Romanian Campaign of 1916.The Invasion

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Imediatelly as between Russia and Romania the peace will be reestablished ,there will have to to be demobilized also the other parts of the Romanian Army ,as they will no longer be necessary for the service of safety at the frontier between Russia and Romania.

6)The Romanian troops will have to evacuate the territory of the austro-hungar Monarchy ,which they occupy.

7)The Romanian Government obliges to wheel as much as possible the transport of troops of the allied powers through Moldavia and basarabia towards Odessa on the railways.

8)Romania obliges to fire imediatelly all officers with which the central powers are in War and which are still in the service of Romania;it will be ensured to these officers by the central powers free passing.

9)This treaty is apllied imediatelly.

Amongst the incidents to which made room the closing of the preliminary treat of peace ,two especially are worthy to be revealed.

The first one it is the extended polemic brought between General Averescu and Marghiloman over the character of the act signed at Buftea at 5th of March.

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General Averescu did not recognize the character of "preliminary peace" which the germans would give in an unjustified mod:it would have been nothing else but a convention for extending of the Truce and ,as such,the specified conditions in it would not have had a difinitive character .

It is true that the letter of Kuhlman and Czernin from 2nd of March to general Averescu says that:"The condition for extending the Truce is signing beforehand of the declarations which follow ,by a representative of the Romanian Government ...".Follows the six points.

Based though on the introduction of the convention ,Marghiloman has considered that his mission was to close ,in the fixed term,the peace,of which bases have been definitivelly and forcefully set amongst the preliminaries of peace signed at 6th of March and which have received even a beginning of execution ,military,(the crossing of the austro-german army through the South of Basarabia).The second incident which was threatening to take a turn very serious ,happened with the occassion of repatriation of the French Military mission.In the day of 12th of March have left from Iasi the four trains which were carrying through Chisinau ,Tighina and Tiraspol ,to rove Russia ,in the way towards patria ,the personell of the French Mission ,of over 1200 persons .General Berthelot has had in the beginning the intention to go through austria ,but gave up this ideea ,even after the austrian government passed the Mission for making quaranteen ,because the French Government did not wanted that by this authorization to give the impression of recognizing implicitely the imposed peace to Romania.In the same time though with the leaving of the French Mission from Iasi ,the german commandment in Bucharest has expedited german troops on route Reni-Tighina with destination Odessa ,as established by the stipulations of the convention with Romania.The coincidence of these two movements was endangering the trains of the French Mission to be intercepted by the german trains ,thing that made a great emotion at Iasi.In the enervation here ,things went as far as atributing to General Averescu unloyal intentions towards the fFench explained by the unfriendly relations between the General and the French Mission*.The agitation has became so big,such that it has been held a Crown Council to examinate the situation and take the apropiate measures .Great inssistences have been made next to the germans ,by the Romanian Comission tasked with the peace tratatives at Buftea ,as to give order to the grman convoys to slow their advancing,to give time to the trains with the French mission to flow over Nistru River ,and obstacle the collision ,suspecting even that marshal Mackensen would have secretly planned a trap.

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For more safety the Romanian Government ,outside the official measures ,has also taken confidential measures :has posted a curtain of Romanian troops between Bolgrad and Basarabeasca train station to delay the advancing of the german convoys towards Odessa ,and a big bridge on the highway ,over which were supossed to pass the automobile trucks ,collapsed "as by mistake".With this face ,the advance of the germans has been delayed ,and the French trains could flow in due time to obstacle any trial of the germans to capture them.

In all case ,this incident has made much bitter blood in the French circles and Romanian ones and brought over General Averescu suspicions and unjust attacks.

