Ceaușescu's speech
On the morning of 21 December,
Ceaușescu addressed an assembly of approximately 100,000 people to condemn the
uprising in Timișoara. Party officials took great pains to make it appear that
Ceaușescu was still immensely popular. Several busloads of workers, under
threat of being fired, arrived in Bucharest's Piața Palatului (Palace Square,
now Piața Revoluției – Revolution Square) and were given red flags, banners and
large pictures of Ceaușescu. They were augmented by bystanders who were rounded
up on Calea Victoriei. The speech was
typical of most of Ceaușescu's speeches over the years. Making liberal use of
Marxist-Leninist rhetoric, he delivered a litany of the achievements of the
"socialist revolution" and Romanian "multi-laterally developed
socialist society". He blamed the Timișoara uprising on "fascist
agitators". However, Ceaușescu was out of touch with his people and
completely misread the crowd's mood. The people remained unresponsive, and only
the front rows supported Ceaușescu with cheers and applause. About two minutes
into the speech, some in the crowd actually began to jeer, boo, whistle and
yell insults at him, a reaction unthinkable for most of his rule. Workers from
a Bucharest power plant started chanting "Ti-mi-șoa-ra!
Ti-mi-șoa-ra!", which was soon picked up by others in the crowd. In
response, Ceaușescu raised his right hand in hopes of silencing the crowd; his
stunned expression remains one of the defining moments of the end of Communism
in Eastern Europe. He then tried to placate the crowd by offering to raise
workers' salaries by 200 lei per month (about 9 U.S. dollars at the time, yet a
5%–10% raise for a modest salary) and student scholarships from 100 to 110 lei
while continuing to praise the achievements of the Socialist Revolution.
However, a revolution was brewing right in front of his eyes. As Ceaușescu was addressing the crowd from
the balcony of the Central Committee building, sudden movement came from the
outskirts of the massed assembly, as did the sound of (what various sources
have reported as) fireworks, bombs or guns, which together caused the assembly
to break into chaos. Initially frightened, the crowds tried to disperse.
Bullhorns then began to spread the news that the Securitate was firing on the
crowd and that a "revolution" was unfolding. This persuaded people in
the assembly to join in. The rally turned into a protest demonstration. The entire speech was being broadcast live
nationwide. Censors attempted to cut the live video feed and replace it with
Communist propaganda songs and video praising the Ceaușescu regime, but parts
of the riots had already been broadcast and most of the Romanian people
realised that something unusual was in progress. Ceaușescu and his wife, as
well as other officials and CPEx members, panicked; Ceaușescu's bodyguard
hustled him back inside the building.
The jeers and whistles soon erupted into a riot; the crowd took to the
streets, placing the capital, like Timișoara, in turmoil. Members of the crowd
spontaneously began shouting anti-Ceaușescu slogans, which spread and became
chants: "Jos dictatorul!" ("Down with the dictator"),
"Moarte criminalului!" ("Death to the criminal"), "Noi
suntem poporul, jos cu dictatorul!" ("We are the People, down with
the dictator"), "Ceaușescu cine ești?/Criminal din Scornicești"
("Ceaușescu, who are you? A criminal from Scornicești"). Protesters eventually flooded the city centre
area, from Piața Kogălniceanu to Piața Unirii, Piața Rosetti and Piața Romană.
In one notable scene from the event, a young man waved a tricolour with the
Communist coat of arms torn out of its centre while perched on the statue of
Mihai Viteazul on Boulevard Mihail Cogălniceanu in the University Square. Many
others began to emulate the young protester, and the waving and displaying of
the Romanian flag with the Communist insignia cut out quickly became
widespread.
Street confrontations
As the hours passed many more
people took to the streets. Later, observers claimed that even at this point,
had Ceaușescu been willing to talk, he might have been able to salvage
something. Instead, he decided on force.
