Roumanie : révolution manipulation (1990): (III. Tirgoviste, a nervous recruit recounts: ‘the resident Securitate officer in the barracks summarily questioned the 10-15 terrorist suspects and released them…’)
Broadcast 17 May 1990. It appears it was filmed sometime mid-April to early May 1990 in Romania.
from 15:25 the French reporters and camera crew show up in Tirgoviste (Targoviste), where they recount that Ceausescu was tried amid terrorist attacks outside…it is April-May 1990, four months after the Revolution…and surprise, surprise Army officers and recruits are afraid to talk…whether at the base or even on the street…finally they find an unnamed recruit who in hushed tones agrees to talk…what does he say?
he recounts that indeed “10, 15 [terrorists] were captured” but that “a Securitate [officer] at the base quickly [summarily] questioned them and then released them”
(this is based partly on the Romanian I can hear him say, and the French translation overlaying it…I would appreciate readers who know Romanian to confirm what he says prefacing his comments, from approx min 16:00 to 16:05, as I have been unable to transcribe it faithfully…thank you in advance!)
I have no idea who the Securitate person would have been who released those arrested…but it is hardly surprising: the fox was in the hen house…wherever Securitate, Militie, or (military) prosecutors (who were almost wholly beholden to the Securitate in pre-1989 Romania)…were involved in the arrest, holding, interrogation, or transfer of the arrested terrorists (in large measure, Securitate personnel) “miraculously” disappeared, faded into the woods, the night, or wherever.
Some examples of the potential “foxes in the hen house” in Tirgoviste per se, come from Viorel Domenico’s Ceausescu la Targoviste: 22-25 decembrie 1989 book (see below):
“Totodata eu cred ca (seful Securitatii locale, Col.) Dinu nu era strain de actiunile desfasurate impotriva unitatii. De pilda, intr-o noapte, m-a scos afara, in curtea unitatii, si auzind in oras zgomote, imi spunea, ‘Fii atent, astea sunt ABI-uri…In 10 minute, incep sa traga…’ Stia totul, de parca isi confirma un plan cunoscut dinainte. Si mi-a mai spus, ‘Teroristii si antiteroristii sunt pregatiti dupa aceleasi principii si reguli, fac aceeasi instructie.’”
Captain Gheorge Bobric’s recounting of Securitate Col. Dinu’s comment, according to which “…notice, those are ABIs [Securitate USLA vehicles]…in ten minutes, firing will begin…The terrorists and anti-terrorists are trained according to the same principles and rules, they go through the same training.” p. 157
The remainder of pages 156 and 157 also contain important, interesting clues:
For example, Boboc continues:
“Then, there was Major Oancea, also from the county Securitate. Hardly had he come from his mission in Timisoara, on 22 December, but he presented himself to Kemenici (at a time when all the Securitate personnel had been sent home) and he “surrendered to the Revolution.” Kemenici accepted him and dressed him in an Army soldier’s uniform, armed and with the appropriate patch (?), and held him in the unit. He walked through the unit with missions assigned to him by the Kemenici-Dinu tandem. But his principal mission was to investigate with captain Stoian–the Securitate’s military counter-intelligence officer for the unit, the terrorists captured and brought to the barracks.
“For example, I brought one, turned over by revolutionaries, who had been captured shooting in MICRO 11. He was covered in blood, armed, had an ID from Botosani, and was named Balan. And there were were many other such suspects given to the two investigators. In the night before the trial they all disappeared, without a trace, from arrest in the unit. As did Major Oancea!”
Such stuff of course never appears in the Romanian press. Nor do the notes from Army’s “Journal of Military Operations” which suggest that even after the Ceausescus had been executed they were still fighting the “terrorists.”
(Indeed, I would argue: if you don’t know what happened between 26 December 1989 and 24 January 1990 after the Ceausescus were executed 25 for the 25th Anniversary of the Romanian Revolution: #25 After the Ceausescus Were Executed: The Counter-Revolution is Disappeared (26 December 1989 – 24 January 1990), there is no way you can possibly accurately judge the decision to execute the Ceausescus.)
see the entries for 26-30 December 1989:
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The Archive of the Romanian Revolution of December 1989 