COMECON, set up by the Soviets in 1949 as a counterpoise to the European Recovery Program (Marshall Plan), was basically an economic commission designed to assist the economic development of the communist Eastern European nations during the post-World War II period. Within this organization Romania had acted largely as a supplier of agricultural products, petroleum, and other raw materials and depended on the more industrialized member states for most manufactured goods. Under the Khrushchev plan, Romania's role in this organization would remain unchanged, and all domestic plans that had been developed to produce a balanced economy through increased industrialization would be effectively nullified.
Khrushchev, in pushing his revised plans for COMECON, publicly called for the creation of a supranational planning agency within the organization that would be empowered to select investment projects, allocate regional resources, and prescribe economic tasks to be undertaken by the individual member states on the basis of a majority vote. Romanian leaders reacted firmly and resolutely to this suggestion by publishing a statement of the party Central Committee that definitely rejected the policy of supranational economic integration and the utilization of majority decisions as a means of forcing economic cooperation. The committee's resolution further pointed out that economic collaboration should be based on respect for national independence, sovereignty, and the equality inherent in the rights of nations.
Pressure was exerted to bring the Romanian leadership into line. To counter this, the Romanians took steps to demonstrate their determination to hold to their independent views. A program of desovietization was begun throughout the country, during which Soviet bookshops were closed, the compulsory study of the Russian language in schools was ended, and those street names that had been changed to honor Soviet persons or events reverted to their original Romanian designations. Also, in the field of foreign policy Romania adopted an attitude of nonalignment in the Sino-Soviet dispute, resumed relations with Albania (which had been severed after that country left the Soviet bloc in 1961), and conducted negotiations for increased trade with the People's Republic of China as well as with several Western nations.
By the end of 1963 it was apparent that Soviet plans for revising COMECON could not be implemented and, with Romania retaining its membership, it remained an organization of national economies cooperating with one another along both bilateral and multilateral lines. The Soviets, however, retained leadership of the organization and continued to be a major benefactor from its operation.
The surfacing of the policy conflict with Moscow and the subsequent activities of the Romanians in defiance of general Soviet interests and leadership were followed in April 1964 by a formal statement published by the party Central Committee that proclaimed Romania's inalienable right to national autonomy and full equality in the communist world. This so-called declaration of independence made it abundantly clear that the national and independent character of Romanian policy had been extended to all fields and would be applied in both domestic and foreign relations.
The policy of greater national autonomy and political independence from the Soviet Union was continued by Nicolae Ceausescu, who succeeded Gheorghiu-Dej as party chief after the latter's sudden death in March 1965. A militant nationalist in the Gheorghiu-Dej pattern, Ceausescu acted quickly after assuming power not only to maintain the political momentum generated by the new national line but also to more closely identify the communist leadership and policies with this expression of traditional national aspiration (see ch. 9).
In April the name of the Romanian Workers' Party was changed to the Romanian Communist Party, and new organizational measures were adopted that were intended to broaden the party's popular base. This action was followed by the adoption of a new constitution, which changed the name of the country to the Socialist Republic of Romania, a step that elevated the country to an advanced status in the communist system by self-proclamation.
In 1967 Ceausescu's position was further strengthened when he assumed the presidency of the Council of State to become the head of the country in title as well as in fact. Since that time Romania has maintained a firm, orthodox communist control pattern in its domestic affairs but has continued to pursue an independent foreign policy, which has diverged remarkably, from time to time, from those of the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Treaty Organization (Warsaw Pact) allies.
Differences have included opposition to the full integration of the Warsaw Pact military alliance, refusal to joint the Soviet bloc in condemning Israel after the 1967 Six-Day Arab-Israeli War, and unilateral establishment of diplomatic relations with the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany). Perhaps the strongest position vis-à-vis the Soviet Union was taken in 1968, when Ceausescu denounced the so-called Brezhnev Doctrine of limited sovereignty among socialist nations, which was used by the Soviets to justify the invasion of Czechoslovakia (see ch. 10).