Soon the protesters—unarmed and unorganised—were confronted by soldiers,
tanks, APCs, USLA troops (Unitatea Specială pentru Lupta Antiteroristă,
anti-terrorist special squads) and armed plainclothes Securitate officers. The
crowd was soon being shot at from various buildings, side streets and tanks. There were many casualties, including deaths,
as victims were shot, clubbed to death, stabbed and crushed by armoured
vehicles. One APC drove into the crowd around the InterContinental Hotel,
crushing people. A French journalist, Jean-Louis Calderon, was killed. A street
near University Square was later named after him, as well as a high school in
Timișoara. Belgian journalist Danny Huwé was shot and killed on 23 or 24
December 1989. Firefighters hit the demonstrators with powerful water jets, and
the police continued to beat and arrest people. Protesters managed to build a
defensible barricade in front of the Dunărea ("Danube") restaurant,
which stood until after midnight, but was finally torn apart by government
forces. Intense shooting continued until after 03:00, by which time the
survivors had fled the streets. Records
of the fighting that day include footage shot from helicopters that were sent
to raid the area and record evidence for eventual reprisals, as well as by
tourists in the high tower of the centrally located InterContinental Hotel,
next to the National Theatre and across the street from the university. It is likely that in the early hours of 22
December the Ceaușescus made their second mistake. Instead of fleeing the city
under cover of night, they decided to wait until morning to leave. Ceaușescu
must have thought that his desperate attempts to crush the protests had
succeeded, because he apparently called another meeting for the next morning.
However, before 07:00, his wife Elena received the news that large columns of
workers from many industrial platforms (large communist-era factories or groups
of factories concentrated into industrial zones) were heading towards the city
centre of Bucharest to join the protests. The police barricades that were meant
to block access to Piața Universității (University Square) and Palace Square
proved useless. By 09:30 University Square was jammed with protesters. Security
forces (army, police and others) re-entered the area, only to join with the
protesters. By 10:00, as the radio
broadcast was announcing the introduction of martial law and a ban on groups
larger than five persons, hundreds of thousands of people were gathering for
the first time, spontaneously, in central Bucharest (the previous day's crowd
had come together at Ceaușescu's orders). Ceaușescu attempted to address the
crowd from the balcony of the Central Committee of the Communist Party
building, but his attempt was met with a wave of disapproval and anger.
Helicopters spread manifestos (which did not reach the crowd, due to
unfavourable winds) instructing people not to fall victim to the latest
"diversion attempts," but to go home instead and enjoy the Christmas
feast. This order, which drew unfavourable comparisons to Marie Antoinette's haughty
(but apocryphal) "Let them eat cake", further infuriated the people
who did read the manifestos; many at that time had trouble procuring such basic
foodstuffs as cooking oil.
Military defection and
Ceaușescu's fall
At approximately 09:30 on the
morning of 22 December Vasile Milea, Ceaușescu's minister of defence, died
under suspicious circumstances. A communiqué by Ceaușescu stated that Milea had
been sacked for treason, and that he had committed suicide after his treason
was revealed. The most widespread opinion
at the time was that Milea hesitated to follow Ceaușescu's orders to fire on
the demonstrators, even though tanks had been dispatched to downtown Bucharest
that morning. Milea was already in severe disfavour with Ceaușescu for
initially sending soldiers to Timișoara without live ammunition. Rank-and-file
soldiers believed that Milea had actually been murdered and went over virtually
en masse to the revolution. Senior commanders wrote off Ceaușescu as a lost
cause and made no effort to keep their men loyal to the regime. This
effectively ended any chance of Ceaușescu staying in power. Accounts differ about how Milea died. His
family and several junior officers believed he had been shot in his own office
by the Securitate, while another group of officers believed he had committed
suicide. In 2005 an investigation
concluded that the minister killed himself by shooting at his heart, but the
bullet missed the heart, hit a nearby artery and led to his death shortly afterward.[citation
needed] Upon learning of Milea's death,
Ceaușescu appointed Victor Stănculescu minister of defence. He accepted after a
brief hesitation. Stănculescu, however, ordered the troops back to their
quarters without Ceaușescu's knowledge, and also persuaded Ceaușescu to leave
by helicopter, thus making the dictator a fugitive. At that same moment angry
protesters began storming the Communist Party headquarters; Stănculescu and the
soldiers under his command did not oppose them.
