Furthermore, according to The Balkans: Nationalism, War, and the Great Powers, 1804–1999 by Misha Glenny, dislike of Russia and Russians is deeply integrated into Romanian culture since the end of the 19th century due to chronic quarrels between the two countries, and has been for most of the modern era.

Russian-Romanian relations were generally cordial until the end of the 18th century when Russia was helping Wallachia and Moldavia, two principalities that would later join to create Romania, free themselves of Ottoman domination.

Then in 1774, Catherine the Great agreed to return Moldavia, Walachia, and Bessarabia to the Turks, but she obtained the right to represent Orthodox Christians within the Ottoman Empire and oversee the principalities' internal affairs.

In 1787, the Imperial Russian Army again marched into the principalities, but a stalemate gripped forces on all fronts and in 1792 the empress and sultan agreed to reaffirm existing treaties.

Phanariot rule in Walachia and Moldavia led the Greek nationalists to view the principalities as possible components of a renascent Byzantine Empire.

Despite the fact that the Porte remained the principalities' suzerain and could exact a fixed tribute and direct certain aspects of foreign policy, the sultan could neither reject nor remove a prince without Russian consent.

[2] During Russia's occupation, a capable administrator, Count Pavel Kiselyov, improved health conditions, organized a well-disciplined police force, built up grain reserves, and oversaw the drafting and ratification of the principalities' first fundamental laws, the Règlement Organique.

The Règlement provided for elected assemblies of boyars to choose each prince, reformed the principalities' judicial systems, and established public education.

The new government of Walachia quickly affirmed its loyalty to the Porte and appealed to Austria, France, and Britain for support, hoping to avert a Russian invasion.

Shocked by the revolution's success in Europe and fearful that it might spread into Russia, the tsar invaded Moldavia and pressured the Porte to crush the rebels in Bucharest.

If the Principalities were able to modernize the port facilities on the Danube and the Black Sea, they could begin to undercut the price of Russian wheat on world markets.

[10] During the Balkan crisis of 1885–1886 there were marked Russian-Romanian divergences because the Romanian diplomacy supported the election of Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg at the Bulgarian throne, the candidate backed by Austria-Hungary.

During the interwar period, the Soviet-Romanian relations were marked by the Bessarabian question, as the Soviet Union refused to recognize Romania's acquisition of Bessarabia.

But after mid-1952, when Gheorghiu-Dej had gained full control of the party and had become head of state, Romania began a slow disengagement from Kremlin domination, being careful not to incur the suspicions or disapproval of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.

At the same time, Ceaușescu announced that Romania would no longer put the Romanian People's Army under the Warsaw Pact's joint command, even during peacetime maneuvers.

In 1978, after visiting China, Ceausescu attended a Warsaw Pact summit meeting in Moscow, where he rejected a Soviet proposal that member countries increase their military expenditures.

When the UN General Assembly voted on a resolution calling for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of Soviet troops, Romania broke with its Warsaw Pact allies and abstained.

The wording of the communique following a meeting with Ceausescu in Moscow suggested that Andropov intended to pressure Romania to bring its foreign policy into line with the Warsaw Pact.

In April 1996, the Romanian-Russian relationship experienced one of its tensest moments, as the Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov flew to Bucharest at the invitation of Romanian authorities to sign a renegotiated version of the bilateral good-neighborly relations treaty.

Russia furiously denounced Romanian intentions as hostile and driven by irredentist inclinations towards territories within the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine, to which Moscow considered Romania might lay claim.

A series of high-level contacts culminated with a visit of President Traian Băsescu to Moscow in 2005, but his statements at the time, of overcoming historical prejudice of the previous 15 years, did not take shape as the relations continued to freeze.

[30] Time later, a video showing Grichayev allegedly trying to get classified information in Romania regarding its foreign policy, army and energy sector was released.

Starting in late April 2022, the Russian hacking group Killnet launched a series of cyberattacks against Romanian government and other official websites.

He also hinted that Romania is a member of NATO, described Kherson Oblast as illegally occupied by Russia and stated that striking civilian infrastructure is a war crime.

The Romanian-Russian treaty of 2003 did not mention the Treasure; presidents Ion Iliescu and Vladimir Putin decided to create a commission to analyze this problem, but no advances were made.

Regarding the annexation of Bessarabia, the Romanian historian A.D. Xenopol said: Răpirea Basarabiei ar fi trebuit să înveţe pe români cu lucrul: că dacă există vreun pericol pentru existenţa lor ca naţiune, acesta va veni de la nord; dacă este vreun element adevărat duşman al elementului român, este acel rusesc, care nu din întâmplare, din neîngrijire pune în pericol existenţa noastră, ci lucrează cu conştiinţă la distrugerea ei.

Acest pericol l-au simţit toţi românii acei ce şi-au iubit într-adevăr poporul şi care au binemeritat de patria lor.

[43]Relationships have traditionally been strained by successive geopolitical disputes that saw Romania caught in the crossfire between repeated Russo-Turkish wars, and Russo-Romanian territorial disagreements.

The French Major General Louis Auguste François Mariage observes: "the inhabitants were more exposed, aside these requisitionings, let's call them regular, to any sort of abuse, theft, plundering, that brought them into poverty" or "… the Russian army destroyed this country [Wallachia] to such a level, that at the beginning of the year, she offered nothing more than the image of a waste.

The poverty inflicted on the local population was extreme: "The Russian occupation came with its set of ills: unbearable thefts, incessant requests for carts for transportation, brutality and abuse that befell the people.