Memoria stalinismului. Citind despre Polonia în ziarul „Scânteia”, 1948-1953
The memory of Stalinism: Reading about Poland in the newspaper „Scânteia“, 1948-1953

Summary/Abstract: It is clear, both from the political decision in Warsaw and Bucharest, and from the reading of „Scânteia”, that the relations between Romania and Poland after the Second World War but especially after the proclamation of the People's Republic in Bucharest were neither close nor self-sufficient. During Stalin's lifetime, until the beginning of 1953, nothing was treasured in the bilateral connection, as had happened after the First World War when, even the first months of peace had brought with them a number of joint actions and calls for strategic alliance, including the establishment of a common border. On the contrary, after 1948 this memory is repudiated and the protagonists are criticized. „Scânteia“ does not, of course, resume any of the episodes of the bilateral relationship between Romania and Poland in the interwar period and does not refer to any of its peak moments, even if the elapsed time was not long at all. For example, the Polish refuge in Romania in the autumn of 1939 and its prolongation in the wartime years had taken place only a few years before the abdication of King Michael, on December 30, 1947 and the entry of Romania into totalitarianism. The image of Poland in Stalinist Romania is flawless from a dogmatic-ideological point of view: almost certainly a more perfect template is hard to find in the editorial spaces of the other offices of the communist parties in the states occupied by the USSR. Being a story fully accepted by Moscow and the Soviet occupiers, the image of Stalinist Poland also became an indigestible text for the general public. And further, continuing in patterns and without any relevance in bilateral relations, until the early 1990s, after the collapse of communist regimes, Romania and Poland went separately as minor regional interests and options, other than those imposed by the USSR, throughout the Cold War. A situation completely contrary, of course, to the golden stories of the „alliance of hearts” from the interwar period.

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