Words for communists. A conversation with the torturer Frant Tandara. *)
Fabian Anton
Mr. Tandara*, when you welcomed us to your home in Giurgiu, you told me something I didn't expect to hear. You said that you would be happy that young people come here, to your home, to find out, to ask you all sorts of things...
I am very happy.
Perfect. For all those who do not know you and for those who have not read your book, I would like to ask you, first of all, to tell us a few words about yourself. So, who are you? When were you born?
in 1930, in February. I turned 72 on February 22. I was born into a fallen family, as they say now. I grew up poor, uneducated... After my family fell apart, neither my mother nor my father took me, and having nowhere else to go, I went to the regiment.
Were your parents divorced?
Yes. They split up, and I ended up in the regiment, a troop child. This happened around 1941-1942, during the war. The war was in full swing then. I did very well in the regiment, but, of course, not in the same way as I would have done with my mother or father. It was hard. You went to bed with the whole troop, when the curfew was sounded, at 9 p.m., and at 5 in the morning you had to wake up. Over time, however, I got used to this barracks life. The problems for me started when the war ended because the regiments and divisions merged. Then they threw us, the troop children, here and there, to jobs, to who knows where... I managed to go to Tirgoviste where I began my career as a communist politician, as a young communist.
But how did this career begin? So, suddenly, you arrived in Târgoviște and became a communist politician?
It's a longer story. It all started with Bizim Ion. This was a Moldovan who was said to be related to Gheorghe Apostol. I don't know if this story was true, but that's what was said, he himself claimed to be related to Apostol. Bizim was in charge of the UTC there, in Tirgoviste. I was initially sent to the Army Arsenal. But the Army Arsenal in Tirgoviste then turned into a CFR vocational school. So it was taken over by the CFR and, instead of making cannons and repairing cannons, we worked on CFR wagons. I didn't even have time to do that because I took up this side of my political career. This Bizim took me along with him, there were about two or three others and we formed organizations. I would walk around the city all day, around Tirgoviste. Well, and so, being young, the dirty guy made me steal some sheets. When I was caught, the management never forgave me.
But you have to know that back then, around 1945, there wasn't any communist organization, not everyone was communist. When they caught me, they took notice of me and made me think badly of them. They expelled me from school so I had to leave. So I packed my bags and left Tirgoviste, I returned to Giurgiu. But before I left, Bizim told me what to do when I came to town: to look for the Communist Party. But where the hell would I find a Communist Party in Giurgiu? At that time there wasn't one. There was a Socialist Party, communists weren't even mentioned in town back then. There was the Ploughmen's Front, the Socialist Party, the Social-Democratic Party... They were all grouped together and, among them, there were communists. But it didn't have a company, something like "The Communist Party". There was only the Socialist Party and the Social-Democratic Party. Kind of like now, with the PSD. Back then there was the National Democratic Front, now we have the National Salvation Front… There are some things that make your head hurt… This shocks me because I remember how it was 50 years ago and I know how it all started…
But now they are democrats…
Well, they were still “democrats” back then. Back then there was the National Democratic Front, now it is the Social Democratic Party. But don't forget Voitec, who was a social democrat who stood right next to Ceausescu… You don't know, but look what was said back then, what the slogan was: it said that old lady Leana went with Voitec and Ceausescu to buy three pork heads from the Obor warehouses. And they saw that three pork heads had three different prices. And Leana noticed and asked why hers was cheaper, why the prices were different. And the butcher replied to Ceausescu: "Comrade First Secretary, yours has a tongue, but no brain. Comrade Voitec's has a brain, but no tongue. And Comrade Elena's has neither a tongue nor a brain." So that was the point, Voitec was there like a mannequin, just to show that he was a social democrat.
And I got there, to the Social Democrats. Now I'll make a parenthesis: the signature on my release from prison is given by Sadoveanu. Sadoveanu... a great poet. I liked and I like everything he wrote. But not as a politician, as he was active even though he didn't have a party membership card. If that's the case, I didn't have a membership card either. But I was active, I did everything for the communists. If someone asked me, I would say: "My membership card is in my heart!!!". That's what I said to everyone! And I worked firmly convinced for them, you know. I can't back down, to say that I wasn't a communist!
Let's go back then... You came back to Giurgiu and looked for the Communist Party...
