The position of Romania in the 1920s. Romanian National Policy. Romania: the pursuit of greatness
Romania's participation in World War I on the side of the Entente was not successful. The losses of the army amounted to 800 thousand people. (10% of the population). Germany occupied 2/3 of the territory of Romania. The government moved from Bucharest to the city of Iasi. The invaders took out more than 2 million tons of food. The transport system was destroyed. The industry didn't work. There was a food problem. [child mortality was 70%]. The difficult situation forced Romania to stop the war with the powers of the Quarter Union. At the end of November 1917, an armistice was signed. In April 1918, a separate Bucharest peace treaty was signed. The occupation of Romania by German troops continued. Dobruja was taken from her. The Romanian army was subject to demobilization. Romania actually turned into an agrarian and raw material appendage of Germany. She undertook to supply food to Germany, German firms received a monopoly on the development and exploitation of Romanian oil resources for a period of 90 years.
In December 1917, Romania was asked to include Bessarabia by the authority created there - "Sfatul Tarii", or "Council of the Country" (it included officers, officials, representatives of the bourgeoisie and the intelligentsia). This led to the entry of Romanian troops into Bessarabia at the beginning of 1918. At the end of March 1918, the SC decided that Bessarabia would become part of the Romanian Kingdom on terms of autonomy. In December 1918, the SC dissolved itself.
After the signing of the armistice between the Entente and Austria-Hungary and the beginning of the revolution in Germany, on November 10, 1918, Romania announced the denunciation of the Treaty of Bucharest and the resumption of the war with Germany. This returned Romania to the camp of the Entente. The German troops left the country, and on December 1, the government and the royal family returned to Bucharest.
romania war treaty of bucharest
The collapse of Austria-Hungary in the autumn of 1918 revived the idea of a "Greater Romania". Romania put forward claims to a number of neighboring territories. In November 1918, Romania occupied Bukovina [Southern Bukovina decided to join Romania, and in Northern Bukovina the People's Council allegedly spoke in favor of joining Ukraine. Therefore, it is believed that Romania occupied only Northern Bukovina]. The Romanian National Party (established in 1881) headed by Iuliu Maniu was active in Transylvania. She demanded the entry of Transylvania into Romania. The Romanian National Council of Transylvania was created, which on October 31, 1918 declared itself the supreme authority in Transylvania and refused to obey the Hungarian government. It took the so-called. "Declaration of unification" on accession to Romania under the condition of democratic transformations. King Ferdinand agreed to this condition, and the Romanian army entered Transylvania [Transylvania includes 3 regions - Transylvania proper, Crisana and Maramures].
By the beginning of the work of the PMK, Romania included many territories, the claims for which Romania tried to justify by any means. The Allies eventually decided to recognize Romania's territorial gains. Romania's participation in World War I on the side of the Entente spoke in favor of Romania, but the main thing was Romania's participation in the suppression of Soviet power in Hungary in the spring and autumn of 1919. According to the Saint-Germain, Neuilly and Trianon treaties, the so-called. The "Old Kingdom" (ie Wallachia, Moldova and Northern Dobruja) included Bukovina, Transylvania, Southern Dobruja and Eastern Banat. In 1920, the so-called. The Paris Protocol on the legal recognition by the great powers of Romania's annexation of Bessarabia, but it was ratified slowly and remained unratified by Japan, so that it never formally entered into force. In the spring of 1922, King Ferdinand was crowned as sovereign of "Greater Romania".
The territory of the Romanian kingdom after the 1st century increased more than 2 times - from 138 to 295 thousand square kilometers, the population also increased 2 times - from 8 to 16 million people. However, ¼ of the population were national minorities (Hungarians, Germans, Slavs, etc.). Territorial increments have significantly increased the economic potential of Romania. Its industry was 235% of the pre-war level, more than half of it was located in Transylvania. The railway network has grown 3 times (from 3.5 to 11 thousand km), the number of the working class has increased from 250 to 550 thousand people. However, Romania was an agrarian country (more than 80% of the population was employed in agriculture). The most developed branches of industry were light, food and oil production. Almost 80% of the capital in the industrial sector belonged to foreigners (first Austrian and German, then English and French).
In December 1918, an election law was issued. Universal suffrage was introduced for men from the age of 21. However, the political development of Romania was unstable. Weakened the positions of the old parties, including the most influential - the National Liberal Party. It was headed by Ion Bratianu, the head of the Bratianu family, which King Ferdinand himself called "the second Romanian dynasty" for wealth and influence. In 1919, parliamentary elections were postponed five times. From the end of 1918 to the beginning of 1922, 7 cabinets were replaced. They had a coalition character and were formed from representatives of the new parties - the Republican People's Party and the Tsaranist (peasant) party. The elections of 1922 brought the victory of the NLP, and Ion Brătianu became the head of the government. The NLP ruled the country until 1928. The main opposition party and the most massive after the NLP was the National Tsaranist Party, which arose in 1926 by merging the RNPT and the Tsaranist Party. Its leader was Iuliu Maniu (the NCP conducted peasant propaganda; some of its leaders even appeared at royal receptions in peasant clothes - a long shirt and bast shoes).
In March 1923 a new constitution was adopted. Basic democratic rights and freedoms were proclaimed. Significant power powers belonged to the king (dissolution of parliament, appointment of a prime minister, sanctioning and veto over laws and the right to revise the constitution), the cabinet of ministers was not responsible to parliament. The constitution was supplemented by a number of laws. In 1924, a law on national minorities was adopted. In fact, a course was taken towards the assimilation of the non-Romanian population (civil servants had to take exams in the Romanian language, history, geography, and law). In 1925 there was a unification of legislation: the legal norms of the "old kingdom" extended to the entire territory of Romania. In 1926, the new electoral law introduced a de facto majoritarian electoral system (the party that received the relative majority of votes, i.e. 40%, also received the majority of seats in parliament).
In May 1921, the CPR was formed (until the autumn of 1922 - the Socialist-Communist Party). However, repression immediately unfolded against her. The secret police, the Siguranza, were active. Already in 1922, the "trial of the 270" took place over the participants in the First Congress of the CPR. In 1924 the CPR was banned and operated illegally.
From 1922 to 1928 Romania was going through a period of stabilization. Metallurgy (in Transylvania) and the chemical industry received some development. More than 1,000 new enterprises were created. By 1929 the volume industrial production exceeded the level of 1924 by 1.5 times. Industrial growth was facilitated by the government's policy of "self-reliance" (the slogan of the NLP). It implied some restriction and regulation of the flow of foreign capital into the country, the introduction of protectionist customs tariffs. In the 20s. the economic elite of the "old kingdom", with the support of the NLP, pursued a policy of pushing the bourgeoisie of the newly annexed regions and national minorities into the background. In 1921, the agrarian reform promised back in 1918 began. The land maximum was set (from 100 to 500 hectares). The surplus was redeemed by the peasants on the rights of use (the free sale of the acquired land was temporarily prohibited). The agrarian reform strengthened the prosperous peasantry and contributed to the further development of capitalism in the countryside.
In the mid 20s. the internal situation worsened. King Ferdinand I and the head of the Brătianu clan - Ion Brătianu - were already old. The NCP tried to unite all opposition forces around Crown Prince Karol (the "Carlist Opposition"). The prince opposed the influence of the Brătianu clan, but with the help of the king (mainly Queen Mary), they succeeded in depriving Karol of the rights of succession to the throne and expelling him from the country in 1926 (the reason was his family affairs). Ferdinand's heir was declared by his grandson - the young son of Karol, Mihai. The NCP began to demand the return of Karol to the country.
