Western Betrayal

Russian did a wonderful coup and fooled the Allies at Yalta. They took Eastern Poland and to make this theft acceptable to the allies they gave the Poles some German territory. Doing this did split East Prussia and also got a chunk out of this territory for themselves and got acces to the Baltic sea. They kept the three Baltic countries an added Memel (Klaipeda) on top of it. Moreover they kept Moldavia to "punish" the Romanians (without any compensation, oh well the Romanians "recovered" Transylvania which had been occupied by the Hungarians) unlike the Poles who got Pommerania, Brandenbourg, Danzig,Silezia and Mazuria from the Germans. What not many people know is that the Russians also "stole" Ruthenia from eastern Tcechoslovaquia and this annexion almost went unnoticed in 1945. So yes, I understand the former eastblock countries are somewhat bitter, but I doubt much could have done about this except listening to Patton and push the front back to Moscow with the help of German Pows and the named countries. I believe there are a couple of "What ifs" about the matter.

 

Wow this certainly got out of hand.lol

 

Do you think so Tomcat? I think it's a rather nice discussion with different points of view, we don't have the chance to discuss this with people who live in the former East Block countries every day and I must admit they made some fair points.
I remember going to East German border near Fulda in 1984. There were towers eveywhere and a huge iron curtain. I was watching one of the towers when suddenly I realized the guard was watching me too with his binoculars. It freaked me out. Now that I think about it , it makes me laugh, but I really thought they were the mean guys at the time. The cold war propaganda certainly worked. The poor bloke probably thought he'd be better home or wished he could cross the border freely, or did he think I was the bad guy?

 

Without wishing to go into much detail, it could be argued that part of Moldavia was ceded to the Russian empire by the Ottomans, so they have some title to the land and the 1940 action was a recovery of lost territory. You may thank your German allies for including that in the Soviet sphere of interests in the Molotov-Ribbentropp pact. After that, I believe Romania more than compensated itself by invading a large chunk of Ukrainian territory including the city of Odessa, parts of Crimea and even extending troops up to Stalingrad, two armies there, none the less.

A pity things did not work so well after that, otherwise I don't think we wouldn't be hearing much complaint about the territories acquired by Greater Romania.

 

Along those lines Miguel, I was called apologetic by our dear Frederich for pointing out that Poland hadn't been a nation for almost a hundred years when after WWI it was formed again, and that the Germans might have wanted it back?

Or we could also point out that the Italians had run the better part of N Africa and Europe and they wanted it all back.... This is why we constantly watch the "Native Americans" (Indians for all of you who dont speak PC) here in the US, they may want their land back.

 

Ah, I missed this.... Very well put Miguel thanks.

 

It could be argued that the first invader here was the USSR. Invading Moldavia was just as illegal as invading the Baltics and Finland, Eastern Poland, Ruthenia. It is understandable that all those people considered themselves under attack and a German victory was their only chance to gain their territorial integrity back (with some compensation for some of them). Russia never gave Carelai back to Finland and Eastern

 

Moldavia was ceded to the Russian empire, because as allways much more powerfull countries played God with the smaller ones.Moldavia was and still is part of Romanian history, long before it was conquered by the Otoman empire.It was inhabbited by Romanians, so the Russians have no right on that land!!!!!!!!!
I will say no more, because I respect this forums, with it's members and it's rules, but I would suggest you that before making such statements, learn the history of that land and the link between a land and a certain country, and maybe compare it to other lands....

 

I know that feeling from visits to DDR in '84 and USSR in '86. Eventually I worked out that most often they were looking at your clothes, quality leather coats and shoes being much sought after... poor buggers.

 

Makslin I'm sorry if I offended your patriotic sensibilities and would appreciate if you could point me to some place where I can learn some essential Romanian history.

That Ottoman/Russian land deal was after the 1806 Russian-Turkish, so it goes some time way back, and I don't know how far back the Turks could claim conquest.

Nevertheless my question still stands: would we hear much complaint if things had gone well and Greater Romania included occupied Odessa, Crimea, etc?

 

It's not my patriotic sensibilities that you offended, but the ideea that Russians own that land because it was ceded by another power.....it's like saying that France owns northen Italy because it was included in the French empire during Napoleon's reign.A country has no right on a land where another language is spoken, where traditions differ...where everything is different.

You can find more about the history of Moldova here. It can help you make an ideea of this territory.

Greater Romania would never include Odessa and Crimeea, because Greater Romania contained only territories where romanian was spoken.Greater Romania was created at the end of ww1, when, at an assembly on 1 december 1918 at Alba-Iulia, every region inhabited by romanians sent a delegation with the request to unite with Romania.As far as I know, there were requests even from a few regions that are now in Hungary, but which our King (Ferdinand I) refused.