Yes. Well, I found shelter with them. In Giurgiu I found work at the CFR, where they placed me. There was a guy, Heiselhoff called him, he was German, who didn't want to take me in, he knew I was sent by the communists. And I started working at the CFR, where they sent me. I was thin at the time, dystrophic, I was never fat. They made me work on sleepers and, as thin as I was, I would take the sleeper on my back... They told me: "Stay there for about two or three weeks, until we sort out your situation..." And they sorted it out so that, after a short time, I ended up working for the union. I no longer worked on sleepers, I was taken out of production and made to carry correspondence here and there... That was until Pavel Stefan arrived in town, who was first secretary, and I became his faithful dog.
What year was that?
I think it was in the fall of 1946, after the elections. Pavel Stefan was from Galati and was married to a woman from Ploiesti, Elena Pavel, who had been staying in Doftana. He wasn't a guy who knows what, I think he was promoted because of his wife (he was then promoted to Bucharest, became a minister, later he also reached the Central Committee). But as a basic profession he was an engineer, because it wasn't a big deal for the Party to give them a diploma, a license... Well, in Giurgiu too, when he came, there were all kinds of communists, about 30-40 years old, older than me. But I worked more than any of them. I worked with faith and with my heart.
What exactly did you do?
I was a kind of spy. I reported to Pavel Stefan everything that was happening in the institutions, where they were plotting… And I was also waiting for the promotion because they promised me that in 1949-1950 I would go to Moscow. But I didn't have time before the misfortune happened to my father. I killed my father!
How did this happen?
The Communist Party had won the elections in 1946, in November. That's when the change began. Institutions became state-owned, there were no longer any owners, they took their mills, the lands were confiscated and put together. They had to liquidate all the bourgeois by 1948. And in 1948 nationalization came. Around 1947, at the beginning of the year, I woke up with my father at my place, he asked me to come back home. In the meantime, he had kept about three or four women. He had about 30 sheep, he could no longer work alone, and he was calling me home. Pavel Stefan told me not to go to the sheep, because it would ruin my future. I had a future ahead of me, and Pavel said to me: "Where are you going now, are you becoming a shepherd?" I told him: "It's impossible. I'm going back to my father!" My father was crying, his tears were flowing. And he says to me: "If I were you, I would hit him in the head!"
That's what Pavel Stefan told you...
Yes. He predicted that I wouldn't be able to stay with my father. He had found out what my father did, where he worked, and he said that he was a worthless man. He probably was. Even though he was my father, I can't condemn him. But, as he was, he was my father, I looked at him like a father and I was happy that he turned to me with pity. I told myself that, after all, it was something that, at 17-18 years old, after so much time, he would turn to me with pity. I told myself that he had a soul, so I went. But I was wrong, it wasn't like that and I could only stay with him for about seven, eight months. And, one day, it happened that he was chasing me away. He was telling me to leave and take everything that was mine. But I had nothing, I hadn't achieved anything with him. He took his money, the same with food... I had nothing. What I had come with was torn, and I was also without clothes. I asked him: "Well, what are you giving me?" I wanted to take a hat and he didn't give it to me either: "That's my hat!" He was holding his, to leave with what I had come with. I hadn't come with much, I had almost nothing. And then I remembered what Pavel said, that he wasn't my father, and I said to myself: "Stefan was right, I'll finish him! I just have to finish him!" And, determined as I was, after the fight I ran away, took an axe and... in short! That was it!
Did you guys start a fight?
Yes. There was a fight. But I ran after the axe, outside. I came with the axe, and when he was about to leave the house, I hit him in the head with the axe and finished him off! It was a rage, an excess of madness, because these crimes are committed in excess of madness, you can't reason anymore. All crimes are committed like that, I think, you can't reason anymore. I recovered from the shock and said to myself: "I'm going to comrade Pavel immediately!". Pavel was in Bucharest, I only found his deputy, Costache Vasile, someone I had helped promote. I had thrown him in front of Pavel, I always said: "Uncle Costache is the right man. His place is here, in your place!". And that's how it happened. And I went to him, to Costache, and I said: "Look what I did, Uncle Costache. Comrade Pavel Stefan was right. I should have killed him earlier, but look, now I've killed him!". He said to me smiling: "Well, what, Comrade Pavel taught you to hit him in the head?! Don't mention this somewhere that you shouldn't have done that! But it's nothing. Go home, I'll make a phone call, you stay quiet and I'll send the militia. I'll take care of your father!". And that's exactly what happened.
