Abstract
Glenn Torrey’s book captures the paradox of Romania’s involvement in the First World War: the country entered the war in 1916 as a dark horse, dwindled to half of its initial territory following crushing military defeat, subsequently sprang back into action, and recovered its national territory and almost redoubled it by annexing Romanian-inhabited provinces from the neighbouring empires. Torrey’s analysis is lucid and balanced, source-rich, with an eye for the anecdotal and humane detail. Thorough research provides this book with a rounded perspective drawing on Romanian, German, Austro-Hungarian, French, Russian, and British archival sources.
Romania’s decision to enter the war was based on a political rationale rather than military preparedness or opportunity. Prime Minister Ion I. C. Brătianu led protracted negotiations with Entente representatives and, given the country’s military and geostrategic vulnerability, drove a hard bargain: Romania eventually joined the Entente in exchange for extensive territorial compensation at the end of the war, which would have satisfied Romanian national aspirations for bringing together into one state the numerous Romanian population outside the boundaries of the Romanian kingdom. Torrey shows the huge disadvantage the fledgling Romanian army was at prior to entering the war in August 1916, with infantry divisions which varied greatly in size and armament, obsolete methods of warfare (which ignored the strategic experience acquired by the other belligerents during the first two years of war), and no adequate leadership. Moreover, as Torrey points out, the Brusilov offensive drew the Romanians into the war not because it was viewed as an opportunity but rather because it was perceived as a threat. Brătianu’s fear was that the Russians might occupy Transylvania, the holy grail of Romanian nationalism, and Austria-Hungary might sue for peace while Romania was still out of the war and had no say in the matter.
Romania committed to a war on two fronts, which was pursued with the bulk of the army concentrated on the northern, Transylvanian, front, leaving the southern, Danube, front dependent on illusory promises of Russian support and a strong Allied offensive from Salonica to keep the Bulgarians in check. Although it benefited from the surprise element of Romania’s unexpected entry into the war, the Transylvanian campaign was eventually stalled by the devastating reverse the Romanian army sustained on the southern front at Turtucaia in September 1916. What followed was, according to Torrey, a classic case of changing horses in midstream, with a propitious offensive stopped in Transylvania and troops rushed from north to south of the country and stranded en route for the best part of a month. This allowed the Austro-Hungarian forces to regroup and receive reinforcements, which enabled them to mount a powerful counteroffensive in Transylvania. Concomitantly the German and Bulgarian forces under the command of General Mackensen defeated the Russo-Romanian army defending Dobrogea, while General Falkenhayn’s forces pushed through the mountain passes from Transylvania into Romania. The occupation of more than half of Romania by the Central Powers in late 1916 gave the victors access to the country’s rich resources of grain and, most importantly, oil. However, as Torrey stresses, the gains on the newly opened Romanian front did not outweigh the cost of these campaigns for the Central Powers: the deflection of valuable troops from other fronts and, even after occupation, the indefinite maintenance of troops along a ‘new front of almost 300 km’ (p. 168) considerably sapped the Central Powers’ military energy. The Romanian army, which underwent major reorganization under the skilled command of French general Henri Berthelot, succeeded in keeping German and Austro-Hungarian armies in check across the eastern Carpathians and was only caught offside in 1917 when the Russian revolution led to the disintegration of the Russian army. This in turn forced Romania to sign a separate peace with the Central Powers in spring 1918. As the tide of the war turned in the summer of 1918 Romania entered the war once again. Remobilization was facilitated by the foot-dragging that had characterized the actual implementation of the Treaty of Bucharest. The reassembled army rejoined the war on the Entente side on the very eve of the armistice, and therefore was used ‘to stabilize the postwar situation in Southeastern Europe and participate in a cordon sanitaire against Bolshevism’ (p. 334).
The Romanian Battlefront in World War I is a seminal work which throws new light on the evolution of the Eastern Front and is by far the most comprehensive study of Romania’s participation in the First World War. The book makes available in English a wide range of Romanian archival material and secondary bibliography that would otherwise have remained outside the reach of mainstream scholarship of the war. By focusing on the Romanian battle-front, Torrey showcases the high degree of interdependence between developments on the Western and Eastern fronts and the subtle ways in which Romania’s entry into the war, defeat, and eventual military resuscitation influenced the overall direction of the war as well as the terms of peace in the region. All these points make the book a major contribution to scholarship on the Great War.