December 1st, Romanian National Day

[aSk^Ghost]

Romanian National Day, some pictures i snapped with the tv-tuner

http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/5492/15vn.png

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http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/8077/43tn.png

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[Team Sergeant]

Romanian National Day, some pictures i snapped with the tv-tuner



So tell me aSk^Ghost, what does "Romanian National Day" mean to you?

TS

[Roguish Lawyer]

Looks like the Romanians may organize units by dude size, at least for parading purposes . . . LOL.

[aSk^Ghost]

Well the Romanian National Day reminds me of all the people who made the ultimate sacrifice to get our country united and the incredibly heroic things the romanian army did during the first world war, these two things ( world war one and our unification ) being kind of related one to the other.

[Airbornelawyer]

Well the Romanian National Day reminds me of all the people who made the ultimate sacrifice to get our country united and the incredibly heroic things the romanian army did during the first world war, these two things ( world war one and our unification ) being kind of related one to the other.
Romanian history didn't stop in 1919.

That Romania was allied with the Axis until 1944, and provided the second-largest contingent in the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, doesn't change the fact of the heroism of individual Romanian soldiers on the battlefields of the Crimea, the Caucasus and Stalingrad. Whether the current government wants to gloss over that, as well as Romania's military history until 1989 under the Communists, is a separate political question.

And of course, the heroism of individual Romanian soldiers, like their Hungarian and Italian compatriots, didn't change the fact that their ill-equipped forces were crushed by the Red Army in the offensive which encircled the German 6th Army at Stalingrad. The grandfather of an ex-girlfriend of mine was one of the Romanians caught with the Germans inside that cauldron.

But Romania's Army is writing itself a new chapter. Like Poland, Romania is one of those Eastern European states who have shown themselves to be more reliable allies in the war on Islamist terrorists than our many comfortable Western European friends.

Romanian infantry battalions, including several in that parade, have served in Iraq, along with military police and combat engineers. Romania currently has I believe the 7th largest contingent in Iraq, after the US, UK, Poland, South Korea, Italy and Ukraine.

And Romania is the only country that continues to deploy ground combat troops in Afghanistan as part of the US-led coalition. Other conventional ground forces are part of the ISAF peacekeeping force, and other countries have sent SOF to the so-called "Special Operations Olympics", but Romania has rotated somewhere around 8 mechanized infantry battalions in country as part of the OEF coalition.

Here are links to some galleries of Romanian National Day events, courtesy of the Romanian Ministry of Defense: http://www.mapn.ro/fotodb/20051130_zn

[aSk^Ghost]

During world war I we fought to get our territories back. Same with the beginning of warld war II, but the invasion of Russia... :rolleyes:

[Jo Sul]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/12/02/romania.usbases.reut/index.html

BUCHAREST, Romania (Reuters) -- Romania and the United States will sign a deal Tuesday to set up U.S. military bases in the Black Sea country, the Foreign Ministry says.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will sign the accord in a brief visit to Bucharest during a European trip which also includes stops in Germany and Brussels.

"Signing the Access Agreement is an essential step in consolidating the strategic partnership between Romania and the United States," the ministry said in a statement Friday.

Rice's visit comes amid mounting controversy in Europe over allegations that the CIA was running secret jails in Eastern Europe, possibly in Romania and Poland.

Washington has neither denied nor confirmed the allegations, while both Poland and Romania have repeatedly denied them.

Romania, which joined NATO in 2004, is grateful to Washington for supporting its bid to enter the Atlantic alliance, and has been a staunch ally of U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The ministry did not give the exact location of the bases, but President Traian Basescu has said possible sites included Babadag, close to the Danube delta, Mihail Kogalniceanu near the Black Sea and Fetesti, 200 km (125 miles) east of Bucharest.

U.S. soldiers used the Mihail Kogalniceanu airbase as a hub to send equipment and 7,000 combat troops into Iraq during the early stages of the invasion in 2003, and temporarily kept up to 3,500 American troops there.

Washington aims to pull about 70,000 troops out of Europe and Asia during the next decade. It will shift its European focus eastwards and will close Cold War bases in favor of small, flexible facilities closer to hot spots such as the Middle East.

The bases are seen as important to Romania's drive to secure more foreign investment to close the enormous wealth gap separating it from the other members of the European Union, which it hopes to join in 2007 or 2008.