I went home, I didn't tell anyone anything, and after a while, he had calculated how long it would take for the militia to come, they came and picked me up. They themselves were telling me what to declare: that my father had a knife, that he ran after me with the knife, all sorts of things that weren't true. The militia teaches me. At that time, there was a guy at the Security, his name was Marin Dumitru, who had been a legionnaire and, after the elections, had become a communist. This, Marin Dumitru, stood next to me and dictated to me what to say. It was a short statement because the next day they were going to send me to the penitentiary, to the investigation office.
When I arrived at the penitentiary, things were already arranged. The director of the penitentiary was Teohari Georgescu's brother. Teohari was the Minister of the Interior, and his brother had come to Giurgiu as director of the penitentiary. He also received me. He also knew the time when I would arrive. They must have given him that phone number. He just asked me: "Are you Tandara?" "Yes!" And he introduced me, told the first guard to take care of me, they gave me packages from the Party... I was very well looked after at that penitentiary! And, seeing this, I was waiting for my release, I thought to myself: "Eee, I'll get out of here quickly!". And so it was.
Initially, they told me I was going to Arad. They knew that the director was leaving for Arad and they wanted to transfer me with him. But I didn't get to do that because Pavel was looking for me at the prison, in Vacaresti.
But how did you get to Vacaresti?
I was sent. That's because criminal trials weren't tried in Giurgiu. That was only done at the Criminal Court in Bucharest. And they took me there, to try me. The communists assigned me a defense attorney, they taught me what to say... I couldn't get away cheaply. They told me I would get ten years in prison, but during the trial I got away with 12 years of hard labor and one year of interdiction. They said "hard labor", which I was going to do locked up in a cell, but I escaped, because in reality they put me in the kitchen, I don't know where... I wanted to appeal, but they told me to give up the appeal because I was going to Canal. I didn't really want to go to Canal because I was comfortable there, I had adapted to the underworld, to this environment I had entered, this pleasant environment. But I had to endure it and, under their pressure, I went to Canal.
At Canal it was good at first, it seemed like freedom to me. Pavel Stefan told me right from the start that my radius of action, where I could move freely, was 60 kilometers. I was not allowed to exceed this radius, to pass Cernavoda, for example, but I didn't need to. It was enough for me that I could go from Midia or Periprava to Constanta. I had nowhere to go. And they had told me: "You see that you are still confined. If you leave, I will bring you back and then you will have no chance of rehabilitation. You have a great chance of rehabilitation".
I understood them and listened to them. And they, from time to time, would talk to me about the Communist Party. This refreshed my feelings. I had forgotten about communism for a short period, but I was not fully cured.
What use were they in prison for you?
Well, in prison I was also a kind of informant, I gave information. And I had the right to choose the first brigadiers, for example. I chose one, a gypsy. Everyone who did political imprisonment at the White Gate and who is still alive knows who Marin Stanciugel was, this gypsy. I don't have much to tell you about him, he was a man... a man, a teacher, put this in the brick oven... The poor man had just arrived in the colony, he had been brought on a two-day trip, and Stanciugel mistreated him and killed him. I wasn't there then, but I saw his bones in the oven, that they were already burned.
Wait a minute... Did you arrive at Canal as a prisoner?
Yes, as a prisoner!
And by what right could you appoint this brigadier?
Well, at Canal there was self-management. That's what it was called. There was the technical office, the administrative office, the site managers, the technicians and the brigadiers. the latter kept track of the quota, how much was excavated, how much was dug, the loading and unloading, how much stone was broken, all this work. Each brigade had about 80-90 prisoners and there were about 110 brigades. There were never more than 12,000 prisoners at the White Gate, it couldn't handle more. It was already quite crowded, they couldn't bring more. Initially there were 32 barracks, 16 on one side and 16 on the other, and then they made some H-shaped ones, that's what they were called, where they brought the politically convicted.
And this Stanciugel killed a teacher?
