Romania

Romania is a presidential republic in Southeastern Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south. Romania has a stretch of sea coast along the Black Sea. It is located roughly in the lower basin of the Danube and almost all of the Danube Delta is located within its territory.

The territory's recorded history includes periods of rule by Dacians, the Roman Empire, the Bulgarian empire, the Kingdom of Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire. As a nation-state, the country was formed by the merging of Moldavia and Wallachia in 1859 and it gained recognition of its independence in 1878. Later, in 1918, they were joined by Transylvania, Bukovina and Bessarabia. Romania joined the Axis during World War II, and were met with defeat; however, in August 1944, following a coup d'état, it fought on the side of the Allies until the end of the war. Parts of its territories (roughly the present day Republic of Moldova) were occupied by the Soviet Union and Romania became a member of the Warsaw Pact.

With the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, Romania started a series of political and economic reforms. Romania joined the European Union in 2007.

Romania in Crosstime Traffic
In the home timeline, Crosstime Traffic had a number of stations located around Romania, but there was considerable local discontent with their presence. Crosstime Traffic staff would often have to be smuggled into the country to reach the stations.

Romania was a poor country. An obvious sign of this poverty was that most Romanians seeking to learn a foreign language had to do it in the old way, by long and laborious study, and then often spoke it with a heavy accent. They could not afford the implants which placed a new language directly in the speech centers of a person's brain, enabling him or her to speak it flawlessly within days. Conversely, the implants were a standard and vital part of the equipment of all Crosstime Traffic field workers. This brought home to Romanians encountering members of the Crosstime Traffic staff the great disparity in wealth and access to resources, breeding resentment and bitterness.

Romania in Gunpowder Empire
Dacia was a Roman province conquered by Agrippa during his reign as emperor. This was in contrast to the home timeline, where Dacia had not fallen until the early second century (when Trajan was emperor), and had not been as permanently conquered. Crosstime Traffic stationed traders in the city of Polisso; in the home timeline, this was the Roman ruin of Polissum. Polisso was reached by way of a Crosstime Traffic station in Moigrad, Romania, near the ruins of Polissum.

During a trade expedition by the Solters family, a number of stations in Romania of the home timeline were attacked by nationalist terrorists. Both the Moigrad station and the other station used to reach Polisso were bombed with biological agents. At the time of the attack, the elder Solterses were in the home timeline, and their children Jeremy and Amanda were stranded in Polisso for an extended period of time while the area was decontaminated.

Romania in In the Presence of Mine Enemies
Romania was an independent ally of the Greater German Reich. It was ruled by the Iron Guard. The year 2011 saw the Iron Guard suffering a very public corruption scandal.

Romania in "Shtetl Days"
In the 21st Century, Romania recreated a Gypsy encampment as a tourist attraction, much as the Greater German Reich recreated Jewish shtetls in what had once been Poland.

Romania in The Two Georges
The principalities of Moldavia and Wallacia were partitioned between the Russian Empire which ruled the Black Sea coastal area, and Austria which held the inland areas

Romania in "Under St. Peter's"
A vampire, serving in the army of the Roman Empire, bit the crucified Jesus in AD 30, turning him into a vampire. Jesus heard his sire referred to as Dacicus, which means "of Dacia," a region which later was renamed Romania.

Romania in The War That Came Early
Romania remained neutral when the Second World War broke out in Europe in October, 1938. It refused to allow Soviet troops to cross its borders into Czechoslovakia, as the USSR had asserted claims to territory in Romania.

Romania became a stopping point for the transfer of displaced persons seeking to flee Europe. Most notably, Czech soldiers who'd fled into Poland were sent to Romania, who in turn transferred them to France, where a government-in-exile had been established.

However, Romania saw some internal instability in 1938 and 1939. Fascist politician Ion Antonescu gained traction in the country, rising to leadership early in 1939.

Antonescu kept Romania neutral until early 1941, when, in the aftermath of the "big switch", Romania declared war on the USSR, joining a substantial multi-national coalition in exchange for the port of Odessa and the adjoining lands on the far bank of the Dniester.

Romania remained a German ally even after the British and the French left their alliance before the end of 1941. Throughout the remainder of the war, Romanian troops fought exclusively in the Ukraine, but they had insufficient artillery and tanks to support the infantry. Consequently, Romanians were generally more willing to surrender rather than fight. Surrender didn't save them from the gulags. Moreover, given the historical animosity between Romania and Germany's other staunch ally, Hungary, the German military placed German units between the Hungarian and Romanian units on the lines. However, by 1943, Germany's situation was so dire that an unreliable ally was better than no ally.

As 1943 ended, Germany was in constant retreat, prompting Marshal Antonescu to publicly announce that Romania was not leaving the war. In April, 1944, the Committee for the Salvation of the German Nation overthrew Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, bringing the war to a halt in Europe. Romania derived no benefit from its alliance with Germany.

Romania in Worldwar
Romania joined the Axis in World War II and turned over its oil production capacity to the German military. The threat to destroy these oil fields forced Adolf Hitler to work with a puppet Romanian government rather than conquer and annex the country outright as he had many other small countries.

Romania also fought the Race's Conquest Fleet with German support. Its oil fields were heavily attacked by the Race's killercraft, but Romania was never conquered.

Though it did not have diplomatic relations with the Race and had not been invited to attend the peace conference convened in Cairo by Atvar, German ambassador Joachim von Ribbentrop made it clear that Romania was under German protection.

Romania initially fought alongside Germany in the Race-German War of 1965 but later attempted to reach a separate peace with the Race. Germany retaliated by destroying its capital city of Bucharest with an explosive-metal bomb. After that, Romania remained a loyal ally of Germany for the duration of the war.

With Germany defeated, the Soviet Union contemplated issuing Romania an ultimatum, pressing old Soviet territorial claims that were left unresolved by the Race's arrival. However, after a similar ultimatum to Finland led the Finnish government to allow the Race to establish a military presence in its borders, the Soviets decided to leave Romania alone.