Romania: Records of the U.S. Department of State, 1945-1963
Romania in the postwar Stalinist era is the subject of this archive. The Red Army swept into Romania in 1944, and in the late 1940s and 1950s the Romanian Communist Party imposed a totalitarian regime. An elaborate security system manned by the secret police and supported by a repressive prison network, enforced obedience to the party. Documents include excerpts from “International Developments of Naval Interest,” 6 February 1948, by the Office of Naval Intelligence: “Confiscation of private property in an attempt to destroy the capitalist class, heretofore limited to Rumanian businessmen, is now being extended to foreigners. One method employed by the Rumanian Government is to accuse foreign owners of ‘economic sabotage.’ …Another method being employed to seize foreign businesses is to tax them out of existence.” The documents here are sourced from the Central Files of the General Records of the Department of State. The records are under the jurisdiction of the Legislative and Diplomatic Branch of the Civil Archives, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.