Activities and affiliations

Military command Romania state institutions 1882–1950 ○ Natural causes

Romania's commander on the Eastern Front

Before the flank northwest of Stalingrad collapsed, Dumitrescu requested German reinforcements.

Petre Dumitrescu was a career officer of the Kingdom of Romania who commanded the Romanian Third Army on the Eastern Front during the Second World War. Alongside German forces, he led Romanian operations in Bukovina, Ukraine, Crimea, and the Caucasus as Romania pursued the war against the Soviet Union. In November 1942, the Third Army's exposed flank northwest of Stalingrad came under the Soviet Uranus offensive; Dumitrescu requested support, but his formation suffered catastrophic losses and retreated. Charged with war crimes after the war, he was acquitted in 1946 for lack of sufficient evidence.

Military command Romania state institutions 1927–1989 ✕ Suicide

Ceaușescu's last defence minister: his death on 22 December 1989 triggered the army's mass defection to the revolution

"I received an order from Nicolae Ceaușescu to shoot into the people. I cannot give the order to shoot."

A Romanian infantry officer who rose steadily through the communist army, he was appointed defence minister by Ceaușescu in 1985. When the revolution erupted in December 1989, he commanded the Timișoara crackdown but was publicly rebuked by Ceaușescu at the 17 December Political Executive Committee for refusing to issue live ammunition: Ceaușescu told him he deserved a firing squad. On the morning of 22 December, immediately after his final meeting with Ceaușescu, he shot himself in the chest at the Central Committee building; his death, broadcast as that of a 'traitor,' instead triggered the army's mass defection to the revolution and sealed the regime's collapse.

Military command Romania state institutions 1928–2016 ○ Convicted: 15 yrs for manslaughter; paroled 2014

The Romanian general who switched sides on the morning of the revolution and brought down a dictator

On the morning of 22 December, he asked a trusted doctor to put a plaster cast on his perfectly healthy left leg, hoping to avoid being sent back to crush the revolution.

A Romanian communist artillery officer, he rose to deputy defense minister by 1986. On 22 December 1989, moments after Ceaușescu appointed him defense minister, he issued the order withdrawing troops to barracks, then organized the dictator's helicopter escape before defecting to the revolution. On 25 December he organized and oversaw the drumhead trial and execution of Nicolae and Elena Ceaușescu. After the revolution he served as defense minister and national economy minister, but in 2008 was convicted of aggravated manslaughter for the Timișoara crackdown and sentenced to fifteen years.