In July 1927 King Ferdinand died. The 6-year-old Mihai I was declared king. A regency council was created under him. In November 1927, Ion Brătianu also died. His brother Vintila Brătianu became prime minister. However, the position of the NLP has already weakened. In the elections at the end of 1928, the NCP won almost 80% of the votes. She formed the government and remained in power until the beginning of 1934.
Already from the end of 1928, the Romanian economy began to decline, which was replaced by a crisis. The decline in production peaked in May 1932 and amounted to 40%, unemployment - 300 thousand people. The industrial crisis was intertwined with the agrarian one. There were "price scissors". Over 80% of peasant farms had debts. Unlike the NLP, the NCP pursued an "open door" approach, making loans, attracting foreign investment, and giving out concessions. In 1931-33. an economic stabilization program was implemented under the name "3 sacrificial curves" (I - in 1931, II - in 1932, III - at the beginning of 1933). It was a policy of "austerity", during which, in order to reduce budget expenditures, the number of civil servants was reduced 3 times and their salaries were reduced. To combat unemployment, the unemployed were forcibly relocated to the countryside and "labor emigration" abroad was encouraged. Export bonuses were introduced for the export of grain. In 1931, a ban was introduced on the sale of peasant farms for debts. In 1932, the peasants received the right to sell their plots, the state wrote off half of their debts and reimbursed the rest to creditors, but the peasants T.o. became debtors of the state (for 30 years, later - for 17). Romania began to emerge from the crisis in 1934.
Intensified during the crisis labor movement. In mid-February 1933, the largest strike in the history of Romania took place - workers of the railway workshops in the Bucharest suburb of Grivitsa, called "Red Grivitsa".
During the crisis, the political situation was turbulent. There was a fragmentation of parties (in 1928 - 7 bourgeois parties, in 1932 - 17). Early elections were often held, in 1929-33. 10 cabinets were replaced, 9 of them were formed by the NCP. In 1930, the Parliament rehabilitated Prince Carol and allowed him to return to Romania. After returning, he was crowned in June 1930 as Carol II. However, he began to move away from the NCP and sought to negotiate with the new leadership of the NLP (V. Brătianu died at the end of 1930).
At the same time, the activities of fascist organizations (the Association of Christian Students, the League of National Christian Defense) became more active. The leader of one of them, "captain" C. Codreanu, in 1927 created the fascist organization "Legion of Archangel Michael", which in 1930 was transformed into the paramilitary "Iron Guard". She led anti-government agitation and regularly carried out "actions of intimidation" (for example, she carried out the assassination of the Prime Minister (Jon Duca) in December 1933). In 1933 the government banned the Iron Guard.
In November 1933, the NCP government resigned. The PNL won the December parliamentary elections.
In foreign policy in the 20s Romania was an ardent supporter of the preservation of the Versailles borders. She sought to find allies who were also interested in this. In 1921, Romania, together with Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia, became a member of the AI, opposing the revanchist aspirations of Hungary and Bulgaria. Romania maintained close ties with Poland. In March 1921, a Romanian-Polish treaty was signed, which formalized the military-political union of these countries, which existed until 1939. To further isolate Hungary and Bulgaria, Romania, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia in February 1933 signed the "Organizational Pact" MA.
France acted as a foreign policy reference point for Romania. In June 1926, the Franco-Romanian treaty was signed. Romania also supported the French Pan-Europe project. However, in September 1926, Romania signed a friendship treaty with Italy. Relations remained invariably tense not only with Hungary and Bulgaria, but also with the USSR. Romania remained the only one of the border states with the USSR that did not have diplomatic relations with it. Only the demarcation of the border along the river was carried out. Dniester.
16. Domestic and foreign policy of Romania in 1918-1939.
Interwar period 1920-1939
post-war system peace treaties, which determined the post-war structure of Europe, more than doubled the size of Romania, adding to the "Old Kingdom" Transylvania, Dobruja, Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina and part of the Banat. The process of political unification of all Romanians in one state was completed. This unification was sanctioned by the wedding of King Ferdinand and Queen Mary to the throne of "Greater Romania" in Alba Iulia in 1922 and the adoption of a new constitution in 1923.
However, neither in the USSR, nor in Hungary and Bulgaria did the expansion of the borders of Romania find understanding, and the entire content of the Romanian foreign policy of 1920-1939 boils down to attempts to retain the newly acquired territories. Romania participated in the system of military alliances created under the auspices of French diplomacy; in 1921, together with Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia, they formed the "Little Entente", directed against the attempts of Germany, Hungary and Bulgaria to revise the post-war peace agreements. In February 1934, Romania, with Yugoslavia, Turkey and Greece, formed the "Balkan Entente", with the help of which it intended to contain the territorial ambitions of Bulgaria. Romania also concluded a military alliance with Poland directed against the USSR.
King Ferdinand died in 1927; his son Karol was a highly controversial figure. In 1920, he married the Greek princess Elena, and the following year a boy was born from this marriage, who was named Mihai. However, later Karol became interested in his stenographer Elena Lupescu and, renouncing his rights to the throne, left with her for Paris. Therefore, after the death of Ferdinand, the 6-year-old Mihai became king of Romania, on whose behalf the regency council ruled.
The Great Depression of 1929-1933 undermined the foundations of the Romanian economy. A million Romanians have lost their jobs, poverty has become the most acute problem of the country.
In such difficult situations, many people tend to look for the easiest way out. And such a way out was offered to the Romanians by the Iron Guard, a fascist organization created in 1927 by the nationalist Corneliu Codreanu, who became famous for killing the chief of police in Iasi with his bare hands. Supporters of the "Iron Guard" blamed all the troubles of Romania on the communists, Jews and liberals and advocated the establishment of a dictatorship in the country. The popularity of the "Iron Guard" grew, and in order to contain its onslaught, the Romanian ruling circles instead of the child Mihai invited the exiled Karol to the throne. In 1930 he became the Romanian king under the name Carol II.
However, despite all the measures, the chaos grew, intensifying the general discontent. Communist-led workers in factories and railways went on strike; the government brutally repressed the strikers and imprisoned Communist Party leader Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Deja. In 1933, supporters of the Iron Guard assassinated Romanian Prime Minister Ion Ducu. After the failure of all attempts to stabilize the political situation by legal means, Carol II, in April 1938, repealed the constitution, outlawed the Iron Guard and all political parties, and established a regime of personal power. On April 19, the police arrested and imprisoned Codreanu and other leaders of the Iron Guard, who were later killed "while trying to escape."
Since the mid-1930s, Romania has been increasingly drawn into the orbit of influence of fascist Germany. On March 23, 1939, Romania and Germany signed a joint ten-year program for the economic development of Romania, which allowed Germany to exploit the country's natural resources.
Political life in the period 1918–1937
Political parties. A direct consequence of the unification of 1918 and the reforms carried out during the First World War, as well as after its end, was the complete eradication of the political system, in which the Old Kingdom was dominated by two parties - national liberals and conservatives. As a result of the adoption of laws on universal suffrage and agrarian reform, the Conservative Party collapsed. After 1918, only once, in 1922, did a conservative faction led by Take Ionescu manage to come to power, but in the elections held at the end of that year, it did not win a single seat in parliament. The Conservative Party disappeared from the Romanian political scene.
