Children of the Night

Book excerpt: Balanced precariously on the shifting fault line between East and West, Romania's past is one of the great untold stories of modern Europe. The country that gave us Vlad Dracula, and whose citizens consider themselves descendants of ancient Rome, has traditionally preferred the status of enigmatic outsider. But it has experienced some of the most disastrous leaderships of the last century: from the corrupt and mentally unbalanced King Carol and the vain General Ion Antonescu to the fascist death cult led by Corneliu Codreanu. After 1945 power was handed to Romania's tiny communist party, under which it experienced severe repression, purges and collectivisation. Then in 1965, Nicolae Ceausescu came to power. And thus began the strangest dictatorship of all.