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*The relations between General Averescu and the French Mission had their origin in the oppinion that General Berthelot would have been ,even from his arrival in the country influenced by the hostile atmosphere dominating against Averescu at the Great General Staff of the Army and at the president of the Ministers Council ,Bratianu.General Averescu show himself unhappy by the fact that the members of the French Misssion were going beyond their role trying to mix up amongst the exercising of his commandment and was balaming General Berthelot for a series of tactical initiatives "missfortuned" as the sacrificing of the Divion at Cerna ,the plan of Arges Battle ,of the offensive at Namoloasa ,as well as the paternity of the ideea of the "triangle of death". in which the Chief of the French Mission would have been inspired more by the interest of his country ,than the ones of Romania.Numerous incidents of service were alimenting this falling apart.General Averescu was of opinion that it was a duty of conscience and patriotism to put to any doubt the merit of the French Military Mission about the reorganization of the II-nd Army ,under his command ;this one would have been the exclusive masterpiece of the Romanian officers started and partly finished before the arrival of the Mission in the country.

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Marghilonan's government and peace tratatives

The discussions for closing of the peace have suffered a new delay .Averescu Government has resigned.The General did not felt support at Iasi anymore.It is imputed to him that he not kept the engagement with which he took the power ,meaning to resist to the pretentions of the enemy and extend as much as possible the trataives ,but,on the contrary ,he has accelerated the trataives and hasted to accept the conditions of the enemy ,making the final step towards the missfortuned peace.Neither at Bucharest or Buftea the General was not in a better situation.

The peace tratatives gave occasssion for the "germanophil" politicians in Bucharest ,maintaining an attitude of permanent protest against the national politic of Iasi ,characterized by the gentlemen as a "defection of Romania from her contractual obligations and her politic role in Orient".The differences of views between the three groups* have accentuated even more.

The attitude of Petre Carp group carried the sign of rigidity of its chief.It did not admitted a solution of compromise ,but the complete infeudation of Romania to the german politics.Consecvent to this principle ,Carp has send to the Sovereign(H.M. King Ferdinand),at Iasi ,the invitation to resign before the beginning of peace trtatives .

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In the same intransigent note/tone was also Stere continuing his politic ,pretending the abandoning sincere and complete of "the missfortuned politic of until now ,which took the country to catastrophe".

Carp and Stere were not though the Government of the Country.Their powers ,no matter how much liked by the enemy governments ,could not engage but only them in person and some other personalities around them.The discussions with them had purely academic interest.The Sovereign,the Government the Army and the free public oppinion of the country were on the other side of the barricade.With these ones had to be entered into tratatives the enemy ,no matter how high have been the advices of the germanophils next to the government of the great german headquarter ,nomatter how great was the hatered of the leading circles in germania against the Romanian Sovereign and the Government of the country.From the need to close a fast peace and of duration with a legal government ,had to be step over the "men of trust" from Bucharest and,all it could be obtained ,was to push to forming up a partizan government of the filocentral politics ,recognized by the King ,the Parliament and the Army ,which to have the legal quality to close the peace and to be willing to close it as the austro -germans whised.

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The indicated man to form this government was Marghiloman.

The group of Marghiloman knew,by the swift moves and opportunism of its leader,to doge too intransigent attitudes.Marghiloman kept connections with the representants of all other currents and now ,near the fatal moment of closing of the peace ,forced peace,seemed to everyone the man of the situation.

Czernin ,the leader in fact of the trataives of peace with Romania ,decided over Marghiloman.In the conversation of Racaciuni with H. M. King Ferdinand ,he recommended to the King the forming of a Marghiloman Cabinet ,which will receive the conditions of the central powers ,to save the country.The particular tratatives followed between Czernin and Marghiloman established a full understanding ."With the first one and the most difficult one between conditions -stories Czernin- he (Marghiloman) declares in agreement ,because he understood faster than H.M King Ferdinand that,faced to our obligations towards bulgaria this point cannot be modified .About the territorial requests ,I have declared to Marghiloman that I put the principal point of weight on that,to be able to reestablish after the peace the rapports of friendship with Romania and that is why ,I am spirited by the wish to reduce the requests of cessions of territories ina proportion ,which to be able to be considered by Romania as suportable .On the other hand ,Marghiloman had to understand that has to be taken into account ,at least to some extent,by the hungarian aspirations and Marghiloman ,which was an old routined parliamentary ,made no ilussion over the situation of constraint in which I was.We agreed ,finally, that the cession of some localities populated or cities as Turnu Severin and Tirgu Ocna must not happen ,and that ,all over the requests from the beginning had to be reduced at aproximativelly half.Marghiloman declares that he receives this compromise"63.