The National Liberal Party (NLP) continued to play an important role in the political life of the country even after the war. The liberals were in power from 1914 to 1918 (with a short break in March-November 1918), when, like other liberal parties in Europe, they lost their own organized elections on the basis of universal suffrage. After a short respite associated with the reorganization and expansion of their influence in the annexed territories, the liberals returned to power in the period 1922-1928. (with a break in March–November 1927) and 1933–1937. (200) In 1922–1927 the liberals were the most successful. The basis of the National Liberal Party was the financial oligarchy, united around the Romanian Bank and led by the Brătianu family. Forced to reckon with the conditions that developed after 1918, the liberal leaders developed a new program that included: the need to adopt a new constitution, implement administrative and legislative unity, achieve economic stabilization, limit the access of foreign capital to the country's economy by implementing the principle of "own ”, as well as the establishment of equality between all citizens, etc. In order to strengthen their own organizations in the annexed provinces, the National Liberal Party united with the Peasant Party of Bessarabia and the Democratic Party of the Unification of Bukovina, and in Transylvania it managed to attract a number of representatives of the Romanian /560/ elites. Ion I. C. Brătianu was elected the chairman of the party, and Vintile Brătianu, I. G. Duca, Constantin I. C. Brătianu, Gheorghe Brătianu, Constantin Angelescu, Gheorghe Tătărescu, and others became the top leadership. The newspaper became the main publication of the party. "Viitorul" ("Future"). (201)
The death of Ion I.C. Brătianu in November 1927 brought about changes in the leadership of this political party. Vintile Brătianu was at the head of the party, but a year later the liberals withdrew from power. After the death of Ion I.K. Bratianu, several factions formed within the NLP. In 1930, despite the reorganization carried out, disagreements continued to exist in the party. Gheorghe Bratianu created the "NLP Gheorghe Bratianu" (the program of which provided for the moral renewal of the country, the introduction of strict principles of economy, the reduction of duties and taxes, the establishment of strict control over the property of officials, etc.), and Constantin Argetoianu, who also departed from the liberals, founded his own political party "Agrarian Union". In December 1930, I. G. Duka was elected to the post of chairman of the NLP. His attempts to restore the prestige of the party were unsuccessful, and three years later he was assassinated by members of the extreme right. Constantin (Dinu) Brătianu became the leader of the party. The National Liberal Party returned to power in 1934, but King Carol II appointed Gheorghe Tătărescu, a member of the Young Liberals, as head of government, not the chairman of the PNL.
At the beginning of the interwar period, the National Liberal Party did not have an equal political rival in strength, thanks to this circumstance it was not subjected to external pressure, and the level of internal tension decreased. In addition, the leader of the liberals, Ion I. K. Bratian, managed to find a common language with King Ferdinand. This situation changed in 1926, when the National-Tserenist Party appeared on the Romanian political scene, formed as a result of the merger of the National Party of Transylvania (under the leadership of Iuliu Maniu) with the Peasants' Party of the Old Kingdom. Iuliu Maniu was elected as the chairman of the party. Other prominent figures of the party were Alexandru Vaida-Voevod, Ion Mihalache, Nicolae Lupu, and others. Although, compared to the liberals, the National Tarenist Party enjoyed wider support from the electorate, it was still in power for a rather short time in 1928–1931. and in 1932-1933. (202) /561/
The leaders of the National-Tserenists, who possessed a sense of patriotism, but lacked the political dexterity and flexibility that the liberals had, made a number of tactical mistakes, among which was their pre-election alliance with the extreme right forces in 1937. This was accompanied by their unsuccessful coming to power precisely during the period world economic crisis. The party program contained very important provisions, such as ensuring the rights and freedoms of citizens, conducting an administrative reform in order to decentralize and strengthen local self-government, removing justice from the influence of political forces, etc. The new party paid special attention to agriculture, based on considerations of that Romania should remain an agrarian country. Its main printed organ was the newspaper "Dreptatya" ("Justice"). Having lost power, the National Tserenist Party remained one of the main opposition forces in relation to dictatorial regimes, advocating the preservation of a democratic system based on the provisions of the Constitution of 1923. At the same time, the party was not devoid of internal contradictions and rivalry, and many of its leaders either moved to other parties, or created their own political groupings. For example, N. Lupu formed a new Peasant Party, while trying to restore the former party under the same name, and E. Filipescu joined the People's Party. (203)
In addition to the National Liberal and National Tarenist parties, such political forces alternated in power as the People's Party (led by Marshal Alexandru Averescu, which was represented in the government in 1920–1921 and in 1926–1927), the Nationalist Democratic the party led by the famous historian Nicolae Iorga (1931–1932), the National Christian Party led by Octavian Goga and A.C. Cuza (1937–1938). On the political scene of Romania, such parties as the Socialist Party, Democratic Party associations of Bukovina (headed by Ion Nistor), the Peasants' Party of Bessarabia (headed by Ion Inculec), parties of national minorities were also represented (the Hungarian Party, the Hungarian Union, the German Party, the Swabian People's Party, the Jewish Party, the Jewish Union), etc.
As a result of influence from outside, parties of extreme left and extreme right forces appeared in Romania, which, however, in the interwar /562/ ny period and could not get the required number of votes in the elections to take power. Compared to other European countries, the influence of left-wing parties in the Romanian political arena was limited. In November 1918, the Social Democratic Party of the Old Kingdom was renamed the Socialist Party and finally broke off relations with the Second International. After voting on December 1, 1918 for the unification of their province with Romania, the Transylvanian Social Democrats decided to cooperate with the Socialist Party of the Old Kingdom in order to achieve the unity of the labor movement throughout the country. At the May 1919 congress of the Socialist Party of the Old Kingdom, an election program was adopted, which was joined by the rest of the socialist parties of the country and which provided for the introduction of universal suffrage for persons over 18 years of age, the expropriation of all landowners' land, the nationalization of industry, and the implementation of reforms in favor of the workers, etc. The congress also decided to include four representatives of Transylvania in the Executive Committee, as well as two representatives of Bukovina and Bessarabia, which essentially meant the unification of the socialist parties. (204)
In 1921, the Socialist Party split into supporters of the Third International (communists) and those who advocated the preservation of the social democratic line. In October 1922, the Second Congress of the Communist Party of Romania took place, at which the general secretary (George Christescu) was elected, the Central Committee was formed and its charter was adopted. According to the charter communist party Romania was in the position of a department of the Comintern, unconditionally accepting as its own only the goals and tasks of the Comintern. Throughout the interwar period, the number of CPR was insignificant. As a result of the adopted program and the ongoing anti-national ideology, as well as after the bloody incidents in the town of Tatarbunary in 1924, near the Romanian-Soviet border, the Communist Party was outlawed. (205)
On the extreme right flank of the Romanian political struggle was the legionary movement, which was entangled in mysticism, encouraged hatred and intolerance, anti-Semitism and anti-Western sentiments. In the first half of the 20s, the role of /563/ vyh political parties was absolutely insignificant. The beginning of the legionary movement dates back to 1922-1923, when Corneliu Zele Codreanu created the Association of Christian Students, and then the professor of the University of Iasi, A.C. Cuza, founded the League of National Christian Defense, which included the Codreanu Society. This organization opposed political parties, advocated limiting the role of parliament and strengthening the role of the monarchy in the political life of the country. The National Christian Defense League created its own paramilitary units, called "lanchiers" (uhlans), who often resorted to violence, mainly against Jews. However, a conflict arose within the League between its leader, A.C. Cuza, and his closest collaborator, Zelea Codreanu. The first gave the League the significance of a broad supra-party national movement and supported the idea of carrying out educational measures in order to change the mentality of the masses. While Codreanu sought to turn it into a well-organized party, which was to launch an intensified anti-Semitic campaign and use any means (including assassinations) to achieve its goal. He sought to disseminate his ideas through the press and at open meetings.
