Historical analysis reveals Romania's diplomatic pivot toward Berlin driven by territorial threats and economic needs, highlighting the fragility of Western security guarantees.
After the Great War, Romania considered that an alliance with the victorious Western powers and regional alliance systems could guarantee the integrity of the new borders. However, the predominantly agrarian nature of the Romanian economy, the revisionist policies of Hungary and the Soviet Union towards their neighbours, and the manifest inability of the Western powers to guarantee the security of the countries of Central Europe led Romania to reorient itself towards restoring relations with Berlin. The assertion of Nazi Germany starting in 1933 led the government in Bucharest to pursue the establishment of economic relations with Germany, in the hope that Berlin, interested in Romanian raw materials and Romanian oil, would not support either Budapest’s claims over Transylvania or Moscow’s claims over Bessarabia.
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Alaric Searle (2026) studied this question.
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