland" will last. Moreover, Prince Sapieha was not shy to declare to the Romanian minister that: "as soon as the Little Understanding would only show an anti-Hungarian character, Poland would not be able to join her", openly speaking to him about reaching to an "alliance between Romania and Hungary, directed against Bolshevism", to which the impossibility of such an approach was demonstrated.
The Romanian minister in Warsaw, Alexandru G. Florescu, also noted that the interlocutor's keen desire to "base Poland on a close friendship with France and Romania, and added that, if he remains in the government long enough - - something that he seemed to be a bit doubtful - - he will try to give a more concrete form to the approach to France". "I understood that this is about the conclusion of a military convention, about which the Polish press often wrote with particular desire and insistence".
Repeatedly, the Romanian diplomat notes the subtle and permanent constant in Polish politics: "sympathy for the Hungarians, antipathy against the Czechs; the second (orientation) could be cured with time, the first is more difficult". It is easy to understand that in Warsaw's attention there was a much more pressing matter: the alliance against the Soviet Union today, against the Russian chaos of tomorrow.
The Romanian minister felt the need to bring new explanations regarding Polish foreign policy, especially in view of the visit of the Romanian minister of foreign affairs to Warsaw. He did it on October 15, 1920, demonstrating that this policy is like Arvinte's anterium, a continuous patchwork, because "when one seems to be resolved, another appears. When the latter in turn gives the appearance of being resolved, here it
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breaks out a new difficulty. It could be said with good reason and with some irreverence that Poland's foreign policy brings with it the formula of Arvinte's predecessor".
Leaning on Poland, Lithuania can keep its independence
The Romanian soil in Warsaw knows how to draw from history the lessons of continuity, perennial. Likewise from the culture of a people. And that's why he states with conviction: "No matter how hard the Allies try to go hand in hand in matters that concern not only the peace of today, but also what of tomorrow, it is obvious that the question of Lithuania separates England from France. England thought that some financial facilities as well as an economic deterioration can quickly change the mentality of a people. The Lithuanian national feeling, which also makes its weakness, exists only in the peasant class, and it still presents itself more under the appearance of a demagogic hatred against the Polish landowner. In the classes of above, the Lithuanian is either a Germanophile or more particularly a Polonophile. What England sought was the acquisition by an economic penetration of a political influence. But England did not quite realize that by trying such a game aimed at weakening Poland she somehow touch France, was preparing an almost certain rapprochement of Lithuania with Germany. This was proved on the occasion of the Bolshevik campaign. Advice and pressures England could not fight the intrigues and help of the Germans". And then it is emphasized that "in the series of declines that England has recently suffered as a result of the Polish victory, the Vilnius issue is one of the most painful", making it clear that "Lithuania's isolation from Russia as well as the entry of the General Zeligowski in Wilna, with all the polite advice given to the Poles by both Great Allies, are received by France with special unofficial satisfaction".
The occupation of Vilnius was possible because "the Head of State - as Supreme Commander - did not take any precautions to thwart him".