In 1927, Corneliu Zela Codreanu founded the Legion of Michael the Archangel, which after 1930 was called the "Iron Guard" and had much in common with the extremist parties of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy (glorification of the leader, form of greeting, dress code, anti-Semitism), and its recruited members and sympathizers primarily from among urban youth, including students, as well as from the ranks of rural priests, workers, peasants and people who were on the sidelines public life. After the assassination in 1933 of liberal Prime Minister I. G. Duka, the Iron Guard was outlawed, but the following year it was transformed into a political party called All for the Fatherland. In the elections in 1937, the legionnaire party took third place, receiving the largest number of votes in its entire existence. After the removal of its leader by order of the king in 1938, the legionary party, headed by Horea Sima, who enjoyed some support from Nazi Germany, returned again in 1940 to the Romanian political arena. (206) /564/
Parliament represented the legislature, and its activities were carried out on the basis of the Constitution of 1923. It consisted of two chambers (the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies), and the post of chairman of the parliament was usually held by a well-known political or cultural figure of the country. The Chamber of Deputies consisted of deputies (residents of Romania and over 25 years of age) who were elected by the adult population by universal, direct, equal, compulsory and secret suffrage. Part of the Senate was made up of members by right, which included heirs to the throne who had reached the age of 18, the metropolitan of the country, diocesan bishops of two Romanian denominations, heads of churches recognized by the state, the president of the Romanian Academy, former chairmen of the Council of Ministers, whose total experience in this post was four years, former ministers with a total experience of six years, former chairmen of the parliamentary chambers, former chairmen of the local parliaments of Transylvania, Bukovina and Bessarabia. Members of parliament could make inquiries to the government, and ministers were accountable for their actions to the legislature. The majority in parliament belonged to representatives of the National Liberal and National Tserenist parties, and during the meetings important documents for the Romanian society were adopted: ratification of peace treaties, approval of the unification acts of Transylvania, Bukovina and Bessarabia with the Romanian kingdom, administrative law, agrarian reform, law on elections, budget, etc. The most important piece of legislation was the adoption in March 1923 of a new Constitution. In it, Romania was proclaimed a nationally united and indivisible state, the population of which was guaranteed the most advanced civil rights and freedoms, which made it possible to consider it one of the most democratic constitutions of its time. The constitution guaranteed citizens personal freedom, inviolability of housing, freedom of conscience, freedom of speech and the press. It contained provisions that guaranteed the right to property. According to the fundamental law of the country, power belonged to the people, who exercised it through their elected representatives on the basis of the principles written in the constitution, including the principle of separation of powers. (207)
Government. According to the Constitution of 1923, executive power was exercised in the name of the king. Between 1918 and /565/ In 1940, 38 cabinets changed in Romania. Measures were taken to achieve legislative unity and integration of the annexed provinces, a monetary circulation system was organized with the introduction of a single coin in 1920, agrarian reform was carried out, a law on territorial unity was adopted, laws were prepared on the economic and cultural development of the country.
One of the most important tasks of most governments in the early postwar years was to carry out agrarian reform. The law on agrarian reform in Oltenia, Wallachia, Moldova and Dobruja was adopted on July 17, 1921, and on July 30 for Transylvania, Banat, Crisana and Maramures, as well as for Bukovina. These laws summarized those adopted in 1917–1920. legislative acts in this area. In essence, they had a single character, taking into account some peculiar features of each province. The provision on the impossibility of selling or mortgaging the received land before its full redemption has become common. It should be noted, however, that the largest plots were allocated in Transylvania, where the political consciousness of the peasantry was most developed, and the liberals sought to enlist significant support. (208)
On the basis of a new fundamental law, in July 1925 a law on territorial unity was adopted, and in March 1926 a new law on elections. According to the law on the administrative structure, Romania was divided into counties (led by prefects), and these, in turn, were divided into volosts (led by praetors), which consisted of urban or rural communes and villages headed by mayors. The new law of 1938 on the administrative structure introduced an additional link - tsinuts, each of which united several counties. Throughout the country, 10 qinuts were formed, at the head of which the king appointed his deputies.
As for the electoral legislation, along with those adopted in 1918-1920. provisions in March 1926, a law was published on the "electoral bonus", according to which a party that achieved 40% total number votes, received 50% of parliamentary seats. The rest of the mandates were distributed among all the parties participating in the elections, taking into account the party that won the "electoral bonus". Although this law was contrary to the provisions of the Constitution of 1923, since favorable /566/ was only a political party, it was retained until 1939. Among the important legislative acts were laws on the development of education (on primary education in 1924 and on secondary education in 1928), on the structure of the judiciary, etc.
After the unification of Transylvania with Romania, almost 8% of the country's population were Greek Catholics. The Orthodox and Greek Catholic Churches were recognized as "national churches" and enjoyed the support of the government. In February 1925, by a separate law, the Metropolitan of Wallachia was elevated to the rank of Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church. Miron Kristea became the first patriarch. In May 1928, a law was approved on general principles the actions of cults, which provided that along with the Orthodox there were also such religions as Greek Catholic (Uniate), Catholic, Reformed, Lutheran-Evangelical, Unitarian, Armenian-Gregorian, Jewish and Muslim. Other laws were adopted in the spirit of the emerging new realities. (209)
Justice represented the third power in the state. According to the constitution, judicial decisions were made on the basis of the law and executed in the name of the king. Judges became permanent. In 1924, a law was passed on the structure of the judiciary. According to this law, representatives of the judiciary could not hold other public positions, be elected to parliament or communal and county councils, did not have the right to hold administrative positions or be elected to the audit commissions of commercial companies, but enjoyed the right to teach at the law faculties of the country or at universities. at the place of residence. (210)
Monarchy. According to the constitution and charter royal family the king appointed the prime minister, appointed and recalled ministers, approved laws, had the right to conclude agreements and treaties, mint coins, assign awards, and was the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Any official document of the sovereign was signed by the minister in charge of the issue under consideration. According to the constitution, the king opened parliamentary sessions by reading his speech from the throne, to which the chamber of deputies and the senate formulated answers. The king announced the closing of the session and could convene extraordinary /567/ parliamentary sessions. The king had the right to dissolve both chambers at the same time or one of them. The dissolution decree was to provide for the organization of new elections within two months and the commencement of new legislative chambers within three months. (211)
King Ferdinand, who ruled from 1914-1927, played an important role in the formation and strengthening of the new united state. October 15, 1922 cathedral The unification in Alba Iulia hosted the coronation ceremony of Ferdinand and Queen Mary as sovereigns of a united Romania. During his reign, a program was implemented to complete the unification process, develop and modernize society, which took place against the background of the crisis of the dynasty in 1925, when Crown Prince Karol renounced this right and went abroad with his beloved Elena Lupescu. All attempts by Ferdinand to convince Karol to return were in vain, and then at a joint meeting on January 4, 1926, both houses of parliament, taking into account the fact that the crown prince had refused the throne, proclaimed Michael, son of Karol, the heir of King Ferdinand. Karol was forbidden to return to the country, and measures were also provided for those who could oppose this decision taken in January 1926. In 1927, King Ferdinand died, and his young grandson Mihai became the heir. A regency council was created, which included Prince Nicolae (Carol's brother), the Patriarch of Romania, Miron Cristea, and the President of the Court of Cassation, Gheorghe Buzdugan, who was replaced after his death by Constantin Sarateanu.
