Socialists and Communists
After 1945, one of the strategies used by the Communist Party to gain complete control of Romania's political life was to create alliances with traditionalist left-wing parties, such as the Social-Democratic Party. The communists masked their true intentions behind false friendships with other powerful parties. Many democrats were in favor of collaborating with the communists, but the alliance proved to be nothing more than another forcible take-over by the Communist Party, which eventually led to the extinction of the Social-Democratic Party.
In 1945, the party was facing a dilemma. They had two options: they could either work together with the National Peasants' Party and the National Liberal Party, or join forces with the communist offensive. At a conference held in December of 1945, the PSD's politburo expressed their refusal to participate in the upcoming elections on common lists with the Communist Party. As a result, the communists resorted to a devious plan: to turn social-democrats against each other in order to gain control of their party. Some party members holding senior positions were promised benefits and rewards if they joined the communists. Others were blackmailed with accusations that they had collaborated with Antonescu's regime.
The trick seemed to work and March the 10th 1946 saw the start of the PSD Congress which would reiterate the decision taken at the party conference in December 1945. A closely-knit group from within the social-democratic party left and formed the new Independent Social-Democratic Party. The conference held in March 1946 which resulted in the party's division. Titel said he would leave the party unless there was an open vote. After the majority voted for the collaboration with the communists, Titel left the party. Voinea slammed his fist against the table and called Titel a deserter. Voinea was in favour of collaborating with the communists. At the congress of October 1947, Voinea spoke for the entire Social-Democratic Party. He addressed the foreign delegates, and said: "you have been freed by the American army, which has a lot of influence in the territories where they're stationed. We suffered from the influence of the Soviet army during their occupation of Romania." Voinea agreed with the unification of the Social-Democratic Party and the Communist Party under one condition: that the two have their own separate congresses. The communists refused.
At the congress in 1947, the main point on the agenda was the unification of the workers' movement. At the congress a lot of delegates stood out and blamed themselves, trying to show that the social-democratic tactics had been wrong, and were not to the benefit of the workers' movement. Barbu Solomon, who was on the steering committee, called me over and told me, although he was with the communists: "They are really overdoing it with the self blame, take the floor and tell them it's the wrong approach". And he gave me the floor, even though it wasn't my turn, and showed them the merits of the social democrats. In the end, communism comes from social democracy, the Bolshevik Party was a branch of the Russian Social Democratic Party, the basic ideas are those of the social democrats.
The so-called unification process bringing together the social democratic and the communist parties in 1948 was only a formality, and the social democrats vanished as a party. The members of the party had different destinies. The Radaceanu's and Voitec's pro-communist group became a part of the upper structures of the Communist party. Voinea, an idealist who was initially in favor of the unification with the communists, went to France, where he condemned the crimes of communism. The founders of the Social Democratic Party who opposed the union ended in tragedy. They were arrested and then died in prison, like Grigorovici, Jumanca, and Flueras, or shortly after being set free, like Petrescu. The union between the social democrats and the communist party meant the destruction of the Romanian democratic left as the communist totalitarianism was consolidating.
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