Nicolae Ceaușescu

"Nicolae Ceaușescu aveva fama di eretico, ma era diversissimo da Tito. Era il più staliniano dei tiranni comunisti balcanici. Umili origini. In sintonia con le radici della sua terra, lOltenia, landa di foreste oscure e di atrocità ottomane."

"We want to ensure a multilateral development of society, the thriving of all sides of social life, economy, science and culture, the improvement of management, the moulding of the new man and the promotion of socialist ethics and equity."

"Our experience shows that today the West is commendably eager to encourage the slightest sign of independence within the Soviet bloc. Lets take advantage of their eagerness... We must make cleverness our national trait... Stop showing a sullen, frowning face and clenched fist to the West. Start making it feel compassion for us, and youll see how fast Western boycotts change into magnanimity. Lets present Romania as a Latin island in the Slavic sea... Our millenia-old traditions of independence are now up against Moscows political centrism... A pawn between two superpowers."

"Its expensive to keep Communism alive today. Ive already got a huge foreign debt staring me in the face, and I cant reduce it by exporting tomatoes or toilet paper. We should be making dollars any way we can. And we should be exporting arms any way and every way, openly and secretly, legally or by smuggling-I dont care how."

"Esteemed chairman of the court, today we have to pass a verdict on the defendants Nicolae Ceaușescu and Elena Ceaușescu who have committed the following offenses: Crimes against the people. They carried out acts that are incompatible with human dignity and social thinking; they acted in a despotic and criminal way; they destroyed the people whose leaders they claimed to be. Because of the crimes they committed against the people, I plead, on behalf of the victims of these two tyrants, for the death sentence for the two defendants."

"Up to 1971, by Marxist standards, he was able to generate new ideas within the limits of the system. After his visit to China and North Korea in 1971, something of crucial importance must have happened in his mind. What he saw in North Korea was an image of real socialism- that is, total regimentation. Of course, everything was fundamentally wrong from the beginning. But the practical approaches until 1971 were mitigated by a degree of realism and independent thinking which had not yet become militant and destructive nationalism. I think that all his life he believed in what he considered to be the generous idea of socialism and Communism. But in 1971 he apparently discovered the uses of pyramidal organisation inherent in one-party rule. And he discovered the crucial importance of the top of the pyramid. He hated and despised Stalin who had enjoyed just such a position, but Ceausescu hated Stalin because he saw him as the leader of an Evil Empire. The evilness of it was its imperial character, not its ideology. Hence Ceausescu was blind to his own messianic bent."

"Tito did not like Ceaușescu personally, because when they went hunting wild boars together, Ceaușescu cheated and broke the rules. He once took a shot at a boar, and having missed it, fired at it a second time after the boar had moved out of Ceaușescus and into Titos field of fire. Tito then killed the boar with his first shot, but Ceaușescu falsely claimed that he too had hit the boar with his shot. In that case, your shot must have gone up the hole under the boars tail, said Tito sarcastically. When they went hunting together again a few year later, Ceaușescu again claimed to have killed a boar when it was in fact Tito who had shot it."

"Dialectical materialism works like cocaine, lets say. If you sniff it once or twice, it may not change your life. If you use it day after day, though, it will make you into an addict, a different man."

"There can be no justification to admit, in any way, the use of armed forced to intervene in the internal affairs of a WTO [Warsaw Treaty Organization] member country. The solving of domestic problems belongs exclusively to the Party and people of each country and any kind of interference can only do harm to the cause of socialism, friendship and collaboration among the socialist countries."

"Stealing from capitalism is not like stealing out of our own pockets. Marx and Lenin have taught us that anything is ethical, so long as it is in the interest of the proletarian class and its world revolution."

"It is a lie that I made the people starve. A lie, a lie in my face. This shows how little patriotism there is, how many treasonable offenses were committed.… At no point was there such an upswing, so much construction, so much consolidation in the Romanian provinces. I guaranteed that every village has its schools, hospitals and doctors. I have done everything to create a decent and rich life for the people in the country, like in no other country in the world."

"Oil, Jews and Germans, are our most important export commodities."