DUNAREA NOASTRA: ROMANIA, THE GREAT POWERS, AND THE DANUBE QUESTION 1914-21

For over a century, the Danube Question was a vital issue in Romanian diplomatic history. As a nation dependent upon the export of primary products, Romania viewed the river as its economic lifeline. Therefore, any attempt to devise an international agency designed to regulate navigation on the waterway became a matter of importance for Romania. This dissertation examines the Romanian diplomatic position regarding the Danube Question from the outbreak of World War I until the signing in 1921 of the Statut Definitif, a treaty that governed the Danube throughout the interwar period.;During the nineteenth century the Danube was an integral factor in the Eastern Question. Due to the river's strategic and economic importance, Europe's statesmen after 1856 tried to internationalize the waterway. They failed to reach any agreement except for the area between the Black Sea and the Romanian port of Galati, i.e. the maritime Danube. From 1856 until 1914, the European Commission of the Danube, the regime devised for this sector, was the river's sole regulatory agency. Composed of members of the European powers and Romania, the Commission supervised commercial activities both as a means of assuring a smooth flow of commerce as well as preventing any single power from obtaining a preponderant influence over such a vital economic artery.;After World War I, instead of creating a single agency for the entire length of the Danube, the peacemakers at Versailles reinstated the European Commission, and created a second river organization, the International Commission of the Danube, with full authority over the fluvial Danube. Responsibility for formalizing the new administration fell to a special Danube Conference held in Paris in 1920. The events and outcome of that meeting not only led to the adoption of the Statut; it also marked a major confrontation between the great powers and Romania, as the latter sought to retain maximum control over the river within its own territorial boundaries.;Romania represents the focal point at which all areas of confrontation converge. A member of the European Commission after obtaining independence in 1878, Romania consistently fought against the influence of the great powers on the river. The destruction of the European Commission as a functioning agency during the war left Romania in complete charge of the maritime Danube. After 1918 Romania hoped to preserve its control over Dunarea noastra ("our Danube"), an objective which set the stage for a clash at the Paris Conference between the Balkan state and its wartime allies.;By nature, the creation of institutions designed to guarantee freedom of navigation on international rivers requires the delicate balancing of riparian and nonriparian interests. The riverine state must surrender part of its jurisdiction over the waterway to an organization composed of all nations which border the river. The agency must address both the sovereignty of the individual state and the vague concept of internationality. Nowhere was the resolution of these seemingly disparate ideas more vexing than over the question of the Danube River.;The outcome of the Paris Conference represented a major diplomatic victory for Romania. Although the country's delegates failed to obtain the dissolution of the European Commission, the Statut upheld Romania's views on all other matters of contention. The treaty therefore not only created a series of navigational laws designed to safeguard all commercial interests; it also protected Romania's sovereignty by granting Bucharest the power to regulate river affairs within the nation's territorial waters, subject to the final approval of the entire International Commission. The Statut thus succeeded in obtaining a consensus regarding the Danube's international status, while at the same time legalizing Romania's perception of Dunarea noastra.