ABSTRACT
The history of Communism in the Republic of Moldova is arguably little-known in the West. Most of the Republic of Moldova was a part of Romania in the interwar period and it is historically, linguistically, and ethnically intertwined with that of Romania. However, one cannot ignore the status of Bessarabia as part of the Soviet Union. During the Cold War, Bessarabia was the only Soviet territory belonging historically and ethnically to a neighboring state—Communist Romania. Thus, one needs to make an extensive introduction on the nature of Soviet regime in former Moldavian SSR. One also has to answer a fundamental question that is intimately related to the mainstream discussions in the last twenty years about the Communist rule in the present day Moldova. Two seem to be the most pressing questions: Could the annexation of Bessarabia in the USSR in 1940, its reannexation in 1944 as well as subsequent Soviet policies be defined as a form of imperial rule? If so, what was specific in this story? The answers, however, cannot be separated from a more general issue: Was the Soviet Union an Empire?
