Romanian Requisitions

Their reports reached Paris, making the unauthorized requisitions internationally known. At the same time, the Hungarian government, paralyzed by the looting, also tried to take action: it sent a note to the Paris Peace Conference regarding the looting. The dual protest finally incurred results and the Mission in Budapest was ordered to take an inventory of the rolling stock taken by the Romanians after September 26, 1919. This important step was likely influenced by a note sent by the management of the Austrian Southern Railway Company (Déli Vasút), which was partly financed by French capital and boasted a large network in Hungary, as the looting of rolling stock in this manner was unheard of in international practice and especially in respect to a private company. The resulting list later became the basis for restitution undertaken by Bucharest.

The dispatch of goods looted in the occupied territories to Romania occurred at an ever-increasing rate following the restoration of the Tisza bridge. Almost the entirety of the year’s grain supply for the Trans-Tisza region ended up in Romanian warehouses and hundreds of animals were transported by train to Bucharest. Rolling stock fared no better. By October, MÁV had hardly any operational passenger cars or locomotives left in the country, possessing only 615 and 410, respectively. Although 26,905 freight cars remained in the country, this was primarily in order to facilitate further looting as the cars had been sent back for reloading. The aforementioned court coaches and conductor and mail cars remained permanently with the Romanian railways.

Although an inventory list of requisitioned trains and locomotives had already been drawn up, an additional 21,970 rails subsequently left the country for Romania. After lengthy discussions and several requests, 4,772 of these were returned to MÁV after November 1920. The extent of this well-organized theft on the part of the Romanians can be accurately calculated if we compare Hungary’s rail car inventory in November 1918 to that following restitution in April 1921.

An accurate picture should include the fact that part of the enormous losses were not stolen by the Romanians but instead came under the jurisdiction of the new states along with the network of local railways in the annexed territories. The inventory of locally-operating companies – which could range from 3 or 4 wagons with an identical number of locomotives up to a hundred cars – also remained in the successor states, thus increasing the losses. Of those private railways which previously operated within Hungary, the entirety of the Košice–Bohumín Railway (Kassa–Oderbergi Vasút) – both its track and its inventory – was transferred to the new Czechoslovak state, with its large freight and passenger traffic remaining in place.  

Among other important companies, the aforementioned Austrian Southern Railway and the Raab-Oedenburg-Ebenfurther Railway (Győr–Sopron–Ebenfurti Vasút) later finalized the future fate of their rolling stock in separate contracts, with the help of the international court convened in Venice. These reallocations also significantly reduced the overall Hungarian railway stock but did so in a legally prescribed manner – not through looting. 

The looting of the Hungarian railways was apparently well thought out and was not limited to the rolling stock as the Romanian military even ransacked the station buildings. They took all the office equipment that could be carted away, including those items they were either unfamiliar with or knew how to use. They didn’t spare the repairmen’s tools either – everything that could be moved, from small tools to large machines, was packed up and carted off. Stoves, benches, and even the clocks in the waiting rooms were loaded onto wagons. At several stations a separate unit was even organized to pack nails pulled from the walls into bags according to size. Most places were left with practically bare walls in their wake.

The Kingdom of Romania’s railway network, which was poorly developed in European terms, was brought up to the much higher level of Transylvania thanks to the looted trains and equipment. Although the requisitions helped to “modernize” the Romanian railways in the short term, the lack of repair centers meant that the locomotives and rail cars were simply abandoned after any breakdowns and repairs were not carried out at the stations. The results of this approach were clearly visible upon the reacquisition of Northern Transylvania in 1940 as a significant portion of the rolling stock had to be replaced when the railways fell under the management of the MÁV once again.

The question arises as to what extent, other than the sudden enthusiasm for the emergence of a Greater Romania, could have led the Romanian military and political authorities to pursue such ruthless plundering.

1. One important element was obviously the series of successes achieved by the new Greater Romanian nationalism. The scale of territorial growth effected by the Romanian state brought enormous international and internal recognition. Romania, which had been in almost complete isolation and defeat until the last month of the war, took great advantage of the change in the European balance of power and, without any actual fighting, was able to rise to top of the list of victors, a fact which it attributed to its own growing strength.

Even the enlightened Romanian intelligentsia of Transylvania was in a pro-national unification mood at the end of the decade, although it was displaced within a few months during the state reorganization. Although the Romanian propaganda of the time reached only a small portion of the population, it was able to instil the sentiment of a victorious nation both to them and to foreign states. It is enough to consider the photograph of the Romanian queen’s folk costume worn during her first visit to Oradea (Nagyvárad) in May 1919. The combination of this “enthusiastic” atmosphere and the temporary laxity of the great powers made the attempt to plunder Hungary and its railways possible.   

2. The Romanian invasion of Transylvania in 1916 and subsequent defeat at the hands of Hungary and the Central Powers contributed to fostering and maintaining Romanian hostility. The flight of the Romanian king and his government to Iași was considered a great embarrassment which left its mark on both the political elite and the population. Although Bucharest had indeed re-entered the war, the promises that had been made to it rested on shaky grounds. As a result, soldiers and politicians alike considered it advisable to loot as much as possible on the presumption that whatever crossed the border could probably stay there based on the decisions of the peace conference.

3. Their opponent was a fragmented Hungarian state that was first led by a political leadership that forbade any kind of resistance and then by alternating governments that lacked authority and failed to obtain national recognition – a fact that was also evident in Hungarian military efforts. As for the railways, they could no longer ensure even their daily operations let alone prevent the dispatch of looted material.  

4. Lastly, the Romanian commanders who had suffered numerous losses over the previous years had both the desire and the ability to personally avenge their grievances. Although their units were more suited to requisitioning than fighting, the mere existence of weapons was sufficient to deter resistance against the looting of the railways. 

(translated by Andrea Thürmer and John Puckett)