Conclusion
Being part of a larger study regarding the activity of Romanian diplomats in Warsaw during the interwar period, this paper aims to present some aspects resulting from the reports sent to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from Bucharest, existing in the Romanian Diplomatic Archives,
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written by the first envoy extraordinary and Romanian minister plenipotentiary, Alexandru G. Florescu. The information of this professional diplomat, who came from an old family from Wallachia, with great- grandfathers among the Romanian revolutionaries who worked with the Great Polish Emigration from Paris, was published in full in the monograph recently published in Bucharest, devoted to Marshal Pilsudski. The present study presents a series of novel aspects contained in the diplomatic reports of the first head of the Romanian Legation in Warsaw regarding the situation in Poland from 1920-1921, as well as about Polish foreign policy actions, especially in the eastern area of special interest for the state Romanian. The on-the-spot assessments drawn up by Minister Florescu for the leadership of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Sturdza Palace) are of great importance for Romanian, as well as Polish and universal historiography, the Romanian diplomat being an objective, equidistant eyewitness of the events that took place. Former minister plenipotentiary in Greece and diplomat in many capitals, including in Petersburg, director in the headquarters of M.A. S., their author knew how to draw the necessary conclusions, even very useful to Romanian decision-makers in bilateral cooperation, trying to make his judgment as objective and fair as possible. That is why he appeals with aplomb to the knowledge of the situation in Poland to the most truthful sources at the head of the Polish state, to conversations held with Generals Piłsudski and Rozwadowski, with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Prince Eustachy Sapieha and others. It should be remembered that before the Miracle on the Vistula in the report sent in July 1920 to Bucharest, the head of the diplomatic mission in Warsaw, Alexandru G. Florescu, report to decision makers in Romania: Although Mr. Piłsudski has recently been the object of passionate attacks, I still believe that his presence at the head of the State will be a sign that Poland will stop on the edge of the precipice. His popularity, indeed very great still among the lower classes, will be able to be a strong bulwark against the dangerous currents. Very low in the upper classes, it represents for the lower ones the memories of a still recent revolutionary past and will perhaps be able to channel the unhealthy beginnings in the name of which the red armies seek to penetrate as deeply as possible into the heart of Poland.
It would be worthy to compare this judgment and others from this study with those sent by other members of the Diplomatic Corps at that time on a diplomatic mission in Warsaw. Polish historiography must lean on these texts.
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KING CAROL II - NICOLAE TITULESCU
ONE OF THE STILL UNRESOLVED CONTROVERSIES OF THE INTERWAR PERIOD1
Nicolae MAREŞ Ambasador
Abstract: In a period when the rise of the personal power of the most unpredictable monarch of the Kingdom of Romania, despite spectacular economic progress and the flourishing of an effervescent artistic and cultural life, there are political turmoils that lead to surprising and difficult to understand decisions in the context of those times. The present article proposes a documented analysis of the evolution of relations between the monarch and the exceptional politician Nicolae Titulescu, a prominent figure of the interwar political life, who was twice elected president of the General Assembly of the League of Nations. Why this aversion? Readers will learn the author's arguments in a passionate read complemented by numerous documentary and bibliographic references.
On August 29, 1936, following a government reshuffle of the cabinet headed by Gheorghe Tătărescu, Nicolae Titulescu was released from the position of Minister of Foreign Affairs2 or, as the writer-diplomat, Elena Văcărescu, said, kicked out of his post. He was replaced by his government colleague, Victor Antonescu, also with old states in diplomacy. According to Nicolae Iorga's testimony, only a few days after landing, on September 2, 1936, Ion Inculeț, former Minister of the Interior and, from August 29, 1936, vice-president of the Council of Ministers, told him: "how the ministerial change took place with the removal to Titulescu", explaining to him that "he
1 In the assertions below, I also highlight an interesting point of view expressed by the historian Narcis Dorin Ion, general director of the Peleș Museum, in his monumental work: Carol II of Romania – A controversial king
2 See Ion M. Oprea, Nicolae Titulescu, Bucharest, Scientific Publishing House, 1966, p. 341-366; Titulescu și strategia de pace (Titulescu and the Peace Strategy), coordinator Gh. Buzatu, Iași, Junimea Publishing House, 1982, chapter XI, entitled Eșecul păcii globale. Demiterea lui N. Titulescu (A Failure of Global Peace. The Dismissal of N. Titulescu), p. 275-326.
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had been looking for a long time to get rid of him. But he needed a situation that would not give him a platform"3. The suggestion of the great historian, who had not been an admirer of the Romanian diplomat for several years, was the following: "I tell him that at least one should make a joke of asking him to join the party that demanded a strictly homogeneous government. He regrets that they didn't think..." 4.
