DLC Idea - Romania's story ("Between the Hammer and the Anvil")

[Akfiz]

I previosuly made this Battlefield 1 suggestion: https://answers.ea.com/t5/Game-Information/DLC-Idea-Romania-s-story-during-the-Great-War-quot-The-Gr... and got some positive feedback on it, however, @WindowsManTv_CZE told me that unfortunately Battlefield 1 is no longer in development. So I decided to give another DLC idea but for Battlefield V.

The motto of Battlefield V is "World War II as you have never seen it before", so I will offer you a World War II story you have never heard before.

The way Romania views World War II is different from what you may expect. Being an Axis power you’d think that Romanians views World War II with shame, similary to Germany or Japan, but the Romanians’ view World War II is more similar to that of the Finns and Polish. To understand why, we must explore that time in history from Romania’s perspective.

Romania was traditionally an ally of France ever since it was established in 1859, joined the Entente in 1916 and won World War I in 1918. In the aftermath of World War I Romania took territory from Austria- Hungary (Transylvania and Bukovina) and what became the Soviet Union (Bessarabia).

It is very important (at least to Romanians) how and why those territories were taken because it wasn’t just a simple land grab. Those territories had a long history with the Romanians and already had a Romanian majority, although also significant minorities of other nationalities.

This was the territory Romania took in 1918:

And this was the population census in 1930:

No population exchanges were made between 1918 and 1930. Out of 18 million people, 13 millions (72%) were Romanian.

Considering the historical background as well, that Bessarabia and Bukovina used to be part of Moldavia ever since its founding before being annexed by the Russian and Austrian Empires, while Transylvania was part of Dacia and later the Voivodeship of Gelou, Glad and Menumorut before the Hungarian conquest, it’s no wonder that Romania views those territories as rightfully theirs (except for Southern Dobruja - Durostor and Caliacra, those are another story).

At the end of World War I Romania already achieved its national dream. Every territory with a Romanian majority was now under a single Romanian state. As such Romania lost interest in warfare. It was a founding member of the League of Nations in which it had an active implicaiton and focused more on economy.

But it’s neighbours who lost World War I (Hungary and Bulgaria) weren’t as content with the current state of affairs, as such Romania joined the Little Entente and later the Balkan Entente to protect against revanchism.

In the intewar period, Romania’s fascist party was the Iron Guard, which in the last year with free election, 1937, only won 15% of the votes.

Things weren’t going well, the current King was a less than competent hendonist that is hated to this day by many.

But at least Romania was a democracy (constitutional monarchy) and western-aligned (which at that time only meant France, UK didn’t really care about Romania and USA was isolationalist).

At the outbreak of World War II Romania had an alliance with Poland and was ready to assist them. But Poland declined Romanian military assistance because it expected to receive assistance from its British and French allies through Romanian ports, the Romanian Bridgehead Plan.

When the Soviet Union also attacked, the Polish high command abandoned the plan and ordered its units to evacuate, many units went through Romanian borders, to the Black Sea ports and then to France.

After Germany defeated France Romania found itself in a dangerous position: It was a winner of World War I, the war whose outcome Nazi Germany hated, it was an western-aligned country and it helped the Polish escape.

The government of Romania turned to Germany in hopes of a guarantee, unaware of the secret Ribbertrop-Molotov Pact between Germany and Russia who would also split Romania.

As such in a few months Russia took Bessarabia with Northern Bukovina, Bulgaria took Southern Dobruja and Hungary took Northern Transylvania. One third of Romania's 1939 area was taken in 1940 and with it Romania's population shrank from 20 million to 13 million, half of the lost population was ethnically Romanian.

These territorial losses caused the popularity of Romania’s king and government to plummet, further reinforcing the fascist and military factions who eventually staged a coup that turned the country into fascist dictatorship under Marshal Ion Antonescu and forced King Carol II to abdicate.

The new regime firmly set the country on a course towards the Axis, officially joining the Axis in November 1940 and entering the war in June 1941 against the Soviet under the pretext of recovering northern Bukovina and Bessarabia.

The contribution of Romania to the Axis war effort was significant as it provided most of Germany's oil and over a million men to Operation Barbarossa.

After the Battle of Stalingrad in 1943 Antonescu started to negociate for peace, but by 1944 discontent among both the elite and the populace had grown which led to Prince Michael leading a coup against Marshal Ion Antonescu and Romania switching sides to the Allies.

After that the Romanian army continued fighting on the allied side in Hungary and Czechoslovakia. After the war they gained back Northern Transylvania, but not Southern Dobruja, Northern Bukovina and Bessarabia.

In 1947 King Michael was forced to abdicate by the communists and Romania became a communist state.

As such World War II is viewed by Romanians as a great injustice and as a war that they were forced into.