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Based on this program ,Marghiloman has become at 19th of March ,by the power of the circumstances and by the trust of count Czernin ,prime minister of "Romania of dezastre".He had to close the humiliating peace which meant taking out of Romania from the ranks of independent countries.It was a mission of sacrifice which he was assuming,linked by a great responsibility towards history.But he was the only man which ,in this circumstance ,could bring the country the service to ease a part of the difficulties put over her shoulders ,by his cleverness and by the credit which he had near the enemy.His principal colaborator was C.Arion ,which had the Foreign Ministry and was,with Marghiloman ahead of the Romanian dellegation for peace tratatives.

The campaign carried by germanophils for changing of Romanian rapports with the central powers has continued also after the beginning of the Romanian tratatives of peace.

At the installation of Marghiloman government ,Carp has retreated in an hostile attitude.His partizans have abandoned the guarants posts ,in which they' ve been named at the installation of the government of german occupation.At berlin-next to the conservatives politicians and their press -and at the great german headquarter ,the partizans of Carp ,especially Beldiman ,started a campaign of intrigues and agitations against Marghiloman ,which he dennounced as being a germanophil not orthodox enaugh.

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(The Teachers of the Infantry Officers School in Bucharest-1928)

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At 22nd of March the tratatives have begun again ,this time at Cotroceni Pallace ,in the room which became historic, in which has been held the Crown Council of 27th of August 1916(the entering of Romania in the Great war).The delegations tasked with the tratatives of peace were prezided:for Romania by the prime minister Marghiloman ;for germania by minister of foregn affairs Kuhlmann;for austro-hungary by the foreign affairs minister von Czernin ;for bulgaria by prime minister Radoslavov and for turkey by the great vizir Talaat Pasa.Czernin has resigned soon after the beginning of the tratatives ,because of the publication of the letter of prince Sixt de Burbon*.[11] and has been replaced by at 14th of April at the presidency of the austro-hungarian commission by his successor Burian.Numerous delegates and experts for for technical matters were seconding in each commission the first delegate.Especially ,the german delegation was made up by a great number of experts for all branches of economy and financial ones,full knowers of the whole of our economic life ,armed with a great documentary material and statistic one ,which they were supposed to use to impose the country the most terrifying harness which a country imposed to another ever,which they had at their free will.

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The discussions have followed in four sections :political,military,juridic and economical.They have been very brief.The german delegates ,especially ,had their papers already written ,of the treaty and of the numerous aditional conventions .The protests and explanations of the Romanian delegates were inutile.After whatever small concessions on formal and detail matters ,the german delegates were putting the text in an imperative way.The stereotype reply addressed to the Romanian delegates was this:"If instead of us being in Bucharest,you were in Berlin ,at Budapesta ,and your Allies at Berlin , you would have treat us the same...".During one of the meetings ,one of the Romanian delegates ,the professor of international law Missir ,could not retain his tears.The plenipotentiary minister german Kriege tried to ease him with the words:"Don't get sad for such a small thing ;it is nothing next to what we prepare to France and England ,for the Western peace!"

Romania was stretched on the table of sacrifice;around her ,the ones who carry the sentence through,sure that this time noone could intervine in the help of the victim ,were concurring to cut each one a slice as big as possible from her body.Czernin ,using one of his formulae ipocrit,such familiar to austrian diplomacy ,announced from the beginning that the peace has to be "a peace which to wheel the retaking of the friendship connections for the future".In fact was the destroying peace ,the one that exterminates the defeated one.