Here's how it was: at each barracks, at the entrance, there was a fence and on the left and right were some flower plots. But those plots looked like graves. This professor, a young man, about 30 years old, would have said to the other prisoners: "Look, the prisoners are buried here!". I didn't know this man, I only saw his bones in the oven. A Hungarian gypsy called me, Horvath called him, and he said to me: "Come here and see that they burned one in the oven...". "Well, who put him in the bath?" "You don't mean me?" "I won't say you!" "Marin burned him!" I mean Stanciugel, you understand? I then asked him: "Well, how did he get there?" He said: "I don't know!". When I went to the oven, I saw that the professor had been pushed in with his head forward, that the bones of his legs were still visible. I took a willow stick, pulled out his leg, looked at it and then threw it back into the fire. Since it was very hot, he had put two-meter pieces of wood inside, willow sticks, in the brick ovens.
The next day the check began, the counting, because not one came out. A count was done at the exit and then, after the brigades came out, the inside was also done. And I went and told Paun, who had counted three times by then: "Stop counting, because one is missing!". "What's wrong with him?" And then I put him aside so that the platoon leader, who was the head of the guard and took over the interior, wouldn't hear, and I said to the commander: "Well, let me tell you, Marin put one in..." "Did you see?" "I saw the leg, I smelled it! And the people who went to the toilet smelled it!" Okay, the gypsy was also among those where they were counting, he was outside, in the square, made like a football field. There they were also counted from the auxiliary, in the infirmary, in the kitchen... Only the platoons in front of the barracks remained. They counted them with the platoons, they had entered the bedroom, they had looked under the beds... "Where is one?"
The commander understood the situation then and stopped the counting, not to count anymore. So, at around half past nine the counting was finished, the search in various places and they said: "That's it, that's it..."
They called Marin and he sensed what the matter was and recognized it. What they did next I don't know because I, for example, was never called out of nowhere to be asked what I knew about this man's disappearance, how this man disappeared. That, normally, the Constanta prosecutor's office, to which I belonged, should have been notified, but no one from the prosecutor's office showed up. I was also asked about other things, but no one asked me anything about this case. Although it is said that the prosecutor's office knows something about this case. But I don't know what and how.
Look, all the work started from here. Because I, from here, in 1950, was transferred to Culmea. There came one, my close collaborator, with whom I worked a lot. His name was Nicolau, he was from Bessarabia, he had a Bessarabian accent. You could say he was Russian, I don't know if he was, but he spoke Romanian with an accent. He was a blond guy. He came after me, to Culmea, to tell me that I was going to Bucharest. He explained to me, he told me what it was about… He asked me if I had ever seen a madman, how a madman talks, how he acts… When I heard, being young, I kind of liked these adventures. And I went with him to Bucharest.
When I got to Bucharest, he handed me over to someone, his name was Cocos, who was a doctor, he knew some specialty. Now, do I know if he was Cocos or was that a conspiratorial name? Because they worked under conspiratorial names there.
I arrived at Hospital No. 9 where I had my first assignment, on August 8, 1951. At that time, there were all sorts of events in the country: problems with students, with the "Black Sumanele" organization, with all sorts of organizations against communism. There were all kinds of young people like that and we were trying, through various methods, to get information from them, to make them confess. That is, to tell about this and that, about who knows what case, about who knows what organization, about how many members there are in a certain organization... The security service couldn't do that and we did it... After torturing them, they would bring them here, to this section No. 9. This section hadn't been established for a long time, they had set it up a few months before I came there. It was led by a certain Tomorug, a forensic doctor at the Ministry of Internal Affairs. He was of Greek origin. This man never tried to approach me or ask me what I was doing there. But he knew, especially since I hadn't come there with a file. A patient, normally, should have had a file. I saw, at the common law there were some who came for an expertise, that he would send them to us for an expertise. But this doctor didn't deal with the "politicians", I know that for sure. I was with a nurse and I was able to glance at the registers, to see. And I saw that the "politicians" were not treated there.
There were three common law cells, three cells with four beds. That means 12 patients. There were never more. As soon as they finished the treatment there, a treatment that was short, not long-term, they would send you back. But we still had three cells that were at the disposal of the Securitate. I was also on that side.