Such credible statements are more and more numerous, also clarifying the glorious ascension of the monarch to the throne of Romania. From 1934, the controversial king felt eclipsed in his totalitarian aspirations and manifestations by Titulescu's diplomatic success. And not only because of this the king was disappointed. The minister's critical attitude towards the royal clique and towards His Majesty's mistress, Elena Lupescu, caused him the greatest annoyance. It is generally known that after returning from Montreux, on July 11, 1936, Nicolae Titulescu submitted his resignation, through a letter (transmitted, in copy, to the king. He explained his gesture by the fact that "for some time now, various internal facts have shown me very clearly that I can no longer remain responsible for the development of our foreign policy on its essential principle, namely, good understanding with all nations without distinction. On the contrary, they have shown me that I cannot even take responsibility for maintaining the results achieved so far".5
"I am Romanian - said Titulescu -, born of Romanian parents, raised at the school of Take Ionescu and Vintilă Brătianu, and therefore Romanian nationalism is a dogma for me, both inside the country and outside. That's why I ask that no one from outside the country interfere in our internal affairs and that the guiding principles of our internal policy are purely Romanian". At the same time, Titulescu told Prime Minister Gheorghe Tătărescu, a docile tool of the monarch, that his concern was to "remain faithful to our alliance treaties, but also to establish the best possible relations with all our neighbors, maintaining, of course, our integrity territorial and national interests, that he did not conclude any assistance treaty with the U.S.S.R., respectively he never "assumed a commitment
3 N. Iorga, Memorii. Sinuciderea partidelor politice (Memories. Suicide of the parties) (1932-8), vol. VII, p. 353.
4 Ibidem
5 Nicolae Titulescu, Politica externă a României (Romanian Foreign Policy) (1937), edited by George G. Potra, Constantin I. Turcu, Ion M. Oprea, Bucharest, Enciclopedică Publishing House, 1994, p. 37-38 and further up to p. 56.
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regarding the passage of Soviet armies through Romanian territory, such a matter never even being discussed".
In his memorial work entitled Politica externă a României (Romanian Foreign Policy) (1937), to which we refer below), Nicolae Titulescu admits that Tătărescu, Inculeț and, above all, Victor Antonescu insisted on withdrawing their resignation, reaching the signing of the well-known minute of July 14 1936, through which the three expressed their approval of the foreign policy led by the head of foreign affairs. That Gheorghe Tătărescu was working at two ends can be seen from the memorandum he sent to King Carol II, on July 11, 1936, in which from his perspective of Prime Minister, if Titulescu resigns, it is not due to a conflict between the two, but to some factual situations that go beyond passing contingencies. And after the reshuffle of August 29, 1936 - he should also note that "in the difficult situation that Mr. Titulescu created it abroad personally, through attitudes and exaggerations whose responsibility he cannot share with anyone: conflicts with officialdom and Italian public opinion; conflicts with Polish officialdom and public opinion, conflicts with part of French public opinion; tightening of relations even with some of the political leaders of allied and friendly countries - all these facts created an atmosphere of opposition for Mr. Titulescu, in which the action of his lordship can no longer be carried out freely and which sometimes gives him very embarrassing moments. The latest incident with the Italian press is one of the outbreaks of this difficult situation".
At the same time, the head of the Romanian government informed his sovereign that he is "sure that Mr. Titulescu is aware of this atmosphere; it is certain that his lordship is aware that this atmosphere has a detrimental effect on the country and its interests, and that is why he considers it necessary to withdraw, even if only temporarily". Gheorghe Tătărescu also specified that "to this external case, another internal case is added. Mr. Titulescu must be aware that some exaggerations of his lordship - in speech and in attitude - in the matter of relations with the U.S.S.R. they alienated a good part of the sympathies of the Romanian public opinion, refractory to a policy that would go beyond the framework of only external relations with our neighbor from the East. His lordship, not being able to recover neither from the acts committed nor from their consequences, can no longer acquire what he feels he has lost and therefore must consider the solution of withdrawal as the only one that would give him the possibility of restoring his popularity". We can easily see in Tătărescu's gesture that of Pilate from Pontus.
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To these "essential causes", the prime minister also added "the collapse of some of the illusions that our hearty collaborator had placed in the systems and practices of international politics, in the elaboration of which he collaborated with passion".6
It was obvious, under the conditions in which the German rise in European politics became more and more pressing, that Nicolae Titulescu could no longer officially represent the policy of adaptation to the realities of the time, which Romania tried in the years 1937-1940, forced to is getting closer economically and militarily to the Third Reich, which has become the master of Europe. The conclusion of the report submitted to the king was that "in this cycle of facts are found the origins of the decision taken by Mr.
