As someone who lived in
Romania for 20 years, I would like to add a few comments and make a few corrections to
bitter_engineer's great writeup above:
- Some of the massive and expensive public works projects ended up being extremely useful. For example, Bucharest (the capital of Romania) has a very reasonable subway system, the construction of which could not be done during the current state of affairs in Romania.
- I do not know about the early years, but during the past 10 years of the Ceausescu dictatorship, there was no requirement that women have at least five children. Most Romanian families had less than three children, the average being around two.
- The punishments were not as strict as it is believed. No, owning an unregistered typewriter was not punished by death, but by having the Securitate (secret police) keep you under investigation. However, it is quite possible that death was a better alternative to seemingly endless arrests, searches and interrogations under torture.
- The part about the "colonel dog" is an urban legend. Making and spreading rumors about the eccentricities of the Ceausescu family was a national pastime in Romania, and one that was encouraged by the Securitate.
- Ceausescu did not attempt to leave the country by helicopter. The plans included taking a helicopter to a military base, and then leaving unconspicuously in an unmarked car.
- The actual time and location of the execution (on Christmas day 1989) were kept secret; nobody could have volunteered for the proceedings. Although the tape (as shown on national TV during the days of the revolution) was edited to remove any fragments that could reveal the identities of the people present at the trial, the full version released one year later showed that the execution was conducted, upon order, by a military squad.