DOCUMENT

VLADIMIR SOCOR (New York, U.S.A.) YESHAYAHU JELINEK (Philadelphia, U.S.A.) compilers, translators, and editors

Polish Diplomatic Reports on the Political Crisis in , September 1940

The Iron Guard's advent to power in September, 1940, remains one of the least documented chapters in the modem political history of Romania and in the history of Europe's major radical right-wing movements. Although the Iron Guard has been described as "the most original, spectacular, and success- ful of the interwar fascist movements in ,"i study of this movement is handicapped by the general unavailability of internal primary sources-especially concerning the Iron Guard's rise and rule from mid-1940 to early 1941. However, Polish diplomatic reports2 sent from to London by Poland's ambassador to Romania, Count Roger Raczynski, provide a well-informed, firsthand account of the circumstances surrounding the Guard's accession to power.3

1. See Robert O. Paxton, Europe in the Twentieth Century (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1975), p. 361. 2. The reports published here are part of the Polish Government Collection, box 235, deposited at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace at Stanford, California. The authors express their appreciation to the Hoover Institution for permission to use archival materials, as well as to Dr. Anthony Polonsky of the London School of Econom- ics and Political Science, who called their attention to this collection. Owing to the length of the reports, we provide herein translated excerpts rather than full transcriptions. 3. Count Roger Raczynski (1889-1946), previously wojewoda of Poznan, served in Romania (succeedingMiroslaw Arciszewski) as Poland's ambassador from 1938 to 1940. His younger brother, Count Edward Raczynski, was Poland's prewar and wartime am- bassador to Great Britain. Following the Nazi-Soviet invasion of Poland, the Polish em- bassy in Bucharest performed important tasks in assistingthe exodus of the Polish govern- ment and troops who had found in Romania a haven and a transit route to the West; cf. Raczynski's record of the events in "Zapiski Ambasadora Rogera Raczynskiegodotycz4ce przejscia Naczelnych Wladz Polskich do Rumunii i rezygnacii b. Prezydenta R. P. Prof. Ignacego Moscickiego," ed. Wbdyshw Pob6g-Malinowski,Kultura. 9-10 (1948). Polish- Romanian relations continued for over a year after the occupation of Poland, and were severed only at the beginning of November, 1940, by the Romanian government under the pressure of its German ally; thereupon, Raczynski and the embassy staff left Romania for Great Britain via Turkey; cf. Raczynski, Constantinople, to the Foreign Ministry, 3 November 1940, No. 49/R/1940. ; 95

' After the Nazi-Soviet conquest of Poland, the Polish embassy in Romania became merely a symbolic outpost of the Polish government-in-exile in Lon- don. Henceforth, Polish diplomats in Romania focused attention on monitor- ing the politics of the host country. The Polish embassy informed the govern- ment-in-exile about Romania's relations with Nazi Germany, the , Hungary, and other states as well as about Romanian political life, territorial changes, economy, army, political personalities, and the press. Polish reports also detailed the history of the Iron Guard-also known as the Legion of the Archangel Michael or the Legionary Movement. In these pages we limit ourselves to an account of General Ion Antonescu and the Legionary movement's accession to power in September, 1940, as well as of the first weeks of rule.4 The Legion of the Archangel Michael was a radical, national and social movement inspired by Orthodox religious mysticism. Attracting a large popu- lar and intellectual following, the Legion advocated a total restructuring of Romanian politics and society along egalitarian, integral nationalist, and au- thoritarian lines. The Legion was subjected to more severe police repression

4. Due largely to the continued inaccessibility of primary source materials, the Le- gionary movement's rise to power has not been separately studied by Western historians. However, brief summary accounts by Western scholars are to be found in the following general works: Harald Laeuen, Marschall Antonescu (Essen, 1943), pp. 38-52 (a frank apologia for Antonescu); Henry L. Roberts, Romania: Political Problems of an Agrarian State (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1951; rpt. New York: Archon Books, 1969), pp. 233-34; Henri Prost, Destin de la Roumanie (Paris: Berger-Levrault,1954), pp. 146-54; Eugen Weber, "Romania," in The European Right: A Historical Profile, ed. Hans Rogger and Eugen Weber (Berkeley & Los Angeles: Univ. of California Press, 1966), pp. 558-60 (the most illuminating generaltreatment of the Legionary movement); Nicholas M. Nagy- Talavera, The Green Shirts and the Others: A History of Fascism in Hungary and Ru- mania (Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1970), pp. 307-11; Andreas Hillgruber, Hitler, Kdnig Carol und Marschall Antonescu: Die Deutsch-Rum3nischenBeziehungen 1938-1944 (Wiesbaden: Steiner Verlag, 1954), especially pp. 93-99 (foreign policy in September, 1940). A scant Romanian account is contained in General Antonescu's pro domo after the break with the Legion; Pe marginea prcYpastiei(German translation: Ru- manien am Rande des Abgrundes) (Bucurefi: "Monitorul Oficial," 1942), I, chap. III. A few of the German minister's cables from Bucharest on the events of early September are printed in Documents on German Foreign Policy, Series D, Vol. XI, docs. 9, 17, 19, 21; however, thelengthy, comprehensivedispatch of 11 September lfUIi1Fabncius is not included. Post-WorldWar II Romanian historians have not yet fully addressed themselves to the Legionary movement. The three efforts to date, although based on extensive ar- chival research, are sketchy and unreliable in their data, ideologicalin interpretation, and polemical in tone; cf. Mihai Fatu and Ion Spala#elu,Garda de Fier: Organizafie terorist2i de tip fascist (Hungarian translation: A Vasidr d a-fasisztatipusu terro+ervezet) (Bucu- resti : Editura politica, 1971), pp. 275-87; the collective volume Impotriva fascismului (Bucure5ti: Editura politica, 1971); and Alin Gh. Savu, Dictatura Regal£ (1938-1940) (Bucure§ti: Editura politica, 1970), pp. 433-53. For the Legionary movement's activities in the spring and summer of 1940 until Carol's abdication on 6 September, see the re- cently published volume of recollections by Horia Sima, Sfdr;itul unei domnii sângeroase (Madrid, 1978); the final section, pp. 437-94, offers a detailed factual account of the Le- gionnaires' attempt to overthrow King Carol.