d
by the National Renaissance Front, a monopoly party that he founded
later in the same year.

Internal instability and uncertainty were aggravated by rapidly
developing international events that threatened the security of the
state. The swift rise of Germany under Adolf Hitler resulted in the
annexation of Austria in 1938 and the subsequent dismemberment and
absorption of Czechoslovakia. These actions, unopposed by the Western
powers, were early warnings of weakness in the Western-oriented
collective security system on which Romania had depended since World War
I. The lessening of confidence in the West led Romania in 1939 to
conclude a treaty of economic collaboration with Germany. This agreement
greatly increased German influence in the country and placed the
extensive Romanian oil and other resources at Germany's disposal for
later wartime use.

Although Romania's territorial integrity had been guaranteed by both
Great Britain and France after the fall of Czechoslovakia, these
assurances were nullified by the early German military successes
achieved following the outbreak of World War II. After the conclusion of
a nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union in August 1939, Germany
invaded and occupied Poland and, by mid-1940, had defeated France and
forced the evacuation of the European mainland by British forces. Faced
with the loss of its two strongest partners in the alliance system and
with the aggressive ambitions of the two strongest totalitarian powers
on the European continent--Germany and the Soviet Union--Romania had
little chance of continued independent survival.

WORLD WAR II

The first claims against Romania were made by the Soviet Union, which in
June 1940 demanded the immediate cession of Bessarabia and northern
Bukovina. Under German pressure Romania acceded to these demands, as
well as to the later loss of northern Transylvania, which Germany and
Italy transferred to Hungary at a joint conference held in Vienna on
August 30, 1940. A third loss of territory, also under German pressure,
followed one week later with the return of southern Dobruja to Bulgaria,
which had already entered the war on the side of Germany.

The crisis caused by these territorial losses had a serious impact
within the country. King Carol was forced to appoint a pro-German
cabinet, and the government was heavily infiltrated with members of the
Iron Guard, most of whom were released from custody under German
pressure. A n