After the death of Ferdinand, an intensified campaign was launched in the country in support of the return of Karol and his enthronement. At the head of this campaign was the National-Tserenist Party, which in fact achieved the removal of the liberals from power in this way. After lengthy negotiations with the Nationalist leaders, Carol returned to the country on June 6, 1930, and two days later the Parliament proclaimed him King of Romania under the name Carol II. Under him was the "royal camarilla", which consisted of a significant number of people close to him. (212)
The question of the role of Carol II in the history of Romania has been and remains the subject of constant debate. For many, Carol II, who is seen as a forerunner of fascism and a traitor /568/ democracy, was, nevertheless, a man of his time who, although he did not manage to completely solve all the problems of the period of the 1930s, at least strove to overcome them. His activities showed a lack of respect and trust in the principles of democracy in the interwar period. His political creed is an authoritarian system of government, in which the sovereign became the decisive political factor and the initiator of all political actions. Evidence of this was his attitude towards Iuliu Maniu, who ensured his return from exile and to whom Karol responded with ingratitude. Maniu supported the idea of the existence of democracy under the control of a constitutional monarchy, Karol, for his part, believed that the prime minister should only be the executor of the will of the king. The break between the king and Iuliu Maniu is seen as the end of the democratic experiment. The resignation of Maniu from the post of prime minister, the official motivation for which was Carol's extramarital affairs with Elena Lupescu, could not hide the real reason for this gap, namely the refusal of the king to cede the palm to the head of government and submit to the nationalist policy. Simultaneously with the accusations against Elena Lupescu (of Jewish origin), Maniu touched upon the Jewish question, which in the 1930s was increasingly present in the speeches of political leaders and cultural figures. (213)
Romanian political life in the 1930s was marked by the collapse of democratic institutions. The liberals and nationalists have lost their dominance, which they had enjoyed in the previous decade. The resignation of Iuliu Maniu from the post of prime minister was followed by a period of ministerial leapfrog. (214) In April 1931, a government of national unity was formed under the chairmanship of Nicolae Iorga. Unlike the previous ones, this cabinet was not formed on a party basis, all its members were appointed by the king. Such a government was in every way in the interests of the king, who could thus do without the support of large political parties. Government policies in the period 1931–1933 was not particularly dynamic, and specially taken measures to address social and economic issues did not lead to any results. /569/
The formation of a new nationalist cabinet chaired by Alexander Vaid-Voevoda (June 1932 - September 1933) also could not be considered best solution question. Moreover, as a result of the economic crisis and the suppression of the labor movement by force (for example, the strike of railway workers in February 1933), the party's popularity declined significantly. (215) In the autumn of 1933, the national-Tserenist government was replaced by another - a national-liberal one headed by I. G. Duka. The new prime minister took steps to eliminate the consequences of the economic crisis and reduce tensions in the country. He took an uncompromising stand against the Iron Guard, which he had disbanded. The Iron Guards took revenge on him for this by killing him in December of that year.
On January 4, 1934, the leader of the Young Liberals, Gheorghe Tătărescu, appointed to replace I. G. Duca, led the longest-serving government in the history of interwar Romania. Until November 17, 1937, it carried out a program that gave a significant impetus to the development of the national economy, especially industry, it supported customs protectionism, the issuance of loans to new enterprises, etc. Particular attention was paid to the armed forces, which were modernized (taking into account the growth of revisionism in the international arena), agriculture was also supported through the issuance of loans and the adoption of a number of measures that could improve the technical equipment and product quality in this area. During the tenure of the government of Tătărescu, a significant the economic growth, as a result of which in 1937 the level of social production increased by 70% compared with 1932, and the national income increased by 60%. (216) During this period, the role of the monarchy increased. Having transgressed the limits of his powers established by the constitution, Karol exerted influence on the government, which in turn took a number of legislative measures that allowed him to fully control the situation in the country. In fact, proposals for the adoption of laws aimed at strengthening the powers of the executive branch and weakening the role of parliament and the opposition came mainly from Karol himself.
The period of the 1930s was largely marked by ever-increasing tensions between the king and the big politicians. /570/ political parties, on the one hand, and between the king and the far right, on the other. After the assassination of I. G. Duka, for the first time since 1862, censorship was reintroduced, and the government received the right to act solely on the basis of royal decrees. The split within the liberal wing was facilitated by Gheorghe Brătianu, an adherent of the old Bratian tradition (son of J.I.K. Brătianu, an outstanding historian, but a very mediocre politician) and close to King George Tătărescu. The liberals, although having achieved significant success in the socio-economic and cultural fields, began to gradually lose their popularity, which led to their defeat in the elections at the end of 1937 (217).
From the book The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. Volume I author Shearer William LawrenceLIFE IN THE THIRD REICH: 1933-1937 Just at this time, in the middle of the summer of 1934, I arrived in the Third Reich for a permanent job. And I discovered in the new Germany a lot of things that impressed, puzzled, disturbed a foreign observer. The vast majority of German
From the book World History: in 6 volumes. Volume 2: Medieval Civilizations of the West and East author Team of authorsPOLITICAL ROLE AND POLITICAL LIFE OF CITIES IN ITALY AND GERMANY XIII-XIV centuries. - the time of the rise of cities, which were, as mentioned above, the most dynamic element of medieval society, a fundamental source of change in all spheres of his life. In development
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From the book History of Ukraine. Popular science essays author Team of authorsThe political situation in Ukraine in May - October 1918 On May 10, 1918, the government of F. Lyzohub published a declaration in which it recognized as its main task "to strengthen the state order in Ukraine and, in conditions of complete peace and real will, lead the country to
From the book Airborne Forces. History of the Russian landing author Alekhin Roman ViktorovichIn the 1930s the population of Romania exceeded 19 million people. Romanians (71.9%), Hungarians (7%), Germans (4.1%), Jews (4%), Ukrainians (3.2%), Russians (2.3%) lived within the borders of Romania in 1940 ), Bulgarians (2%), Gypsies (1.5%), Turks (0.9%) and other peoples. By the beginning of World War II, interethnic relations in Romania were in the stage of "smoldering conflict".
In the second quarter of the twentieth century. in Romania, the emerging from the second half of the 18th century became widespread. the myth of the national exclusivity and national mission of the Romanians, who were declared the descendants and cultural heirs of the two great peoples of antiquity - the Romans and the Dacians, who rallied into a single ethnic entity in the southern foothills of the Carpathians during the reign of the Roman emperor Trajan (53 - 117 AD). They were assigned the role of a civilized people, surrounded by barbarians - Slavs, Turks and Magyars. Gradually, the idea of “Romanization” of national minorities arose, and anti-Jewish and anti-Gypsy sentiments were also stable. Since the 1930s various kinds of Romanian national radical parties and movements were formed: the Anti-Semitic Union, the National Italian-Romanian Fascist Movement, the National Romanian Fasci, the National Fascist Movement, the Iron Guard.
