ABSTRACT

This chapter examines the course of bilateral relations after the historical visit of the American president in August 1969. The first part deals with economic and trade relations, with the issue of Romania achieving Most Favoured Nation (MFN) status being central and a recurring theme in this context. The second part focuses on the political aspect of the relationship with President Ceausescu’s visit in the United States as its centrepiece. The Romanian president’s first visit to Washington was a life time experience which enabled him to realise in a first-hand way that expanding trade and consequently know-how imports from the West was the only way to achieve his grandiose designs for a developed industrialized Romania. Lastly, the chapter concludes with the case of Romania’s entrance to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank by the end of 1972. This move proved in an emphatic way the complete detachment of Romania’s foreign policy from its ideological foundations. By following the example of Yugoslavia, it was willing to integrate to the Western international system in order to secure certain financial benefits even if that was in contrast to the dictums of Marxist–Leninist socialist solidarity.