N. Titulescu to resign from the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs".
Although he expressed his regret for "separation from a man endowed with so many elite qualities", Gheorghe Tătărescu took "this resignation into consideration without concern", even though he was aware that "for international public debates, for the solution of general, European and world problems, Mr. Titulescu's absence will be a difficult gap to fulfill". "However, for Romanian interests - the prime minister emphasized in the report sent to the monarch - the withdrawal of his reign, without causing any danger, will be, on the contrary, an occasion for necessary relaxation in the relations with some of the allied or friendly states, against which the incidents provoked, willy-nilly, because of his rule, they created stressful situations for us".
At the same time, the President of the Council of Ministers considered that "this withdrawal will also give us the opportunity to proceed with a review of the bodies of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and its propaganda tools, which in today's situation, in many centers, only work within an action personal and constitute dangerous anomalies in the action to defend the general interests of the state and the government". And that scenario was implemented, so that after the elimination of Titulescu from the formula of the new reshuffled government, until the end of 1936 many plenipotentiary ministers were recalled from their posts, being considered to be very close to the former head of Romanian diplomacy, whose policy was not she was still wanted in Bucharest, but offering them other diplomatic missions.
Analyzing the consequences of Titulescu's resignation, Gheorghe Tătărescu also took into account the fact that "the interpretation that will be given, perhaps, by a malicious press and an uninformed public opinion - and according to which Mr. Titulescu's departure means a new orientation in foreign policy of the country - will be quickly refuted by the future acts and attitudes of the government, which will prove that nothing has changed in this policy".
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Everything was in vain, because, unfortunately, the prime minister and the king of Romania did not correctly estimate the influence that Titulescu had in the Western diplomatic circles and the completely unfavorable echoes of his removal from the government, the European press putting on the wallpaper exactly this interpretation of a change in Romanian foreign policy. The change will occur, but not in the summer of 1936, but only in the summer of 1940, during the regime of monarchical authority, when pressed by the territorial claims of our revisionist neighbors (the U.S.S.R., Hungary and Bulgaria, copiously helped by Germany and Italy), will shatter the territorial integrity of Greater Romania in the summer of 1940.
Precisely to reassure European diplomatic circles, the head of government informed Carol II that "the replacement by Mr. Victor Antonescu, a traditionalist of our foreign policy, will be, on the other hand, in the first moments of confusion, an additional guarantee and a call to order for all foreign public opinion". The assessment of the President of the Council of Ministers did not turn out to be true. Western and Soviet chancelleries interpreted it exactly the opposite! Noticing this, in order to manage the susceptibilities of the Soviet Union, Prime Minister Tatarescu will make, on September 26, 1936, the following statement to Mihail Semionovici Ostrovski, the Soviet plenipotentiary minister from Bucharest (1934-1938): "The reorganized cabinet will continue Titulescu's policy , which is a traditional policy of the country, less flashy, but more methodical and energetic. Romania's only enemies are Germany and Hungary. (…) Relations with the U.S.S.R. not only will they not change, but the government even has a plan to strengthen and deepen these relations"7 .
The oddity of history is that Ambassador Ostrovski will be sent to the Soviet Gulag because he "contributed to the removal from office of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Romania, N. Titulescu".
Despite all these assurances given by the head of the Royal Romanian Government, following the replacement of Titulescu as head of Romanian diplomacy, Maxim Litvinov, his counterpart in Moscow, informed him, in September 1936, that he no longer considered the draft treaty, initialed at Montreux on July 21, 1936, in which the principles of mutual assistance between the Kingdom of Romania and the U.S.S.R. were
7 Dokumentî vneșnei politiki S.S.S.R., vol. XIX, doc. nr. 279, apud Ioan Talpeș, Diplomație și apărare. Coordonate ale politicii externe românești (Diplomacy and Defense. Coordinates of the Romanian Foreign Policy)., 1933- 1939, p. 167.