Romanians today usually blame the king for being incompetent and giving up that territory. He had his flaws, but I don’t think there’s anything he or the government could have done trapped between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union who both didn’t like Romania due to its previous western stance. Fighting back would have only ensured that more territory is lost.

Some see Romania as being sold by the Allies, but I don’t see what the Allies could have done after Germany defeated France. The only thing the Allies can be blamed is not attacking the Soviet Union in 1945 as Churchill urged them to do.

Ion Antonescu is controversed. He was definetly a patriot, had integrity and was a good strategist. But some see him as a villain who allied with Nazi Germany taking part in the Holocaust, although reluctantly; others see him as a hero trying to recover Northern Bukovina and Bessarabia, while others see him as a pragmatic leader who didn’t care for the fascist ideology but was confident Germany will win and wanted to be on the winning side.

There was no way World War II could have ended well for Romania, the choice was either Communism or Nazism.

For more information: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9TsuLYAGQo

The main character/hero of the campain can be a soldier of the Mountain Huntsmen "Vantori de Munte": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%A2n%C4%83tori_de_munte

"The Romanian vânători de munte saw action in World War II on the Eastern Front in some of the harshest battles - including the sieges of Sevastopol and Stalingrad - where their performance lived up to their reputation: virtually all their commanders from brigade level and up received the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross, with general Mihail Lascăr being the first foreigner to receive Oak Leaves on 22 November 1942. After 23 August 1944, they fought on the Soviet side, notably in Tatra Mountains. The greatest single achievement of the vânători de munte was the capture of Nalchik on 2 November 1942, the farthest point of Axis advance into the Caucasus. This victory earned Romanian Brigadier General Ioan Dumitrache the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross."

The Mountain Huntsmen are a special military branch of the Romanian Army. Their role is to carry out operations independent or in cooperation with other forces, on mountainous and wooded land, on territories difficult to access, on any weather and season conditions.

During the Second World War, the Mountain Huntsmen actively participated in the fights on the Eastern Front and, after August 23, 1944, on the West Front. In 1940, the number of battalions in a brigade of mountain hunters increased from 4 to 6, by mobilizing eight reserve battalions (numbered 17-24). Two other battalions, number 25 and 26, formed a separate group of skiers.

The Mountain Hunters Body participated in the fighting for the release of northern Bukovina in 1941, the province being released on July 9th. After the liberation of Bucovina, the body participated in the struggles in Ukraine until October 1941. Later, mountain troop troops participated in the Crimean campaign.

On March 25, 1942, the brigades were reorganized into divisions, by increasing their numbers. Artillery of mountain hunting brigades has proved to be the weak point of these formations, with the mouths of fire not being strong enough for the steppe in Russia. In the mountain areas, however, the performances of obsolete artillery pieces were satisfactory.

Since July 1942, the Mountain Hunters Corps has participated in the Blue Operation with Divisions 2 and 3 of the Mountain Huntsmen that have advanced to the Caucasus. General John Dumitrache, commander of the 2nd Division Mountain Huntsmen, received the Iron Cross Knight's Cross for his troops to conquer Nalcik. Mountain Huntsmen Divisions 1 and 4 were used in the winter of 1942 and 1943 to guard the Crimean Peninsula, being rebuilt after the conquest of Sevastopol.

After the Battle of Stalingrad, Divisions 2 and 3 of the Mountain Huntsmen were gradually withdrawn from the Kuban Bridge in the Crimea, then the Mountain Hunt Corps took part in defending the Crimean Peninsula, being partially evacuated in Romania until May 9, 1944, when Sevastopol was occupied by Soviet troops.

Since the beginning of the war, the staff of a division of Mountain Huntsmen have grown from 12,000 soldiers to nearly 16,000 soldiers following the reorganization between 1943-1944.

Divisions 1, 2 and 3 Mountain Huntsmen participated in the liberation of Romania after August 23, 1944, in the fighting in northern Transylvania and at the conquest of Debrecen.

After October 26, 1944, Division 1 and 4 Mountain Huntsmen were absorbed by Divisions 2 and 3 Mountain Huntsmen. The latter participated in the battles for the liberation of Hungary and Czechoslovakia.

As a result of World War II operations, 74,208 soldiers from Mountain Huntsmen troops were killed in the battle. Of these, 2,378 were officers, 1,830 were non-commissioned officers, and 70,000 were graduate soldiers. The road from these units was over 3000 kilometers, from Romania to the foothills of the Caucasus, then from Kuban to Czechoslovakia.

[TTZ_Dipsy · Accepted solution]

It's too bad the team isn't doing War Stories anymore because this would have been perfect. I think it's great to get another side's perspective of battles and I'm sure bringing the Romanians into the fold would make a lot of people happy

[TTZ_Dipsy · Accepted solution]

It's too bad the team isn't doing War Stories anymore because this would have been perfect. I think it's great to get another side's perspective of battles and I'm sure bringing the Romanians into the fold would make a lot of people happy