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3 A Model Of Treaty

Politic enslavement

The voluminous treaty of peace ,closed at Bucharest ,together with its aditional conventions ,contained an extraordinary big number of dispozitions which were finishing/unbirthing in fact Romania as country and were throwing her in the abyss of the greatest slavery.It was the continuing and reglementation of the military occupation regime of the country ,with its despotic pressure and humiliating ,with draining of the last resource of the ground and Romanian labour ,completed and agravated with the mutilation of her territory.

The condition imposed to Romania tended to fulfill three things:

1)The military inferiorization of the country ,such that an offensive action or defensive one against hungaria or bulgaria to not be possible.

2)Dissolution ,total, of the means of material or moral rising of the country.

3)The economical and financial asserving of the country ,to put her in complete dependence by the central powers ,isolating her all together from Europe and kidnapping her any freedom of movement or own action.

Romania was ceasing in this way to be in fact a state ,independent.The nominal independence left to her,out of hypocrisy ,was in fact an advantage in the favour of the central powers ,which did not want to take over them the tasks and responsibilities of administration and defence of the territory and of population ,but only the outcomes of her exploatation.

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A very brief resume of the military conditions and political ones of the treaty of peace and its annexes ,give an ideea over the enslavement regime imposed to the country .

The Romanian Army has been as unbirthed: it has been left eight Divisions with peace effectives ,meaning in total 20 000 infantry men ,3 200 cavalry men and 9000 artillerists....The rest has been demobilised.All the war material had to be passed into the occupied territory and held there under german guard .A military mission ,established at Iasi ,had the task to supervise the disarming.

It has been permitted though maintaining in Basarabia of two Divisions of Infantry and two of Cavalry ,with war effective ,which equivalated with an indirect recognition of the union with Basarabia .The austro-germans and the romanian germanophil politicians were exploiting the concessive attitude of the central powers in the Basarabia matter ,as a friendship act towards Romania.It has been however a politc act well calculated.The preoccupations of Romania had to be pushed in another direction ,to make us forget the harshness of the treaty .The eyes of Romania had to be turned from Carpathian Mountains ,to East .As ,after 1870 ,germania of Bismark was encouraging the politic of colonial expanssion of France ,to make her forget the bleeding wound ,made by the ripping of Alsacia -Lorena ,in the same way germania of Ludendorff thought that the matter of Basarabia will be the bridge of connection between Romania and the central powers.

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As Romania was being disarmed ,and by the kidnapping of the Carpathian Mountains and of Dobrogea ,she was throwed without any power of defence to the will of the enemy ,germania was keeping in our country the whole military apparatus of occupation and of draining out,maintaining ,until the ratifying of the peace ,the state of War.After the ratification of the treaty ,the state of War was becoming state of occupation ,by keeping of six divisions ,as well as of" the formations needed for economical exploatation",and this without a limited stretch of time ,but as much as the occupant will see fit!The means of communication ,the railways ,the mail and telegraph ,will remain under military administration ,as the control of the currency circulation ,the National Bank and the popular banks.The frontier between Moldavia and the occupied territory will remain close and was not admitted the passing of the refugees on the other side ,but only with the aprobation,indiviual,of the commandment of the army in Basarabia and with the condition that Moldavia to give to this commandment the necessary quantity of aliments.The requisitions ,"either in money or in nature ",had to continue until the ratifying ,and after ratifying ,the support of the army in Basarabia was in the care of Romania ,which had to spend in this way aproximatively 700 millions Lei a year ,meaning more the entire budget of the country before the War.

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The Danube River receives a new regime ,which placed her in the unconditioned mastering of the central powers ,of which comercial vessels and of war could circulate on the whole stretch of her,without recoprocity for Romania -outside territorial waters -and with the exclussion of the Western states.

All desertors and spies in the service of the enemy were freed by the shameful dispozition and imoral which sounded:"Romania gives a complete amnisty to her servants for their political conduct during the War or for their military conduct-based on political reasons".To produce agitation and inside resentiments ,they imposed the solving of the Jewish matter by the naturalization in mass of the Romanian Jews ,although the solving of the matter has been announced of own initiative by the Romanian Government in the spring of 1917.