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established, based on mutual respect for territorial integrity, because they interpret Titulescu's dismissal as a change in Romanian foreign policy. Nicolae Titulescu's mistake was that he did not bring to the knowledge of the king and the prime minister, neither then nor later, the content of this document that he had initialed with Litvinov, creating great suspicions, which also contributed to his removal from the new government .
Because Titulescu had not notified the Romanian government, officially, about the content of the pact - he reasoned, in a letter to the king, from the end of 1939, that he "conformed to Litvinov's wish, who did not want me to enumerate the act, but to - I will bring it to Your Majesty's attention myself" -, Litvinov telephoned the former head of Romanian diplomacy, in September 1936, to ask him: "Have you submitted the document of July 21 to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs? No, I replied in good faith. I submitted to your wish and ceased to be a minister before I could communicate it, personally, in Bucharest. Then, Litvinov answered me, don't submit it anymore, because the act of July 21 has no value between us, because we consider that your dismissal, under the known circumstances, is equivalent to a change in foreign policy"8.
In May 1937, Litvinov will personally tell Titulescu, at the meeting in Talloires, that he had already communicated to Victor Antonescu, the new foreign minister, that "Romania has changed its foreign policy. So we have to defend ourselves against the documents that Titulescu made us sign. I have only one regret. That of having made the map of Europe out of precious stones, in such a way that Bessarabia entered the Romanian territory. I tried to correct my mistake by adding an old map, in which the territory of Bessarabia is hatched"9.
In fact, as Armand Călinescu rightly intuited, after meeting with Titulescu in Paris on April 30, 1937, he wrote: "It seems that the Russian did not have the authorization of his government. In connection with this
8 Viorica Moisuc, Premisele izolării politice a României. 1919-1940 (The Premises of Romania's Political Isolation. 1919-1940), București, Editura Humanitas, 1991, p. 329.
9 George G. Potra, Convorbirile Nicolae Titulescu-Maksim Maksimovici Litvinov de la Talloires. 28 mai 1937 (The Talks Between Nicolae Titulescu and Maksim Maksimovici Litvinov from Talloires. May 28, 1937), în lucrarea George G. Potra, Titulescu. Neuitarea geniului. Culegere de studii, articole, conferințe (Nicolae Titulescu. The Oblivion of Genius. Collection of studies, articles, conferences), vol. I, p. 316.
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agreement, there had been rumors in the country that the passage of Soviet troops was authorized in case of war. He shows me the text, which is annotated by Litvinov. In reality, it was said that the Russian armies will only pass with the authorization of the Romanian government and will be forced to withdraw as soon as the Romanian government asks for it"10.
An additional argument for rejections from the Soviets was the fact that, at the end of 1936, King Carol II personally decorated Stanisłav Poklewski-Koziełł (1868-1939), a Russian diplomat of Polish origin, was envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of the Tsarist Empire in Bucharest during the First World War. The gesture of the Romanian sovereign - which expressed the gratitude of the Romanians for the role of the Russian diplomat - was interpreted, forced, by the Soviet mass media, obviously at the order of the Kremlin, as a manifestation of anti-Soviet policy on the part of the Romanians, which is completely false and interpreted in a tendentious way. On July 20, 1937, the newspaper "Pravda" published a special article, titled Politics of Adventures, in which it was mentioned that "the Romanian government demonstratively emphasizes its anti-Soviet tendencies. So, for example, at the end of last year, the former plenipotentiary minister of tsarist Russia, with a resonant name, Poklewski-Koziell, was decorated. This fact, in itself, has a humorous character. But the speech given by the King on the occasion of this important event, without a doubt, was aimed at giving this decoration the character of an anti-Soviet political demonstration"11.
A well-versed "zoon politikon", Tătărescu also exposed to the king the possibility that "if Mr. Titulescu wants to make his resignation a platform for agitation and a weapon at the service of a party, it could disturb our internal political field. However, I reckon that his lordship will not commit this mistake, which would jeopardize his return to international activity and make his relations with other political parties impossible".
