ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the relations between the Romanian Communist Party and the Romanian military since the late 1960s. Although the relevance of a conceptual framework designed for the analysis of Soviet civil-military relations is questionable, some of the concepts delineated in the chapters by Roman Kolkowicz, William Odom, and Timothy Colton will be employed. The transformation of the Romanian army was the work of Emil Bodnaras, minister of the armed forces from 1947 to 1955, and the only "Muscovite" Party leader to survive the "nativization" purges of the early 1950s. In 1955 Bodnaraj left the Ministry of the Armed Forces and was replaced by another non-Romanian, Leontin Salajan, a prewar Party activist co-opted into the army in 1950. Romanian soldiers and civilians are constantly reminded of the past glories of Romanian arms in defense of national independence and sovereignty. The de-emphasis of Romania's role in the Warsaw Pact appears to have caused some dissension within the military.
