The Role of the Military in the Fall of the Ceausescu Regime and the Possible Relevance for a Post-Kim Jong-Il Transition in North Korea

The Role of the Military in the Fall of the Ceausescu Regime and The Possible Relevance for a Post-Kim Jong-il Transition in North Korea by Greg Scarlatoiu In September 2008, reports began to circulate in of what, on the surface, appeared to be a sudden, the world media that Chairman Kim Jong-il might disorderly and bloody collapse of the Ceausescu be in serious condition after having suffered regime? And what is the applicability of the Ro- a stroke, and discussion on possible post-Kim manian experience to possible end-game scenar- Jong-il transition scenarios in North Korea once ios in North Korea? again made the headline news. For a few months, plausible post-Kim Jong-il transition scenarios Ceausescu and Kim Il-sung, a “Special spanned a broad range, from military or collec- Relationship” tive rule to the hereditary transfer of power to Kim Jong-il’s eldest son Jong-nam, youngest son Romania’s Nicolae Ceausescu ruled the commu- Jong-un, or to brother-in-law Chang Sung-taek, nist country with an iron fi st between 1965 and under some type of protectorate, to total collapse 1989, when a popular anti-communist revolu- of the regime, similar to the fall of Romania’s Ni- tion resulted in his and wife Elena’s downfall, colae Ceausescu in 1989. Following immediately military trial, and execution. Beginning in 1971, after the “Velvet Revolution” in Czechoslovakia Ceausescu and North Korea’s Kim Il-sung met and the more peaceful and orderly transition in on several occasions, in Pyongyang and Bucha- other Eastern European countries, the violence rest, and Ceausescu’s reaction to North Korea’s of developments in Romania was shocking. Of surreal personality cult, national-communism, all post-Kim Jong-il era scenarios, the worst-case and self-reliance, or Juche philosophy, was love scenario would seem to be a Romanian-style re- at fi rst sight. He subsequently trampled on the gime downfall, involving a country on the brink human rights of Romanians with impunity, se- of civil war, the total collapse of authority, chaos, verely restricted their freedom to travel abroad, and bloodshed, and raising the specter of North and saw the damage caused by a March 1977 Korea’s nuclear, chemical and bacteriological ar- 7.2 Richter scale earthquake as an opportunity to senal being on the loose. raze large parts of the capital city of Bucharest, once known as “The Little Paris,” and turn it into Nevertheless, was the fall of the Ceausescu re- a Eastern European replica of Pyongyang, a city gime in December 1989 a swiftly anarchic pro- fi lled with cold, soulless pharaonic structures and cess, involving the total collapse of the power gigantic squares broad enough for hundreds of structures in Romania? Or were some of the state thousands of worshippers to be forced to gather institutions not only left intact, but also in control and venerate the leader, as he was delivering his seemingly unending speeches boasting Romanian stances, as it avoided escalating the already grim independence from the imperialist powers and her- civilian casualty count to unimaginable levels. alding the ultimate triumph of the “new socialist man.” Ceausescu borrowed astronomic amounts of A few days after their failed attempt to fl ee, Ceaus- money from foreign sources in the 1970s to build escu and his wife were captured and executed by a a notoriously ineffi cient industrial sector, the sole military fi ring squad, following trial by an ad-hoc purpose of which was to claim self-suffi ciency and military tribunal. After their attempted escape and establish the Romanian brand of juche. Toward the even for a few days after their execution, over 1,000 late 1980s, Ceausescu managed to repay the entire people were killed and over 3,000 wounded during foreign debt by exporting vast amounts of Roma- a week of fi ghting, by rogue snipers acting on some nian consumer goods and drastically curtailing im- pre-existing guerilla warfare plan or simply aiming ports, resulting in food and energy shortages that to destabilize the country, or by accident, caught challenged the very survival of average citizens. in a crossfi re. Although the Romanian military was Life in Romania under Ceausescu was the closest involved in the brutal repression of the popular Eastern Europeans ever got to experiencing North demonstrations prior to the dictator’s fl ight, and al- Korea up close and personal. though many were accidentally shot by the military in the subsequent sporadic fi ghting, the role of the The December 1989 Anti-communist Romanian military is generally perceived to have Revolution been benign, and the anti-communist revolution would certainly have failed if the military had not Begun with popular unrest in the Southwestern fraternized with the protesters. city of Timisoara and further infl amed by