10 Armand Călinescu, Însemnări politice. 1916 - 1939 (Political Notes. 1916 - 1939), edited edition and prefaced by Dr. Al. Gh. Savu, Bucharest, Humanitas Publishing House, 1990, p. 348
11 "Pravda", no. 198 of July 20, 1937, apud Nicolae Titulescu, Opera politico-
diplomatică (Political-Diplomatic Works). January 1, 1937-December 31, 1937, volume edited by George G. Potra, collaborators Delia Răzdolescu, Daniela Boriceanu, Ana Potra, Gheorghe Neacșu, Part II, Bucharest, Titulescu European Foundation, 2007, p. 898, note 1.
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Under these conditions, the prime minister left the decision to eliminate Nicolae Titulescu in the hands of Carol II: "However, Your Majesty will decide as it sees fit, taking into account the superior interests of the country, and I submit to its decision beforehand." As is known, the king's decision - instigated, of course, also by Elena Lupescu, whom the great diplomat virulently criticized - was to reshuffle the Tătărescu government. In these conditions, on August 29, 1936, in the new cabinet, Victor Antonescu, former member of the National Liberal Party, deputy (since 1901), former Minister of Justice (1914-1916, 1933-1935) and of Finance (1916-1917, 1935-1936), but also former minister plenipotentiary in Paris in several times: 1917-1918, 1918-1919, 1922-192412.
On July 20, 1936, participating in Montreux, at the Straits Conference, during which he gave a speech, Nicolae Titulescu will go to his residence in Cap Martin, located on the Cote d'Azur, in the south of France, from where he sent several telegrams to Sturdza Palace. Here he will learn, on August 29, 1936, about the reorganization of the Tătărescu government, of which he will no longer be a part. In Nice, Titulescu told the newspaper "Le Figaro": "I did not learn about the formation of the new Romanian Cabinet, which is made up of all former ministers, except me, until after it had been formed. The new government no longer needs my services. It is his right. I would have preferred, however, to have been informed of his intentions beforehand, for I am not the man who would have tried to impose his presence. For the moment I refrain from any assessment and I will not specify my future political attitude"13.
Being in charge of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for more than a year, Victor Antonescu will continue the efforts to normalize relations with the Soviet Union, meeting with Maxim Litvinov in Geneva on September 19, 1936. King Carol II, who obeyed everyone to the rumors coming from the Romanian diplomatic and political circles, he came to see in Titulescu a great conspirator against his regime. "It is true that the great chancellor cannot swallow that he is no longer in the Government and, through his
12 Ion Mamina, Ioan Scurtu, Guverne și guvernanți (1916-1938), p. 130; Organizarea instituțională a Ministerului Afacerilor Externe. Acte și documente, volumul II. 1920-1947, pp. 544-545 [Governments and Governors (1916-1938), p. 130; The Institutional Organization of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Acts and Documents, volume II. 1920-1947, pp. 544-545]
13 "Le Figaro", from August 30, 1936, apud Nicolae Titulescu, Documente diplomatice (Diplomatic Documents), p. 814.
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many friends, he is making intrigues" - Carol wrote in his diary, on May 3, 1937, recording several news received from Dinu Cesianu, the Romanian minister in Paris and friend from the king's youth: "He warned the Government about these agitations, but it did not take any measures. He has continuous contact with the Country, through emissaries. All the people who go abroad, even H. Catargi, went to see him at St. Moritz; apart from Argetoianu, he has contact with everyone. In order to collect internal and external weapons, he has contact with Stelian Popescu. On May 3 he saw Știrbey, at the Ritz, between May 6-7 he continues contacts with some from Foreign Affairs; Cantemir, Niculescu-Buzești, Hiott, Athanasiu give him copies after telegrams". Our conclusion is that Titulescu was being spied on by Carol II around the clock. It is not known if, concretely, he ordered the transition to measures to suppress him, nor does his personal secretary Sergiu Nenișor mention such a thing in his evocations. Instead, he mentions the names of his friends: Edvard Beneš, Edouard Herriot, Anthony Eden - the current foreign minister of Great Britain -, Paul- Boncour, the former foreign minister of France, Léon Blum, the former president of the Council, and among those who passed in the world of shadows: King Alexander of Yugoslavia, the late Atatürk, Louis Barthou, Austen Chamberlain, Robert de Flers, Politis, the great professor of international law, whose disciple he was and others. Not missing from the gallery of his friends – Litvinov. Of course, on his policy, Carol II also noted a statement by his great rival, Barbu Știrbey: "I do not recognize King Carol and I will never recognize him; however, the thought of what will happen when it's gone worries me."14
When he noted this premonition of the former intimate adviser of his parents, Carol II in no way suspected that, in only three years, his policy would lead him to lose the Throne. Cleverly, Titulescu had declared to Georges Masidel, knowing that it would reach the sovereign's ears, that "I have never agreed with King Carol to such an extent: he doesn't want me, I don't want him". In fact, what irritated the sovereign was not only the diplomatic success of his former minister of foreign affairs, still received in Paris as an active head of Romanian diplomacy, but also the statements he made that were in disagreement with the new official foreign policy line coordinated directly by him.