So this doctor had nothing to do with me, to ask me what I was doing there or why I came. That I was only working for a month. That was the agreement with them, with Nicolau and with Major Jidic, that I wouldn't stay more than a month. I couldn't stay. Although I had the freedom to go out during the day and there was incredibly good and plentiful food (there were three types of food: first, second and third class). I took from first class and took from the chosen ones: today I served in installments. I took installments, two or three installments and I also gave to the guards. The sick, my patient, whom I had to liquidate, wouldn't eat. Well, did I give that guy food?! I was trying to finish him off as much as possible. Since I had an order, we weren't supposed to keep him for two days. We had to do something to him in 24 hours.
They would bring him in at 11 at night, at the latest 11 at night he would come, and the next day, also at 11 o'clock, he would leave there, but he would leave cold. He would come in hot and leave cold. That's how it happens. I remember that many times Nicolau would ask me: "How many chapatini have you done this month? How many chapatini?". I mean to give him the report.
I couldn't remember anymore. So you would do one, two a night. It was like that, one chapatini a night. Many times I would tell him: "Well, I only did about 19...". "Didn't you do 30?" I mean, if I stayed for 30 days I had to do 30 chapatini. But I didn't do that much.
This man, Nicolau - I don't know if he's still alive, but in 1951 he was about 38-39 years old - might have ended up like Colonel Craciun, who said that he did nothing but good for the prisoners. But he didn't do them. Maybe he would have done them well in common law, but he didn't do them in politics, because he wasn't interested. That interest was in 1950: to cut down on intellectuals! It was class struggle then and all the philistines had to be eliminated. As he called them: "philistines who studied in Paris!" Whether they had or not, they would tell me that they had studied in Paris. Maybe they had studied in Iasi, Cluj, Timisoara or Bucharest, but they would tell us that they had studied in Paris. Because we didn't look favorably on those people.
And you had to liquidate them...
Yes! And I was liquidating them. But it wasn't just me. That's the problem: this communism wasn't made with me. Communism was made with many people like me. And there were people who knew how to incite you to misfortunes, who managed to do that.
So... patients, detainees who had to be eliminated came to Hospital No. 9...
They weren't prisoners sent with a file, you know. They only had a card.
They were probably jumped off the street...
No one knew where they came from. I wasn't told who I was either. They didn't even have a name. They just had a card. And on that card it only said: 45. Or 59. That was his card.
A number.
A number, that's all. He would come, the van would drop him off...
So you didn't know who he was, what his name was...
If you knew, you would have found out from him.
To torture?
Yes. He didn't say otherwise. Two Securitate officers in uniform would bring him. They would accompany him and hand him over here, to us.
That was after they were tortured?
No. before. Although some people came beaten.
I mean, they tortured them and then brought them to you?
Yes. They were started there, and we finished them.
By different methods. We didn't have a single style. There were the electric shocks, but around 1952, they took away the device. I myself had told them: "Take it, there's no need for that!". We had other methods. For example, beating the testicles (that was the worst beating).
The problem was that they didn't want to have marks. But some came with marks and we reported this, that they came with marks. Then, when they died, we didn't know where they were taking them. The common law dead were taken to the hospital morgue, to have an autopsy done. But the "political" ones were no longer taken for an autopsy. The same prison van, a Praga car, would come and take them away.
It was a pleasure to torture
in the volume The Black Lexicon, your file says this: "As a torturer, he applied the following torture methods to his victims: crushing fingers with a door...
Yes. We couldn't fight some of them. There were two of us and we couldn't fight the prisoner, he didn't want to put his fingers in the door. Some of them would come in eaten, stronger and you couldn't fight them. And I told them not to bring them eaten anymore, because we wouldn't be able to resist them... So, after a while, they would send them to us exhausted, not having eaten for seven, eight, ten days. It was known that these people hadn't eaten for so long, they couldn't hold themselves up, they were wobbly on their feet. Then I would quickly put my hand in theirs and squeeze them as hard as I could, at the door.
Here it also says about beating them in the testicles...
It was a satisfaction for us to beat them in the testicles! That's what I learned from a woman...
What exactly?
This idea came from a woman. She, they say, would beat them with a pencil. I, not having a pencil, made myself a stick. There was a tree in the hospital yard and from those branches I made myself a stick about 50 centimeters long, about the thickness of a pen. I would beat them with that. I would beat them until they fainted. Many times most of them died. Their testicles would swell and they would die. Few escaped this beating with their lives.