By refusing to carry out Ceaușescu's orders (he was still technically
commander-in-chief of the army), Stănculescu played a central role in the
overthrow of the dictatorship. "I had the prospect of two execution
squads: Ceaușescu's and the revolutionary one!" confessed Stănculescu
later. In the afternoon, Stănculescu "chose" Ion Iliescu's political
group from among others that were striving for power in the aftermath of the
recent events.
Helicopter extraction
Following Ceaușescu's second
failed attempt to address the crowd, he and Elena fled into a lift (elevator)
headed for the roof. A group of protesters managed to force their way into the
building, overpower Ceaușescu's bodyguards and make their way through his
office before heading onto the balcony. They didn't know it, but they were only
a few metres from Ceaușescu. The lift's electricity failed just before it
reached the top floor, and Ceaușescu's bodyguards forced it open and ushered
the couple onto the roof. At 11:20 on 22
December 1989, Ceaușescu's personal pilot, Lt. Col. Vasile Maluțan, received
instructions from Lt. Gen. Opruta to proceed to Palace Square to pick up the
president. As he flew over Palace Square he saw it was impossible to land
there. Maluțan landed his white Dauphin, #203, on the terrace at 11:44. A man
brandishing a white net curtain from one of the windows waved him down. Maluțan said, "Then Stelica, the
co-pilot, came to me and said that there were demonstrators coming to the
terrace. Then the Ceaușescus came out, both practically carried by their
bodyguards . . . They looked as if they were fainting. They were white with
terror. Manea Mănescu [one of the vice-presidents] and Emil Bobu were running
behind them. Mănescu, Bobu, Neagoe and another Securitate officer scrambled to
the four seats in the back . . . As I pulled Ceaușescu in, I saw the
demonstrators running across the terrace . . . There wasn't enough space, Elena
Ceaușescu and I were squeezed in between the chairs and the door . . . We were
only supposed to carry four passengers . . . We had six." According to Maluțan, it was 12:08 when they
left for Snagov. After they arrived there, Ceaușescu took Maluțan into the
presidential suite and ordered him to get two helicopters filled with soldiers
for an armed guard, and a further Dauphin to come to Snagov. Maluțan's unit
commander replied on the phone, "There has been a revolution . . . You are
on your own . . . Good luck!". Maluțan then said to Ceaușescu that the
second motor was now warmed up and they needed to leave soon but he could only
take four people, not six. Mănescu and Bobu stayed behind. Ceaușescu ordered
Maluțan to head for Titu. Near Titu, Maluțan says that he made the helicopter
dip up and down. He lied to Ceaușescu, saying that this was to avoid
anti-aircraft fire, since they would now be in range. Ceaușescu panicked and
told him to land. He did so in a field
next to the old road that led to Pitești. Maluțan then told his four passengers
that he could do nothing more. The Securitate men ran to the roadside and began
to flag down passing cars. Two cars stopped, one of them driven by a forestry
official and one a red Dacia driven by a local doctor. However, the doctor was
not happy about getting involved and, after a short time driving the
Ceaușescus, faked engine trouble. A car of a bicycle repair man was then
flagged down and he took them to Târgoviște. The driver of the car, Nicolae
Petrișor, convinced them that they could hide successfully in an agricultural
technical institute on the edge of town. When they arrived, the director guided
the Ceaușescus into a room and then locked them in. They were arrested by local
police at about 15:30, then after some wandering around transported to the
Târgoviște garrison's military compound and held captive for several days until
their trial.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_Revolution
https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/romanian-revolution-pictures-1989/
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