Special privileges have been given to the schools of the german colonies ,strong instruments of strengthening of the german influence in Romania .austro -hungary wanted especially to profit of the occassion ,to paralize any veleity of national education ,by the dispozitions of the following kind:"The contractant parts oblige reciproc(!?) to not let on their territory any kind of agitation ,propaganda or action aimed against territorial inviolability ,to legal order, to security or public order of the other part contractant".It is understood that this"legal order and public one" was the famous maghiar(hungarian) theory of the unity of the hungarian state ,of Banffy ,Tisza and Apponyi.For this "the contractant parts obloge reciproc(!?) especially:1) to forbid to societies and individuals any kind of activity in the way of the one defined above;2) to obstacle any kind of subventions or colects for a propaganda of the kind of the one defined above;3) to watch to not admit books of school or any other means of learning ,but only if their content does not contradict the dispozitions foreseen by the above paragraph;4) to complete the laws,if the need requests it,against the activity shown above ,and this in the interval of one year after the ratification of the present treaty.".Finally :"Each part ,contractant, will not give course to the requests of naturalization of their people to the other part,even if the other conditions are fulfilled -but only if the one requesting proves that he/she has been fired by the union of the state to which he/she belonges".The bilateral form of these obligations was a hypocrisy ;they could not be applied in fact but only to Romanians ,the only ones who had enslaved brothers in the adverse country .It was legiferated in this way the chaining of the freedom of thought and of the Romanian feeling;there were obstacled the brothers which would want to become Romanian citizens ,to do it.More than any demonstration from our part ,austro-hungaria confessed,by these measures of oppression ,the bases and legitimacy of Romanian revendications.

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(BUNCIUG-musical instrument used by the commander of the ottoman music during the Russian-Romanian Turkish War 1877-1878)

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Losing the mountains

The territorial pretentions of austro-hungary were dictated by the special interest of hungary ,which wanted to profit by the occassion to have Romania in hand ,to weaken her so much ,as to become inoffensive for the future.Ina "Promemoria" written by Tisza and handed to Czernin to show the maghiar(hungarian) point of view ,Tisza is saying that "Romania will not get out of the War as weakened as it would be necessary for satisfying the justice (!) and of the rigthful interests of austro-hungarian Monarchy.Losing of the mountains (Carpathian Mountains) is compensated by the earning of Basarabia and the frontier rectifying ,asked by us ,is not at all in the proportion with the guilt of Romania and with the military situation".Tisza warns Czernin that,what he named with eufemism "frontier rectifying" ,is minimum asked with energy by the entire patriot public oppinion of hungaria and that a foreign affairs minister which will give in on this matter ,will not be able to present himself in front of the hungarian delegation.The same language was used by Wekerle and Apponyi in parliament.The entire hungarian press was asking ,in a very violent tone ,that Romania to be treated with the outer most harshness.

The annexation of the mountain region of Romania was presented by hungarians as a condition of national safety.Thanks to it ,Transilvania was becoming "an inexpungable fortress,"separated this time by Romania by a unpassing barrier .Beyond of this barrier would have been established "a zone of etnic defence",by colonizing of hungarian border army.The annexation of a more stretched region ,or even of entire Romania ,was gategoricly rejected by ungarian patriots ,because it would considerable increase the proportion of Romanian element in Monarchy ,weakening in the same time the importance and preponderence of the hungarian one .Czernin decides that,under the name of "strategic rectifying " of the frontier ,the hungarians pretend in fact the annexation of some important territories ,which is in contradiction ,flagrant, with the formulae of peace without annexions ,announced with hypocrisy to the World.But the representative of austro-hungaria was not the man of which conscience to be turmoiled by this kind of scrupuls.Especially that the maltratation and humiliation of Romanians gave him a satisfaction of personal love ,revenging for his diplomatic failure during the neutrality time.