Despite the fact that the Romanian parliament adopted in March 1919 a law on the rights of national minorities, in national educational institutions were obliged to teach in Romanian, national periodicals and book publishers were closed, national names were changed to the corresponding Romanian names, etc. Moldavians were officially accepted to unequivocally refer to Romanians.
In June 1934, the Romanian parliament approved the bill "On the use of Romanian workers in private firms", developed by the government of the National Liberal Party. According to the new law, 80% of the employees of any enterprise were to be Romanians. The Ministry of Industry and Trade sent a special questionnaire to all private firms, which included a question about the ethnic origin of employees. The introduction of this law resulted in mass layoffs of representatives of national minorities.
At the same time, there were legislative acts that formally ensured the rights of national minorities in emergency conditions. So, they had the right to refuse military service in the event of the outbreak of hostilities with the country in which their fellow tribesmen are the “titular nation”. However, as practice has shown, this law was not implemented. Russian citizens of Romania were called into the army everywhere during the war with the USSR. This concerned, in particular, the Lipovan Old Believers, who lived from the 18th century. in the lower reaches of the Danube. For example, in 1943 - 1944. the officer of the quartermaster service of the Romanian Royal Army was the famous Russian singer, emigrant Petr Leshchenko.
During the occupation of Bessarabia and Transnistria by Romania, the official use of the Russian language was prohibited here. Romanian was taught in schools. On November 20, 1943, all schools were closed in Transnistria, except for Romanian ones. In southern Ukraine, there was also a policy of ousting the Russian language in schools.
Romanian "great power" nationalism clashed with nationalism and separatist sentiments of political movements of national minorities. This applies to Romanian Germans (German Parliamentary Party, Saxon Party), Hungarians (Hungarian National Party), Ukrainians (Bukovina Liberation Movement, Ukrainian Party), Moldovans (Union of Bessarabians, Bessarabian National Union, Union of Struggle for the Liberation of Bessarabia), Jews (Union of Romanian Jews, Jewish State Party, Jewish National Party, Jewish Party, Romanian Zionist Federation, New Zionist Organization), Bulgarians (Bulgarian Party). On the one hand, their activities allowed national minorities to fight for their identity and rights, but on the other hand, they radicalized the entire system of interethnic relations in Romania.
The Hungarian, Moldavian and Bulgarian parties advocated the separation of the regions inhabited respectively by Hungarians, Moldavians and Bulgarians from Romania and their reunification with Hungary, the USSR and Bulgaria. The annexations of part of the territory of Romania by the Soviet Union, Hungary and Bulgaria that followed in 1940 led to massive displacements of the population, numbering in the hundreds of thousands of people, as well as interethnic clashes and pogroms.
The Romanian Germans were largely guided by the processes taking place in Germany. In 1932, they formed the National Socialist Mutual Assistance Movement for Germans in Romania, which was soon banned. However, in 1934 it was recreated under a different name - "National Movement for the Revival of the Germans in Romania." The Fuhrer of the "revivalists" was the former officer of the Austrian army Fritz Fabricius. This movement advocated autonomy for the Germans in Romania and found opponents not only in the person of the Romanian authorities and nationalists, but also in the German Evangelical Church in Romania, led by Dr. Hans Otto Roth. In 1940 - 1941, despite the fact that the processes of Romanization of local Germans stopped, many of them emigrated to Germany. The remaining Volksdeutsche were able to voluntarily join the Wehrmacht and the SS troops. Police detachments recruited from Bessarabian and Novorossiysk Germans operated on the territory of Transnistria. They took an active part in punitive actions in the zone of Romanian occupation.
In 1940 - 1944 small ethnic groups in Romania - Armenians, Greeks, Turks, Tatars and others - were subjected to repression and the greatest Romanization. So, according to the law of August 8, 1940, their entrepreneurial activity strictly regulated and limited by interest rates. However, none of the peoples of Romania was subjected to such persecution as Jews and Gypsies. In the 1920s - 1930s. in Romania, there was a noticeable increase in anti-Jewish sentiment, especially among the Romanian intelligentsia and students. Many universities introduced percentage norms for the admission of Jews. After the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, various Romanian parties began to adopt anti-Semitic programs. In 1935, the National Peasant Party merged with the National Christian Defense League, creating the National Christian Party, whose programmatic demand was the protection of Christian workers "by preferring Romanian ethnic elements" and the "Romanization of company personnel", that is, the removal of Jews even from private enterprises.
In 1935, the Board of the Law Association passed a resolution on the percentage rate for Jewish lawyers. Jews were no longer accepted into the association; sometimes licenses were withdrawn from Jews who were already members of it.
In 1940, 728,115 Jews lived in Romania. In the late 1930s, after the adoption of legislative acts aimed at ousting Jews from various areas economic and intellectual life, the catastrophic impoverishment of the Jewish population of Romania began. Therefore, Jews played a significant role in the socialist and communist movement in Romania.
In the summer of 1940, during the annexation of part of the Romanian territory Soviet Union, Hungary and Bulgaria during the retreat, the Romanian soldiers staged pogroms, accompanied by murders. For example, in Dobruja on June 30, 1940, 52 people were killed. Jews were thrown out of refugee trains bound for Romania.
On August 8, 1940, laws were passed in Romania on the universal limitation of the number of Jews in higher educational institutions. Jews were also removed from all government posts, including the army.
From September 1940 a period of cruel anti-Jewish terror began, lasting five months. Jewish shops and businesses were confiscated throughout the country. In order to obtain statements from the owners about the transfer of property to the Romanians, they were subjected to torture.
On January 21, 1941, the Iron Guard attempted a coup d'état. While some detachments of the Iron Guard fought with parts of the Romanian army for control of Bucharest, others attacked the Jews of the capital. 125 Jews were killed and 140 maimed, several synagogues were destroyed.
Soon after the start of the war with the USSR, on June 29, 1941, Romanian soldiers staged a pogrom in Iasi; where about 12,000 Jews perished.
In Bessarabia, Bukovina, southern Ukraine, the advancing Romanian troops everywhere took part in the destruction of the Jewish population of the USSR.
In August 1941, the Romanian authorities began deporting Jews from Bukovina and Bessarabia under their control across the Dniester to the German zone of occupation. The Germans refused to accept the deportees, they shot many, others were sent back to the Romanian zone, where some of them were immediately killed by the Romanian gendarmes; many drowned in the Dniester or died of disease and starvation on the way (4,400 people) to the concentration camps in Bessarabia.
Those who died on the trains of death. August 1941
Within five weeks after the start of the war, half of the Jewish population (about 160 thousand people) living in Bessarabia and Bukovina was destroyed. In September 1941, in the territory occupied by the Romanian army, Jews began to be imprisoned in ghettos. In the Romanian zone of occupation on the territory of the USSR, they were obliged to wear a yellow six-pointed star.
On September 16, 1941, the deportation of Jews from the camps in Bessarabia to Transnistria began. By November 15, when the deportation was stopped, all the Jews of Bessarabia and Bukovina (with the exception of 20,000 Jews of Chernivtsi) were sent to Transnistria. During the deportation, 22,000 people died.
In the second half of October 1941, near Odessa, on the personal order of Marshal Antonescu, about 35,000 residents of the city of Jewish nationality were shot and burned alive.