the vi- cious repression by the communist authorities, the After the de facto coup by General Stanculescu December 1989 anti-communist revolution soon and the Romanian military ensured the demise of spread all over Romania, including the capital city the Ceausescu regime, the military allowed civil- of Bucharest. The downfall of Ceausescu was swift, ian leadership to take control, beginning in the and, while a popular revolution set in motion the early stages of the transition. The reasons for the demise of communist dictatorship, what ultimately decision not to establish military rule may have in- ensured the success of the popular movement and cluded: a genuine belief that the role of the military avoided a colossal bloodbath was a de facto coup was not to rule the country, but to support civilian staged by the Romanian military. leadership; the close monitoring of developments in Romania by the world press and public opinion, After dozens of protesters were killed on Decem- and the very negative perceptions that may have ber 16–22, many of them by army bullets, Gen- been created by the replacement of one type of dic- eral Vasile Milea, the minister of defense, died of a tatorship with another; and last, but not least, the gunshot wound to the chest, under suspicious cir- privileged positions made available to former high- cumstances. Ceausescu promptly appointed Gen- ranking military offi cers in the new government or eral Victor Stanculescu as minister of defense, but the opportunities offered to them as the country’s the general refused to carry out an order issued by economy was being privatized. Ceausescu, his direct superior as commander-in- chief of the military, to step up the armed repres- Although its ultimate success was ensured by a sion, and ordered the troops back to their barracks coup d’etat, the Romanian Revolution and its after- instead. Over the years, it has been debated wheth- math were far more complex. A coup d’etat rarely er Stanculescu’s decision may have been the result results in dramatic systemic change, but remark- of a pre-existing conspiracy, but ultimately it was able transformation did happen in Romania in the the only rational decision under the given circum- long run. After the events of December 1989, Ro- 2 mania traversed a diffi cult transition from nation- Under the umbrella of the Interior Ministry, the in- al-communism to emerging capitalism. Through a ternal security force, or Securitate had over 20,000 diffi cult, messy and sometimes violent transition, troops, most of them also conscripts, and the po- Romanians ultimately managed to put in place a lice, or militia, about 30,000. The only “profes- system that was liberal and democratic, although af- sional” combat units within the Interior Ministry fected by cronyism and corruption. Ultimately, the included about 500 presidential guards and about transformation begun in December 1989 resulted 800 members of anti-terrorist squads. In 1989 In- in a functioning democracy and market economy terior Ministry troops appeared to have insuffi cient and Romania’s joining the NATO in March 2004 experience in riot control through the use of non- and the EU in January 2007. lethal force. The system had relied on a network of informants that ensured that dissent was dealt with What conferred legitimacy upon the Romanian swiftly before it could gain momentum to turn into military, allowing it to win the hearts and minds organized rebellion. The sole exceptions had been a of the anti-communist revolutionaries and become coal miner strike in 1977 and a smaller scale rebel- stabilizing force through turbulent times? That le- lion in the city of Brasov in 1987, when a 20,000 gitimacy had been created by the very system the strong demonstration had been dispersed with no military helped bring down. casualties and only 300 arrests. The indiscriminate use of lethal force by Interior Ministry and Minis- Open Access: Military Service, a Shared try of Defense troops against the initial Timisoara Ordeal protests in 1989 infl amed the spirits throughout Romania, and may have ultimately resulted in the In communist Romania, time-honored institu- rapid propagation of the uprising. tions including the monarchy and the multi-party system had been wiped out, and traditional estab- Although by comparison to other Eastern Bloc lishments such as the Romanian Orthodox Church countries military duty was short, the nine to six- were oppressed to the point of extinction. Within teen months of military service were, nonetheless, a one-party system, the two grand establishments a rather traumatizing experience, shared by most one could join were the communist party and the Romanian men, young and old, college graduates military. Although by the mid-1980s about 20% of and high school dropouts, urban and rural dwell- Romanian adults belonged to the communist party, ers.

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