14 Ibidem, p. 178.
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Although he was no longer the head of Romanian diplomacy, Nicolae Titulescu made, in April 1937, a resounding visit to Paris, the echoes of which in the French press are appended by the King to his diary, as an obvious sign that the problem still interested him, but also irritated him , at the same time. "The French government - we can read in the account of the well-known journalist Pertinax - was obliged to act and, above all, to inform itself, using Mr. Titulescu as a source, who knows, like no one else, the internal problems of Romania. This was received with unusual pomp for former ministers. The dinners, the breakfasts, the reception by the President of the Republic, all of these made it clear that Titulescu's arrival in Paris is much more important than the simple visit of a former Minister of Foreign Affairs from a friendly country. Indeed, Titulescu's actions demonstrated, right from the start, that he is willing to give his visit the real political significance of strict topicality.
As if he had not irritated Carol II enough with his diplomatic actions, Titulescu will meet, on May 29, 1937, in Talloires, a small town near the French-Swiss border, with Maxim Litvinov, the commissioner for Foreign Affairs of the U.S.S.R., with which he addressed the perspectives of Romanian-Soviet relations, general political developments in Central and Eastern Europe, collective security and the future of the League of Nations. On this occasion, Litvinov frankly confessed to Titulescu the true Soviet intentions regarding Bessarabia: "For several days, Mr. Victor Antonescu asks me for a de jure recognition of Bessarabia. Or, to ask the
U.S.S.R. de jure recognition means on the part of Romania to recognize that it does not possess Bessarabia by virtue of the previous documents you signed (…) Romania, I repeat - you say the opposite in vain - has changed its foreign policy. I want the potential that Bessarabia represents to become Russian, not German. That's why I want to inform you that we will try to retake Bessarabia by all the legal and military means that will be possible for us"15.
On February 5, 1940, a year before passing into eternity, the former Senior of Foreign Affairs sent a long letter to King Carol II, in which he
15 George G. Potra, Convorbirile Nicolae Titulescu-Maksim Maksimovici Litvinov de la Talloires. 28 mai 1937 (The Talks Between Nicolae Titulescu and Maksim Maksimovici Litvinov from Talloires. May 28, 1937), în lucrarea George G. Potra, Titulescu. Neuitarea geniului. Culegere de studii, articole, conferințe (Nicolae Titulescu. The Oblivion of Genius. Collection of studies, articles, conferences), vol. I, p. 316., Part II, pp. 899-901, 907-914.
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expressed the bitterness caused by his removal from the public life of Romania: "I will not hide that the way I had to leave the Ministry of Foreign Affairs depressed me deeply at first. Not the fact of no longer being a minister, but the way I was fired after 20 years of service to my country, for which I have, along with the thanks of the heads of state I have had the honor to serve, the certificates of all the presidents of the Council with whom I exercised power. What is worse–here is a thing I never wanted to say, but which I am forced to do–is that I felt that the feelings of some members of my family–I told some–had changed from the moment I became a simple private individual and was subjected to ostracism from the Romanian authorities abroad. I have always had the absolute certainty that Your Majesty has nothing to do with the way I have been treated. But the high officials of the state thought they were doing the right thing by doing so. Thus, then, during these last three years, I was never the former minister, I was not even a simple private, I was only the man without a future, towards whom regret was expressed that he had been followed in the past. And, nevertheless, the present and the future of many young Romanians is not due to the kindness of Your Majesty, who was kind enough to give his high approval for their appointment, proposed by me, in important positions?".
