ROMANIA'S DEFIANCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000706950034-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 13, 2012
• Sequence Number: 34
• Publication Date: August 25, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/11/13: CIA-RDP90-00965R000706950034-1
APTICLE APHTARED
ON PAGE
WASHINGTON POST
25 August 1985
Jack Anderson and Dale Van Alta
Romania's Defiance
No Soviet bloc nation has been more inde-
pendent than Romania. Its autonomy was dra-
matized last summer when the Romanian dele-
gation proudly marched to the cheers of the
Olympics crowd in Los Angeles?alone among
Russia's allies in refusing to join the boycott.
The maverick responsible for this show of
defiance is Nicolae Ceausescu, who has ruled
Romania with an iron fist since 1965. Yet many
Romanians revere him as an indestructible na-
tional asset.
The fact of his mortality, however, has been
of increasing interest to the CIA. which has
been sending top-secret reports about Ceau-
-sesciLta2residentikagam
The dispatches coming out of Bucharest in-
dicate that the 67-year-old leader is dying of
prostate cancer. According to one classified
prediction, he is not expected to live until
spring.
The key to White House interest in Ceau-
sescu is found in one paragraph of a top-secret
CIA profile: "Although the great powers all
play an important part in Ceausescu's thinking,
he has been very interested in improving rela-
tions with the United Staten. He believes
Romania, which has an 830-mile border with
the USSR, needs powerful friends, if only for
the psychological boost they can provide."
This posture also gives him higher approval
ratings at home. "Ceausescu enjoys a jgreati
nu.asiirp of genuine popular support" the CIA
profile says. "His people are highly nationalis-
tic, proud of Romania's continued defiance of
the Russians and admire his ability to exploit
great-power rivalries to promote Romanian na-
tional interests."
Aside from refusing to go along with the
Olympic boycott, Ceausescu publicly opposed
the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, the
Vietnamese takeover of Cambodia in 1979, the
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and both Soviet
and American development of space weapons.
When Ceausescu took control of the Romanian
Communist Party 20 years ago, the Soviets in-
correctly assumed he would be a loyal puppet.
After all, he had joined the then-illegal party at
the age of 14, and he was scarcely out of his
teens before he was thrown into jail for eight
years and intermittently tortured for his politics.
But Ceausescu shocked the Soviets a mere
four years after he came to power by becom-
ing the first post-World War II East European
leader to host a U.S. head of state when
he received President Richard Nixon in
Bucharest.
The following year, he flew to New York for
the 25th anniversary of the founding of the
United Nations. He was later received by
presidents Ford and Carter at the White House
and once took a two-week tour of the United
States.
Ironically, the popularity he has amassed in
Bucharest is indirectly the result of his repres-
sive rule. "He has mana ed to carve out a mea-
sure of indepen ence om oscow, in part, ,
because liehas insisted on maintaining a rigid,
orthodox communist system at home. the CIA,
But the old man has been slowing down.
Close examination even of touched-up photos
in Romanian newspapers show he is deteriorat-
ing. He is losing weight and appears tired. He
has missed key meetings and even volleyball
games, his favorite form of relaxation. The
word in Bucharest is that his wife, Elena, is.
running the government.
Like most despots, Ceausescu is a nepotist.
His wife serves as first deputy prime minister,
head of Romania's scientific policy-making
body and member of three of the four principal '
conunittees of the Romanian Communist
Party. One son, Nicu, has already been
groomed as his successor. Another son, a
daughter, three brothers, a sister and two.
brothers-in-law have also been given top.
Romanian honors or positions to ensure a
Ceausescu dynasty.
Meanwhile, the CIA predicts, Ceausescu_wa
continue his shrewdly calculated defiance cif_
the Soviets. Conclude the analysts:
'Ceausescu knows that the Soviets will tol- ?
erate Romanian recalcitrance only as long as ?
they do not see it as a serious threat. [His] suc-
cess in following his chosen course is a
measure of his ability to judge correctly the
limits of Soviet tolerance. In playing this
course, he is always running the risk of tniscal- '
culation."
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/11/13: CIA-RDP90-00965R000706950034-1