Danubian Dithyrambs

Americans who doubt that the Kremlin has a master plan would do well to observe the flexibility with which it has adapted its methods of control to its strength in the satellite countries. Thus, in Finland, Soviet control, while strong, is practically invisible. In Czechoslovakia, where Communists have tight control of the government, there is a high degree of popular democracy. Yugoslavia, with its Communist dictatorship, is practically a part of the Soviet Union. In Rumania, where Communists are 2% of the population, it has moved cautiously.

In 1945, Russia's first grasp for tighter government power was blocked when the U.S. and Britain threatened not to recognize the Rumanian government if elections were rigged. Last week, after a long period of careful preparation, electoral lists were once more announced. Result: dithyrambic cries of foul play from aging (73) National Peasant Party Leader Juliu Maniu and National Liberal Party Leader Constantin Bratianu. They claimed that the lists had been drawn up in such a way as to favor the Soviet-supported candidates. While tension grew between the government and these two big opposition parties, the government itself threatened to split on the election issue.

Tangible Assets. But the Russians could afford to bide their time. They had tangible assets. There was popular King Mihai, who, with Marshal Tito, is the only Balkan leader to receive the exalted Soviet Order of Victory medal. There was Premier Peter Groza, Soviet stooge and physical culture enthusiast, whose family remains in his native Transylvania while he lives with his mistress in Bucharest. There were the only two divisions of Rumanian troops repatriated, after proper indoctrination, from Russia. They constituted an incipient praetorian guard.

And there were the three real leaders of the Rumanian Communist Party, all able and none of them native Rumanians. The three: Emil Bodnzras (real name Bodnarenko), a Ukrainian from Bessarabia; Laszlo Vasile Luca, a Hungarian from Transylvania; and Ana Pauker, a German-Jewish Communist whose husband was formerly an official of Amtorg (Russian-American Trading Co.) in Manhattan. The brains of Rumania's Communist Party, Comrade Pauker now lives handsomely in her Bucharest villa.

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