Polish–Romanian alliance
Having established contacts with Poland in January–February 1919 (after Stanisław Głąbiński's visit to Bucharest),[2] Romania oriented itself towards a cordon sanitaire alliance aimed at Bolshevist Russia and the newly created Comintern; the proclamation of the Hungarian Soviet Republic, the German insurrection, and the Red Army's capture of Odessa[3] alarmed politicians in both countries.
The diplomat Czesław Pruszyński reported to the Polish government: "A dam that can put a stop to Bolshevik pressure on the West is constituted of Poland to the north, and Romania to the south.
According to another of Pruszyński's reports, Romania facilitated the transit of Polish nationals from Russia to their native areas, as well as furnishing armament and grain at preferential prices.
[5] Alexandru G. Florescu, the ambassador to Warsaw, reported back that the plan for a common military administration was: "[...] an inaccuracy and a fantasy which I suppose one should not take into account for anything other than making stock of them.
[5] In 1920, a similar plan was proposed by Piłsudski himself to the Alexandru Averescu government; the offer was more specific, indicating that Romania was to extend its administration to the east (the Black Sea shore, Odessa, and Transnistria).
[7] The treaty, concluded for a period of five years, committed both parties to rendering armed assistance to one another "in case one of the sides is attacked at its present Eastern frontiers".
In early 1937, Krofta denied knowledge of the book's content and, after Tătărescu visited Milan Hodža, his counterpart in Prague, Šeba was recalled.
Beck, who had previously opposed the status quo policies of Nicolae Titulescu,[14] unsuccessfully proposed a Romanian withdrawal of its support for Czechoslovakia and an attempt to reach a compromise with Hungary.
[15] In 1938, in the wake of the Czechoslovak crisis, Beck urged the Romanian government of Miron Cristea, formed by the National Renaissance Front, to participate at the partition of Czechoslovakia (the Munich Agreement), by supporting Hungary's annexation of Carpathian Ruthenia.
Diplomats and strategists in Poland viewed the alliance with Romania as an important part of Polish foreign and defense policy, but it eventually proved to be mostly irrelevant.
Immediately preceding the war, Poland and Romania avoided specifically aiming their agreements against Germany, a country with which both were still seeking a compromise, as Beck and Grigore Gafencu agreed in the April 1939 negotiations in Kraków.
After the Red Army joined the German attack on September 17, 1939, with Western assistance not forthcoming, the Polish high command abandoned the plan and ordered its units to evacuate to France.
Many units went through Romanian borders, where they were interned, but Romania remained friendly towards Poles, allowing many soldiers to escape from the camps and to move to France.
[21] On September 21, 1939, the pro-British prime minister of Romania, Armand Călinescu, was killed in Bucharest by a squad of local fascist activists of the Iron Guard, with German support.
[22] Notably, the Nazi journalist Hans Fritzsche attributed the assassination to Polish and British resentments over Romania's failure to intervene in the war.