In the winter of 1941 - 1942 in Transnistria among the deported Jews began mass death from hypothermia (the air temperature sometimes dropped to -40 °), hunger and infectious diseases (typhoid, dysentery). Among adults, mortality reached 70%, among children - 100%. At the beginning of 1942, the Romanian gendarmes, Ukrainian police and Sonderkommando "R", where the local Germans served, began the systematic extermination of the exiles. So, in the village of Bogdanovka, Berezovsky district, about 5,000 sick and crippled Jews were driven into sheds and burned alive, after which regular executions of the inhabitants (44,000 people) of the local camp began, culminating in their total destruction. Total in Transnistria in 1941 - 1944. about 200,000 Soviet and Romanian Jews perished.
After the defeat of the Romanian troops at Stalingrad, the attitude of the authorities towards the Jews changed markedly. From December 1942, the evacuation of Jews to Turkey began. In total, up to September 1944, about 13,000 Jews left Romania on 13 ships.
From October 1943, international Jewish organizations (primarily the Joint) began to supply Jews in Transnistria - money, things, medicines, food. The Romanian government was told that these organizations were willing to pay a large sum for the return of Jews from Transnistria. Marshal Antonescu allowed the elderly, widows, invalids of the First World War and former officers of the Romanian army to return.
Return of Jews from Transnistria. 1944
Most of the Jews returned to Romania in 1944, on the eve of the retreat of the Romanian troops from Transnistria. According to the census, 428,312 Jews lived in Romania at the end of 1945.
Repressions against Roma were also systemic. At the same time, a distinction was made between different tribal groups. Roma loyal to the monarchy had their own political party, the General Union of Roma of Romania. Roma served in the Romanian army and participated in the battles on the Eastern Front. The attitude towards the nomadic Kalderars and Lingurars was already different. They were considered "hardened and incorrigible criminals" by the Romanian authorities. They were persecuted and deported from Romania to Transnistria in accordance with carefully crafted instructions. Deportations began in 1942. From June to August, nomadic gypsies were sent to concentration camps - 11,441; gypsies collected in Romanian prisons - 13,176. Also, all gypsies who lived in the occupied territory of the USSR were subjected to repression. About 40,000 gypsies from the Ochakovsky, Berezovsky and Baltsky districts of Transnistria were deported in 1942 to concentration camps. Of the 20,000 gypsies in the Berezovsky district, 11,500 were shot, and 7,000 died of starvation and typhus.
According to the Romanian war crimes commission, 36,000 Romanian gypsies died.
Since August 1944, the national policy in Romania has changed dramatically, but still remained repressive. Now the object of persecution was the Romanian Germans. During the retreat of the German army from the territory of Romania a large number of local Germans went west - to Germany, Hungary and Austria. The remaining Germans were subjected to repression. In December 1944 - January 1945, 69,332 Romanian Germans were forcibly deported to labor camps in the USSR (mainly in the Donbass). Then during 1945 - 1946. Romanian authorities deported about 750,000 Germans to Germany.
Created in 1918, the Polish state inherited Ukrainian lands from both the Russian and Austro-Hungarian empires. New geographic region centered in Lvov was called Western Ukraine. According to the 1931 census, 8.9 million people lived in this territory, including 5.6 million Ukrainians and 2.2 million Poles. More than 3 million Ukrainians in Eastern Galicia with Lemkivshchyna, who were previously part of Austria-Hungary, belonged mainly to the Greek Catholic Church. About 2 million Ukrainians who inhabited the lands that were previously part of Russian Empire(Western Volhynia, Polissya, Kholmshchyna and Podlyashye) professed Orthodoxy.
In 1923, in Paris, the Council of Ambassadors of the Entente (England, France, Italy and Japan) finally granted Poland legal rights to own Eastern Galicia. The eastern border of Poland was officially recognized, which was established by the Riga Peace Treaty after the Polish-Soviet war of 1920. This decision deprived Eastern Galicia of the status of an international territory. The Ukrainians turned out to be the only people of the multinational Habsburg empire who could not obtain national statehood.
In 1923–1926 People's Democrats (Endeks) were in power in Poland, who defended the "incorporation" program in the Ukrainian issue. Its essence was to occupy the western lands of Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania, achieve recognition of the new eastern borders of Poland, and then create a one-national state through forced assimilation. Economic policy endeks in the Ukrainian lands was to slow down the development of the "Eastern kresy" and turn them into an agrarian and raw material appendage of the more developed Polish territories.
The government officially divided the country into two economic territories: Poland "A", which included the indigenous Polish lands, and Poland "B", which included the occupied Ukrainian and Belarusian lands. Cheap loans and government orders supported and stimulated the industrial development of Poland "A", and in the Ukrainian lands, lending to industrial enterprises was sharply limited.
The situation in the agrarian sector of the Ukrainian lands was complicated by the fact that the Polish government gave the best lands at the disposal of the so-called osadniks (Poles - demobilized soldiers, retired officials), and then to everyone. The provision of the best lands to rural settlers caused discontent among the Ukrainian peasants, who suffered from lack of land. Therefore, in the interwar period, about 200 thousand people left for Canada and the United States.
Polish government circles sought to eradicate the very name "Ukraine", "Ukrainian". They called the Ukrainian population of the "Eastern Kresy" "Rusyns", and they called the entire territory Eastern Lesser Poland. The signal for the active Polonization of Ukrainian lands was the law of July 31, 1924, which proclaimed the Polish language the state language. At the same time, the Polish authorities set a course for the liquidation of the Ukrainian school. If in the 1911/1912 academic year there were 2,418 Ukrainian schools in Eastern Galicia, then in 1926/1927 there were only 845.
In May 1926, J. Pilsudski came to power, who was a supporter of the revival of Poland "from sea to sea." In the national question, the Polish government developed a federalist program, known in the 1920s and 1930s. as the doctrine of Polish Prometheanism. The essence of the new course was the state assimilation of national minorities and the rejection of national assimilation, especially language.
The state assimilation program was not used by the Polish government for long. On the eve of World War II under pressure external factors In 1937, especially fearful of Germany's position on the Ukrainian question, Poland changed the focus of its national policy and returned to the Endek doctrine of a one-national Polish state.
Polish politic system based on constitutional principles. This made it possible for national minorities, despite discrimination, to defend their interests through official channels in the institutions of state power. Therefore, already in 1925, Ukrainians had 12 political parties of their own, which represented a wide political spectrum.
The Ukrainian People's Democratic Association (UNDO) is a liberal party that was formed in 1925. Its leaders were D. Levitsky, V. Wise, A. Lutsky. Its program is based on constitutional democracy and the independence of Ukraine. The Ukrainian Social Radical Party (USRP) is a socialist party established in 1926, led by L. Bachinsky and I. Makukh. The party program provided for the restriction of private property and upholding the independence of Ukraine. The Communist Party of Western Ukraine was formed in 1919, and in 1923 it began to be called the KPZU. It was headed by J. Krylyk, R. Kuzma. The main provisions of the program were the fight against social and national oppression, for the unification of Western Ukraine with Soviet Ukraine. On the opposite side were political associations such as the Ukrainian Catholic Party, which tended to cooperate with the Polish government.
Ukrainian parties fought for seats in the Polish parliament: if in 1927 the representation of Ukrainians in the Sejm was 25 ambassadors and 6 senators, then in July 1939 it increased to 50 ambassadors and 14 senators. In the economy, the counteraction of the official line to slow down the development of Ukrainian lands was carried out through the cooperative movement.