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The representatives of germania themselves seemed unhappy by annexionist exagerated pretentions of hungaria ,which unmasked in front of the nations of the World the hypocrisy of the two empires.But not even thee scrupules of germania were not easy to satisfy.Kuhlmann announces to his conationals that,at Brest -Litovsk,austro-hungary supported germany in the most ferm and loial way in the annexionist politics of this one and that,so,it is natural that"now germany to support her ally with the same loiality in the matter of Carpathians frontier".

Besides,the matter has been also put trades-man- way .germania noticed that the territiry that hungaria was taking from Romania was covered by forests,which represented a value of at least three milliards of german marks,that it contained unexploited mines and that it was very rich in petrolifer terrains .It was ,so,that germania "which gave the greatest forcing for defeating Romania" to have a corresponding share of the profit .And Kuhlmann assures his conationals that germania was not at all in loss.A territorial aquisitio being excluded ,because of geographical reasons ,germania was taking from us ,as compensation "the economical advantages which were going to the limit of the capacity of randament of Romania".

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In this way,the sharing was made honest between the two mates of prey!

The presentation of the map with the zone pretended by hungaria ,produced a deep impression of surprise and indignation in the Romanian delegation.For the first time was shown to Romanians ,in a precise way,the stretch of this"rectifying of frontier" which,until now ,has been established only as "a matter of principle".It was far and away by the three corners indicated by Mackensen to General Averescu ,at their first meeting !The zone lusted by hungary represented a surface of over 15 000 squared Kilometers from the body of the country,from which it was cutting a wide slice ,of over 30 Km; it had important cities in it as Turnu Severin,Sinaia,Tirgu Ocna and was kidnapping the petrolifer region from Trotus Valley.

After long discussions ,the austro german delegates have admited a reducement of the zone to be annexed ,such that the final slice of territory given to hungria represented a surface of over 5 600 sqared kilometers.Especially difficult have been the discussions for Azuga and Busteni ,on Prahova Valley and for half of Lotrului Valley ,to which the hungarians did not gave up but only after the personal insistences of Emperor Carol.

The whole ridge of Carpathian Mountains ,all the jewel of our mountains ,all the peaks to which are linked the legends and popular poetry of the Romanian -Parang,Cozia ,Negoiu,Caraiman,Vrancea ,Ceahlau,Rarau-,all the richness of our secular forests and a sum of old Romanian villages ,were taken from us.In counties Suceava and Dorohoi ,important portions of territory ,almost one third of each county ,were sliced from the body of the country.The old frontier ,with her elegant line ,which gave to the map of the country a beutiful contur ,was replaced by a straight line ,which was leaving a rest of a chopped and narrowed country.

"It has moved the land on which from Neagoe Basarab until today noone has stepped over!",has cried in pain Delavrancea ,before his soul departure.

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Kidnapping of Dobrogea

The second territorial matter of the treaty of peace was the one of Dobrogea.It was the repayment revendicated by bulgarians as price of their colaboration in the War and in this pretention were supported without the smallest reserve by hungarians ,glad by any solution which was bringing the weakening of Romania .As such,the central powers have decided ,as a sine qua non condition of the peace ,that Romania to give to bulgaria not only New Dobrogea ,the Cadrilater attached in 1913 ,but all Old Dobrogea ,until the mouths of Danube River.

The annexation of Old Dobrogea towards bulgaria constituted a cinic stepping with boots over the principle of peace without annexions and a real assasination committed over Romania :meant kidnapping by violence of the will of life of a free nation.

No motivation,of any kind,could not legitimate the pretention of bulgarians over Dobrogea.