But, even if they escaped this beating, they did not escape unscathed. That was by no means the case. It was a pleasure to torture.
A pastime, a game…
Yes. It was fun. I admit that, I can't go back. Never. That's why I say I can't repent for all the bad things I've done. That I can't say: "God forgive me!". It's hard for me to tell him to forgive me, because he has nothing to forgive me for.
Here it is also mentioned, as methods of torture, strangulation, asphyxiation, hitting with sandbags and wet sheets...
Yes. They were little bags made of a kind of overalls, a very hard material. They were eight, nine centimeters in diameter and were packed with sand. You would hit them on the back with those little bags until they said what they had to say. You would wait to get something out of them… And if in an hour or two you didn't get anything out of them, I would tell my colleagues: "Fuck him, there's no point in continuing! Finish him! Can't you see that we're going to spend 12 nights with him here?!"
And if he confessed, if he told you what you wanted to know, would he get away?
Don't escape!
So you killed him anyway?
Yes. But we had to have something written down: a name, an address, if he had weapons, a gun...
What did he confess... And then you still killed him?
Of course. You had no reason to let him live!
I've heard of cases of prisoners who escaped with their lives. But I'll tell you one thing honestly: people with pure souls didn't escape! We finished them all off! In 1953 we had nothing left to liquidate! What was left was Coposu, who was a piece of nothing… Coposu… Or Diaconescu… What a piece of nothing was he?! He actually showed himself… I'll tell you this: we finished off the real politicians!
There were young people in prison, people of about 30, 40 years old, whom I have to feel sorry for because they were my victims… those were real intellectuals!!!
I get sick when I hear that "prophet", Brucan, making "prophecies" about the past. Sir, how can you talk, make prophecies about the past?! Well, let him tell his past, not the one of a week, two… Let him tell his past, as I tell it to myself now.
Do you remember Iliescu when, during his first candidacy, he told his biography? He said that he started communism at the age of 12. Ceausescu had started at 10, he at 12 and I at 15. Iliescu told us then that he became a communist out of conviction! And I did the same, you know! Ceausescu also became a communist out of conviction. But we were opportunists, pure opportunists! We were not pure people at heart. Neither was Ceausescu! Well, there was no common law detainee at that time who did not know Ceausescu from trains, from stations… Ceausescu was a common law detainee.
This other one, Iliescu, went to Russia… What was he looking for in Russia? He went to study… But what did he learn there, how the waters flow or how to muddy the waters? What did he learn?! He learned only one thing: Leninism. Not Marxism, Leninism!!!
This is what the youth in colleges and everywhere must know!!!
And why don't young people know this? It's been said on TV, in magazines, in newspapers...
It's not enough!
So what more do we need to do?
in all schools, let's talk about what communism really meant. Let's make real history! Let's not talk to students about that phase with the peasants who shot three people in 1929 and about the story with Roaita's siren...
Well, let's not forget who fired in 22 and after 22... Who fired at us? Who fired at us, not the communists? Who is he, where is that guy caught??? Well, they made me sick then, I said: "Sir, these are my dead!". I said: "They are my dead!". I'm not lying to you! That if it weren't for me and that guy and that guy, these people wouldn't have died like this, innocently... Because they threw away their party cards...
Iliescu shouldn't forget this, how young people tore up their party cards and threw them away. He still keeps his card! I assure you that he didn't break it! I assure you that he didn't break it!!!
That's why I tell you, too little is talked about the real history. I saw only heroes. Too few victims and too many heroes, too many torturers. Because I was terrible, sir!
In the days of the revolution when they started to defend themselves in my block, I told them: "Who are you defending yourself from?" "From terrorists!" "From which terrorists? You are defending yourself from communists!" I have witnesses, there are about seven, eight who are still alive! And they were party members. I cried, I cried in those days. But I didn't know that so many would die.
I knew that they died in Timisoara and I said that they were my dead. And those were my dead! The dead of 22 and all the dead of 1989 are still mine. I take them all upon myself. Because if it weren't for us, these people wouldn't die. Because they were shouting in the squares: "No to communism!" and this bothered me, because they were shouting like that. I haven't forgotten this to this day: "No communism!". It's painful!