Reacting to the Polonization of education, the Ukrainian intelligentsia founded the secret Lviv University in Lviv (1921–1925). During its rise, it had three faculties (philosophical, legal, medical) and 15 departments. It had 54 professors and 1,500 students. The main center of national culture in the Western Ukrainian lands was the Scientific Society named after T. Shevchenko in Lvov. It included about 200 scientists, among whom were historians I. Kripyakevich, S. Tomashevsky, folklorist and musician F. Kolessa.
An important factor in social life in the Western Ukrainian lands was the Greek Catholic Church, which in 1939 in Galicia and Transcarpathia had 4.37 million believers, 3,040 parishes with 4,440 churches. But there was no unity in church affairs. There was a confrontation between Metropolitan A. Sheptytsky, who sought to support the national aspirations of his people, and Bishop G. Khomishin and the Basilian Order, who advocated the unification of the Greek Catholic Church with the Catholic, contributing to this process of assimilation of Ukrainians.
When the oppression of the Polish authorities became unbearable, the movement of the Ukrainian population acquired a revolutionary and sometimes extremist character. From year to year, the working-class movement expanded: if in 1922 in Western Ukraine there were only 59 strikes, then in 1934-1939. - 1,118. Since the spring of 1930, the actions of the peasants have intensified. About 3,000 anti-state political protests took place on the territory of Volyn, Lvov, Ternopil and Stanislav voivodships.
The response of the Polish government was a campaign of pacification ("appeasement") - the suppression of speeches with the help of the police and troops. Residents of 800 villages were subjected to repressions, 1,739 people were arrested.
The assimilation policy of the Polish authorities, the actual lack of unity of the Ukrainian political forces pushed part of the Ukrainian youth to use more radical forms of struggle. In January 1929, the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) was established in Vienna. Its leader was E. Konovalets, and the main ideologist was D. Dontsov, who defended Ukrainian radical nationalism. On the eve of World War II, this organization numbered 20 thousand people. The OUN condemned socialism, capitalism, liberalism, democracy, highlighting revolutionary nationalism. This organization actively used the tactics of revolutionary terror against the Polish administration and Ukrainians who collaborated with the Polish authorities. In 1934, members of the OUN liquidated the Polish Minister of the Interior B. Peracki, on whom the OUN made responsible for pacification.
Thus, despite the constant fluctuations in the official course of the Polish government on the Ukrainian issue, at all stages the strategic goal (the assimilation of Ukrainians) did not actually change.
In 1918–1919 in conditions civil war Romania captured Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina and the Maramaros district, the former territory of Hungary. In 1920, almost 790 thousand Ukrainians lived in Romania (or 4.7% of the total population). The main places of their concentration were Northern Bukovina, Khotyn, Akkerman and Izmail districts of Bessarabia.
The colonial exploitation of Ukrainian lands led to the degradation of the economy. In Bukovina for 1922–1929 85 enterprises and workshops were closed. As a result of the agrarian reform, the size of peasant allotments in the Ukrainian districts of Bessarabia decreased three times. The same processes were typical for Northern Bukovina. In addition, in 1928-1929. during the reaction period, martial law was introduced in the provinces, Ukrainian lands were actively distributed to officers of the Romanian army. At that time, any protest against the authorities was brutally suppressed, as was the case with the Tatarbunary uprising of 1924, in which 6 thousand people took part. There was an active Romanization of the region: all Ukrainian schools were closed, the Ukrainian church was persecuted. Since 1927, the autonomy of Bukovina, which she owned while under the rule of Austria, was liquidated. Period from 1929 to 1933 was a time of crisis, which led to a certain weakening of colonial pressure on Ukrainian lands. But already in February 1933, a state of emergency was introduced in the occupied territories. Romanian authorities plundered Ukrainian cities and villages.
In this regard, the political movement grew in the Ukrainian lands that were part of Romania. Most of all, it manifested itself in the territory of Bukovina, where three main political formations:
1. The Communist Party of Romania, headed by S. Kanyuk, V. Gavrilyuk, F. Stasiuk. Its representatives advocated reunification with Soviet Ukraine.
2. Ukrainian National Party, founded in 1927 and headed by V. Zalozetsky. This party advocated a compromise with the existing regime. During its existence from 1927 to 1938. she managed to win several seats in the Romanian parliament.
3. A "revolutionary" or national camp was formed in the mid-1930s. Basically, he united the youth, but had some support from the peasantry. Its leaders were A. Zybachinsky, I. Grigorovich. In 1938, a military dictatorship was established in Romania and all Ukrainian political organizations went underground.
After the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the question of the future of Transcarpathia became acute. The solution of this problem was greatly influenced by the activities of the Transcarpathian emigration in the United States, whose representatives negotiated with the President of Czechoslovakia T. Massaryk on the issue of joining Transcarpathian Ukraine to this country on a federal basis. According to the Trianon Peace Treaty (June 1920), Transcarpathia joined Czechoslovakia with the name Subcarpathian Rus, and later it was renamed the Subcarpathian region. The government of Czechoslovakia promised the Ukrainians broad autonomous rights, but these promises were never fulfilled.
Czechoslovakia was one of the few democratic states in Europe, so the position of Ukrainians in this state was better than in other countries. Education and culture developed in Transcarpathia, schools were allowed to choose the language of instruction, such organizations as Prosvita and Plast were active. The government did not prohibit the activities of political parties and movements, of which there were about 30. They represented a wide range of views on social development.
At the same time, the Czech government considered Transcarpathia only as an agrarian and raw material base of its state. Industry in the economy of the region did not exceed 2%. agriculture there was not enough capital investment, so 90% of peasant farms became dependent on banks, and various fines and taxes during 1919–1929. increased 13 times. This provoked protests from local Ukrainians. Therefore, during the entry of Transcarpathia into Czechoslovakia, the authorities ordered the troops and police to open fire on the Ukrainian population about 90 times.
In the late 1930s Western Ukrainian national center temporarily moved to Transcarpathian Ukraine. After the Munich Agreement of 1938, a crisis of Czech statehood began. In October 1938, the Czech government agreed to grant autonomy to Transcarpathia. An autonomy government was created headed by A. Voloshin, who enjoyed authority among the population and advocated the construction of the Transcarpathian statehood. But international events prevented the normal development of autonomy. In order to get the support of Hungary in a future war, on November 2, 1938, Germany and Italy held an arbitration in Vienna, which divided Transcarpathia. Hungary was transferred to a significant territory of Transcarpathia with a population of 180 thousand people and large cities of Uzhgorod, Mukachevo, Beregovo.
The government of A. Voloshin moved to Khust. He managed to carry out several reforms, one of which was the Ukrainization of administrative power and education. In addition, the foundation was created armed forces- "Carpathian Sich" in the amount of 5 thousand people. The emergence of the Carpathian Ukraine caused an upsurge in the Ukrainian lands.
But on the night of March 14-15, 1939, the German army entered the territory of Czechoslovakia, and by agreement with A. Hitler, Hungary began the occupation of the entire Transcarpathia.
Questions for self-control
1. How was industrialization carried out in the Ukrainian SSR?
2. How was forced collectivization carried out in Ukraine?
3. What caused the famine of 1932-1933. in Ukraine?
4. Describe the economic, social and demographic consequences of collectivization in Ukraine?
5. Explain the circumstances of mass repressions in the Ukrainian SSR in the 1920s–1930s.
6. Show the disastrous consequences of mass repressions in the Ukrainian SSR in all spheres of society.
7. Describe the position of Ukrainians under the rule of Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia in the interwar period.
8. Show the main results of cultural construction in Soviet Ukraine.
