Letter from the Continent

The news of President Nixon’s trip to Rumania came as a bombshell whose effect was delayed, because no one knows yet whether the Soviets knew about it in advance or were taken by surprise. In this guessing game Europeans have the advantage of knowing more or less what the Rumanians are like. The Rumanian language is of Latin origin but its vocabulary is full of Slav, Magyar and Greek words and its grammar has Illyric elements. Russia has interfered more in the affairs of the Rumanians than did the overlord Austrians. In 1812, Russia annexed the eastern part of Moldavia called Bessarabia. Rumania got Bessarabia back after the First World War, but in 1940 it was re-annexed by the Soviet Union with Hitler’s okay and the Russians kept it after World War II. All Rumanians, whatever their political convictions, dream of its eventual return. The same holds true of Northern Bukovina, another historically Rumanian region which has been in Soviet hands since 1940.

This is one important root of the latent animosity of the Rumanians for the Russians. But there is also a cultural one: although the Rumanians are East Europeans of the Greek-Oriental faith, some of those living in what used to be east Hungary are “Greek-Catholics” (Uniates) and resent having been brutally forced into the fold of the Eastern Church. Also, while the soul of Rumania is Eastern, the mind, the intellectual outlook of its people is Western. Rumanians make a cult of their Latin background, their very name is derived from Rome; their spiritual capital was not Berlin or Vienna, but Paris. Rumanian society was more Gallicized than its Russian counterpart and French influences affected not only the upper crust but the entire literary, scientific and artistic life of the country. Sophisticated Rumanians saw themselves as the easternmost outpost of the Western world. The Rumanian Communists fought this attitude at first, but even they had to let up after a while. In Rumania, life is undoubtedly far more “communized” than it is in Yugoslavia, but resistance to Soviet demands is about equally strong. An example: The Rumanian Communists (probably under Russian pressure) changed the spelling from România to Romînia in order to eliminate memories of Rome and Latinity. But a few years ago the old spelling was officially reintroduced. Straws in the wind of this sort reveal more than editorials in Scinteia. The old Francophilia, revived in conjunction with anti-Russian sentiments existing even in the Communist Party, found its most concrete expression in the tumultuous reception for General de Gaulle at the very height of the Paris student riots. There have been other manifestations of pro-Western and anti-Russian sentiments: the resumption of diplomatic relations with Bonn and Madrid; the refusal to condemn Israel after the Six Day War; the close ties with Peking; and the refusal to participate in the attack on Czechoslovakia by the members of the Warsaw Pact.

EK

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Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn

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The news of President Nixon’s trip to Rumania came as a bombshell whose effect was delayed, because no one knows yet whether the Soviets knew about it in advance or were taken by surprise. In this guessing game Europeans have the advantage of knowing more or less what the Rumanians are like. The Rumanian language is of Latin origin but its vocabulary is full of Slav, Magyar and Greek words and its grammar has Illyric elements. Russia has interfered more in the affairs of the Rumanians than did the overlord Austrians. In 1812, Russia annexed the eastern part of Moldavia called Bessarabia. Rumania got Bessarabia back after the First World War, but in 1940 it was re-annexed by the Soviet Union with Hitler’s okay and the Russians kept it after World War II. All Rumanians, whatever their political convictions, dream of its eventual return. The same holds true of Northern Bukovina, another historically Rumanian region which has been in Soviet hands since 1940.

This is one important root of the latent animosity of the Rumanians for the Russians. But there is also a cultural one: although the Rumanians are East Europeans of the Greek-Oriental faith, some of those living in what used to be east Hungary are “Greek-Catholics” (Uniates) and resent having been brutally forced into the fold of the Eastern Church. Also, while the soul of Rumania is Eastern, the mind, the intellectual outlook of its people is Western. Rumanians make a cult of their Latin background, their very name is derived from Rome; their spiritual capital was not Berlin or Vienna, but Paris. Rumanian society was more Gallicized than its Russian counterpart and French influences affected not only the upper crust but the entire literary, scientific and artistic life of the country. Sophisticated Rumanians saw themselves as the easternmost outpost of the Western world. The Rumanian Communists fought this attitude at first, but even they had to let up after a while. In Rumania, life is undoubtedly far more “communized” than it is in Yugoslavia, but resistance to Soviet demands is about equally strong. An example: The Rumanian Communists (probably under Russian pressure) changed the spelling from România to Romînia in order to eliminate memories of Rome and Latinity. But a few years ago the old spelling was officially reintroduced. Straws in the wind of this sort reveal more than editorials in Scinteia. The old Francophilia, revived in conjunction with anti-Russian sentiments existing even in the Communist Party, found its most concrete expression in the tumultuous reception for General de Gaulle at the very height of the Paris student riots. There have been other manifestations of pro-Western and anti-Russian sentiments: the resumption of diplomatic relations with Bonn and Madrid; the refusal to condemn Israel after the Six Day War; the close ties with Peking; and the refusal to participate in the attack on Czechoslovakia by the members of the Warsaw Pact.