 

Masklin,

actually I only understood why Stalin wanted certain parts of Finland so bad when I read about his views on the "right to own land" which is "Bigger country´s needs are more important than a small country´s" which means that a small country must always accept what the big country requests.

 

Thank you for your insight, I'll try and find more about the matter. Trouble is that sometimes power games and imperialisms go over national and cultural sensibilities, and coins may have several faces at the same time.

If I offended you my public apologies.

 

Edit: Never mind, I missed a page.

 

Masklin is the reuniting of Romania and Moldavia still something that is talked about in 2008 or has Moldavia become too different and independent after the Soviet annexion?

 

Interesting thread. It is actually the additional discussion rather than the original post that has kept my interest - particularly the very international flavour with posters from Eastern and Western Europe, Britain, and the US.

I'm not going to go back and copy various quotes in here, but I did appreciate the comments regarding the belief that the Americans would come to save the various countries from the Soviets and the ongoing resentment of the Americans because they did not do so. The waning days of "The Empire" were already apparent post-World War I. While the U.S. was trying to remain in isolation, it was apparent that despite the Depression it still had the manufacturing power combined with resources to recover. America had been viewed as the Dream for many in Europe with the belief that anything was possible. Therefore when the U.S. did enter the War in Europe, many of the peoples of these countries did not concede that defeat was possible for the U.S. nor that the US could possibly be afraid of any other country. [I use the word afraid in terms of perception - when it was hesitation of becoming embroiled in a war of attrition in which one side (the dictator) would use up its manpower indiscriminately against the US which had to answer to its electorate.] The result was that the people in the countries overrun by the Soviets could only believe that the Americans didn't rescue them because they didn't care and that that they were abandoned to Stalin's dictates. The resentment is understandable because they didn't know enough about the way the U.S. armed forces was run. Many of Eisenhower's decisions - even in Normandy - were the result of questions asked in Congress and the result of inter-national rivalrys and interests of Western Allied countries.

One other comment - it is impossible to study World War II or any military conflict without having a general knowledge or understanding of the histories of the countries involved, their cultures, their political systems, and the international and diplomatic processes which existed immediately before, during and after. It is what makes this Forum special - many of the members bring their knowledge or their interest in learning here - it is usually those with a narrow view/agenda and unwillingness to accept alternate information or viewpoints who flame out.

 

Interesting question.As far as I know, the majority from the Republic of Moldova dreams of reuniting with Romania each day.The problem is Romanians don't actually care......"funny" part is that most of them don't even know that Moldova was part Romania...(sad, unreal, but true, trust me).
If you ask me, even though i'd like Moldova to be part of Romania again, the act itself would ruin our economy, given the fact that Moldova isn't doing that great at that chapter(we're not doing that great either, so just imagine how it would be).....and the fact that a part of Russia's army is on Moldavian territory is kinda frightening, isn't it?

 

Such are the realities of the world, Masklin. Quite unpleasant, but not much one can do about them...

Look at Kosovo, the Serbians claiming it's sacred ground to them, and the Albanians saying "they are there so what?" Or Macedonia, with the Greeks saying they own a trademark on the name, but when Macedonia's name did really matter the Greeks called them a bunch of barbarians with no reason at all to pretend they were Greek. Now FYROM (Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) claims the name on a very dubious ground, the current territory being only at most a backwater to Phillip's and Alexander's kingdom...

 

Try telling that to a Macedonian. I had an argument with one some years ago in wich I politely pointed him that same point (hell, their current territory has not much to do with the pre-expansion Macedonia of the ancient times). Wow all hell broke loose


Cheers...

 

Perhaps such resentment is "understandable" to Europeans or Asians or peoples of other cultures at a political level (the US didn't respond because it's government/military wasn't free to act without the approval of the Congress, for example), but that certainly doesn't explain why these people would expect individual Americans to be any more anxious to have their lives disrupted, and maybe ended, simply to right the "wrongs" of other countries, especially when not everybody in the world agrees that the 'wrongs" really are wrongs.

Individual Americans are just like everybody else; before they will voluntarily shed their blood, or someone else's, they want to be relatively certain that it's necessary and that some permanent improvement in the world situation will result. A century of disappointing involvement in idealistic warfare to "make the world safe for....yadda, yadda, yadda" has caused us to develop a somewhat cynical attitude toward these worthy causes.

Not that we won't support a war if we're convinced that it's appropriate and in our interests, too. But the bar these days has been raised pretty high by past experience. Why is that so difficult to understand?