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Corneliu Codreanu (born Corneliu Zilinschi on 13 September 1899) is a Romanian far-right politician and the current President of the Council of Ministers of Romania. As the Căpitan (Captain) of the Legion of the Archangel Michael, commonly known as the Legionary Movement, Codreanu is considered to be one of the most influential representatives of the European "National Populist" movement, which experienced a drastic rise in popularity since the mid-1920s.
Several similar political movements, especially in Romance-speaking Europe and the Balkans, try to emulate Codreanu's success by building their party's political agenda upon Codreanu's key ideological concepts: Racist ultranationalism, anti-socialism and anti-elitist populism.
History[]
Early Life[]
Corneliu Codreanu was born to Elizabeth (née Brauner) and Ion Zelea Codreanu. Ion would later become a political figure within his son's movement. A native of Bucovina in Austria-Hungary, Ion originally used the family name of Zilinschi (other variants included Zelinski or Zelinschi) and his wife was an ethnic German, who converted to Orthodoxy. Speculation was rampant that Ion was originally a Rusyn is in contrast with the Romanian chauvinism he embraced for the rest of his life.
When Romania entered the Weltkrieg in 1916, Corneliu was too young for conscription, though he nonetheless tried his best to enlist. He was educated at a military school at the Dealu monastery where he remarked himself via profound religiosity and enthusiasm for the military life. In 1919 he moved to Iaşi.
Time in the GCN[]
Codreanu studied law in Iaşi. In late 1919, he joined the short-lived Garda Conştiinţei Naţionale (GCN) (National Awareness Guard), a group formed by the electrician Constantin Pancu. The GCN attempted to revive loyalism within the proletariat while offering an alternative to Syndicalism by promising to advocate increased labour rights.
The defeat in the world war created a new period of social troubles in the larger urban areas. The GCN, in which Codreanu thought he could see the nucleus of nationalist trade unions, became active in crushing strike actions by Syndicalist-affiliated trade unions. In spite of this, however, neither the strikes nor the GCN ended up going anywhere, and the young nationalist found another outlet pretty soon.
Rise to Power[]
In 1923, A.C Cuza founded the National-Christian Defence League, which the junior Codreanu joined. However, after the death of King Ferdinand in 1927, the party split and Codreanu started his own. This new splinter, the Legion of the Archangel Michael, gained more and more adepts in the context of the whirlpool of revanchism and ennui that was post-WK Romania. The young movement eventually got approached by the new king, Carol II, who offered the Captain a safe road to the premiership in exchange for support in building a new Romania; a deal which the Captain accepted. Soon enough, in 1933, the elections carried the Legionaries to victory, and they set forth to achieve their dream of national rebirth and unification.
Codreanu started writing an autobiography around this time describing his views and how he formed the party that would, later on, become the dominant one in Romania. It is not finished by any means, but word has it that it is in its finishing stages, and is set to be published in 1936.