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Ethnographically,Dobrogea is not and has never been bulgarian.The bulgarians have constituted always in Dobrogea a minority.At 1878 ,when Romania has obtained it in exchange for the three counties Southern-Basarabians kidnapped from us by Russia as repayment of our contribution in the Russian -Turkish War ,Dobrogea had a proportion of Romanians greater than the one of bulgarans.A statistic made by Bielozerkovici ,the Russian governor ,for administrative matters ,has given the following figures for Tulcea county and half of Constanta county :15 719 heads of families ,of which 5 572 Romanians and 4 750 bulgarians.Unfortunatly ,the statistic could not be finished ,but the figures which are missing could not in any case ruin the favorable proportion of the Romanians ,because they would refer just at plasile(lands) Cernavoda and Silistra where are the oldest Romanian settlements .The Romanian statistics of 1880 gives 46 671 Romanians and 24 915 bulgarians ,and the counting of 1913 gives 216 435 or 56% Romanians ,faced with 51 149 or 13,4% bulgarians.

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The toponymy comes to bring a decissive probe in he favour of the Romanian preponderent character of the province ,face with the bulgarian one.From the examination of 738 maps of old Dobrogea ,professor Bratescu has extracted a total of 3776 toponymic names :hills,valleys ,lakes ,forests,rivers,villages,cities etc.They are as follows:2 337 Turko-Tatar,1 260 meaning one third Romanians ,145 Russians ,only 28 bulgarians ,four Greek and one hungarian.

Even the bulgarian scientists admits directly or indirect this thing.As in the occasional literature ,printed abroad in 1918 to support the bulgarian cause ,they affirm ,without proving ,the bulgarian character of Dobrogea ,in serious scientific papers they must say the truth.In this way,professor Isirkov ,ina fundamental work*,recognizes that the bulgarians are in Dobrogea but only 50 000 ,meaning the sixth part of the inhabitants.And in another part**,he writes the text:"To think that there are more than 50 000 bulgarians in Dobrogea ,which happens often ,means to deceive ourselves in a thickly way ".Even in the voluminous literature of propaganda there are easily arguments to be found against the bulgarian thesis.The ethnographic map of the same Isirkov ,published in Rizov 's Atlas ,shows explicit the disproportion of the ethnic territory lived by bulgarians ,face with the one of Romanians.In the book of Romanski over the population of Dobrogea ,the author only makes affirmations ,without giving the most insignifiant figure from which it could yield the truth of the affirmed .

And historically Dobrogea has never belonged to a bulgarian constituted state .From the mastering of the Bizantine Empire ,she has passed in the possesion of Mircea the Old(Romanian voievod;medieval king) and from him have taken her the turks ,for that,after 500 years ,Romanians to retake her from the same turks.

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Economically, Dobrogea is indispensable to Romania ,being the only way out to the sea.To take from Romania Dobrogea with Constanta ,means to axfixiate her economically.This argument was so strong ,such that the bulgarians have felt the need to anihilate it by an entire series of publications in which,based on inexact figures,given in bad faith and interpreted and naively commented ,were forcing to prove that ,in fact ,Constanta is not the principal harbour of Romania and that the most intense comercial way is made by Danube harbours ,especially through Braila ,Galati and Sulina ,which would be the real economic lungs of Romania***.

Finally ,Dobrogea represents also for Romania a masterpiece of civilisation of which we can be proud ,the result of an intensive work of almost half a century.

Kidnapping of Dobrogea ,based on the rigth of the strong one and of the powerless in which we were to resist,constituted an act of brigandage with armed hand ,a monstrous attempt to the life and goods of a nation.Conscious of the weakness of arguments of all kind ,the bulgarians try also to invent another one : the will itself of the Dobrogean population ,as a consequence of the principle of autodetermination !They have organised during December 1917 at Babadag ,conform with the sugestions sreceived from the german minister Kuhlmann ,a set up intitulated with the pretentious name of:"The congress of states of Dobrogea".Out of 270 delegates ,none with Romanian name ,Greek ,Jewish or even german ,just at most 10 with Russian name and 13 with turkish name ;the other 245 are bulgarians .In fact ,half of the Romanian population took the road of drifters ;out of the ones that stayed,a good part were being deported in bulgaria ;the small minority which remained ,was held under the terror of the bayonet of the occupant.With such ridicule manifestation ,the bulgarians had the naivity to think they can fool Europe!*.

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