Aware of the future importance of Romania's relations with the Soviet Union, Nicolae Titulescu sent him, as a patriotic gesture, on March 9, 1940, an extensive Report on Romanian-Soviet relations, a document in which he will explain his actions and meetings after his dismissal from the position of head of externals. He lived only one year. Upon his death, Carol II recorded, in his Journal, on March 18: This morning, the newspapers announce the death of Titulescu. He has also gone, thus ended a long and glorious period of our international politics. An undeniably smart man, a great talent, but too out of the way besides egocentric, an actor and seeing things more through the legal prism of a lawyer and sometimes too little realistic. These notes could be understood, even interpreted as a tribute that the monarch finally pays to a great servant of Romanian interests across the country's borders.
In one voice, Romanian historiography believes that after returning to the country from the self-exile to which he had personally condemned himself, the monarch made the divide et impera principle a way of action and life in his relations with the Romanian political forces. He was no longer a balancing factor between the political parties, such as Carol I and
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Ferdinand the Unifier. The first attempt, made in June 1930, was to attract Dinu Brătianu and Gheorghe Tătărescu to his side, from the Liberal Party. Then, from among the People's Party, led by Marshal Averescu, Octavian Goga's group broke away. The most difficult was his relationship with the National Peasant Party, personally with Iuliu Maniu, who ab initio spoke against the restoration. And in this political formation, the monarch made a breach by attracting, in 1935, the older leader Vaida-Voevod and then Armand Călinescu, constituting the "centrist" wing of the PNŢ. Initially, the far right Legionary Movement enjoyed political, moral and material support from the king, so that later it came out from under the tutelage of the throne, appreciating that "occult forces darken the royal crown". In order to feel totally "unchained" she removed from the throne not only Queen Maria, but also her brother, Prince Nicholas, on April 9, 1937.
For the annihilation of Maniu, in 1935 the king launched the idea of forming the Mihalache Government, with Vaida-Voevod at the Interior, and appointed Gabriel Marinescu from the chamber. Faithful to the PNT doctrine, Ion Mihalache did not accept the king's proposal. Then the mandate was entrusted to the servile Gheorghe Tătărescu, with the mission of organizing the elections of December 1937. As no party obtained in that election more than 40% of the total votes to constitute a parliamentary majority / PNL (National Liberal Party) - 35.9% , PNȚ (National Peasants Party) - 20.4% and the "All for the Country" Party of the Legionnaires 15.5%. This - gave the monarch a free hand to appoint to the government the political formation most faithful to his personal interests. This is how Octavian Goga, the president of the National Christian Party, an old and determined opponent of Maniu, came to the head of the government in 1938 / in the elections they had won only 9.15% of the votes/. He manages, at the same time, to make another breach in the PNŢ by attracting the "centrists", appointing Armand Călinescu to the position of Minister of the Interior. Deeply outraged by the manner in which Carol II proceeded, who did not consult him, at least formally, in relation to solving the political crisis, he declared that the Goga government had become "a real challenge to the nation". From 1938, the Iron Guard will attack the democratic regime from all sides, arguing for the reorientation of the country's foreign policy towards the Berlin-Rome Axis. Octavian Goga negotiated a secret agreement with Corneliu Zelea Codreanu. In this context, on February 18, 1938, Carol dismissed Goga from the presidency of the Council of Ministers and established a government headed by patriarch Miron Cristea. He
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suspended the 1923 Constitution, drafting a new fundamental law that was promulgated on February 27, 1938, the monarchy ensuring a dominant position in the country's political system, establishing the Crown Council as an advisory body with members appointed by the king, and on On December 16, the National Renaissance Front was established, "the only political organization in the state", transformed on June 22, 1940 into the Party of the Nation - "Unique and Totalitarian Party".
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