And today, when I see Iliescu triumphing at the head of the country, saying that he has won Romania, that we will join NATO, that we will join the EU, I feel like a madman. He won't get anywhere, that he is dirty at heart...
I'm running away from Vadim, you know. I'm running away from Vadim Tudor! Because he's also a kind of nothing, a troubled mind like mine.
Maybe he'll hear you and get angry...
It's okay, he can get angry! I would like Paunescu to get angry too, because he did "Singing Romania"! These are dirty people, sir!
Well, you see, they say they did only good for the country!
How did they do good?! Well, they are still doing good!
Don't get mad at me, but it is the right of young people to be in this country. I would be happy to see only people under 40 in the Romanian Parliament. Not to see anyone over 40. That's the only way the mentality will change.
I often say that it was better under communism, but then I ask myself: "how was it good?" Because the Romanian has a big flaw: he forgets quickly. I've forgotten too, but I haven't forgotten the bad deeds I did, you know. I know almost all of them, completely. That I avoid them is another thing because, you know, a criminal avoids them a lot. A criminal runs away. But the truth always appears in front of him and that is very painful.
And I, if I told you all this, it is because I know that a man who doesn't have his past sorted out cannot have a future. He is not that kind of man.
The communists were not all bad… There were also decent people among them, people who minded their own business, professionals. Because they were activists and paying members. Those paying members minded their own business. And Iliescu says that there were 3,800,000 communists! That's impossible! We shouldn't put them all in the same pot. There were members who did harm to this country and members who minded their own business.
And, for now at least, the only one who did harm to the country is you…
Only me! Well, I wonder too: only me???
An interview by Fabian Anton
March 21, 2002
Giurgiu
____________
* Torturer Frant Tandara passed away on May 2, 2004, in Giurgiu, without ever being investigated by the competent authorities for the crimes he committed. This interview was the last testimony he wanted to leave for the Romanian media.
I am very happy.
Perfect. For all those who do not know you and for those who have not read your book, I would like to ask you, first of all, to tell us a few words about yourself. So, who are you? When were you born?
in 1930, in February. I turned 72 on February 22. I was born into a fallen family, as they say now. I grew up poor, uneducated... After my family fell apart, neither my mother nor my father took me, and having nowhere else to go, I went to the regiment.
Were your parents divorced?
Yes. They split up, and I ended up in the regiment, a troop child. This happened around 1941-1942, during the war. The war was in full swing then. I did very well in the regiment, but, of course, not in the same way as I would have done with my mother or father. It was hard. You went to bed with the whole troop, when the curfew was sounded, at 9 p.m., and at 5 in the morning you had to wake up. Over time, however, I got used to this barracks life. The problems for me started when the war ended because the regiments and divisions merged. Then they threw us, the troop children, here and there, to jobs, to who knows where... I managed to go to Tirgoviste where I began my career as a communist politician, as a young communist.
But how did this career begin? So, suddenly, you arrived in Târgoviște and became a communist politician?
It's a longer story. It all started with Bizim Ion. This was a Moldovan who was said to be related to Gheorghe Apostol. I don't know if this story was true, but that's what was said, he himself claimed to be related to Apostol. Bizim was in charge of the UTC there, in Tirgoviste. I was initially sent to the Army Arsenal. But the Army Arsenal in Tirgoviste then turned into a CFR vocational school. So it was taken over by the CFR and, instead of making cannons and repairing cannons, we worked on CFR wagons. I didn't even have time to do that because I took up this side of my political career. This Bizim took me along with him, there were about two or three others and we formed organizations. I would walk around the city all day, around Tirgoviste. Well, and so, being young, the dirty guy made me steal some sheets. When I was caught, the management never forgave me.
But you have to know that back then, around 1945, there wasn't any communist organization, not everyone was communist. When they caught me, they took notice of me and made me think badly of them. They expelled me from school so I had to leave. So I packed my bags and left Tirgoviste, I returned to Giurgiu. But before I left, Bizim told me what to do when I came to town: to look for the Communist Party. But where the hell would I find a Communist Party in Giurgiu? At that time there wasn't one. There was a Socialist Party, communists weren't even mentioned in town back then. There was the Ploughmen's Front, the Socialist Party, the Social-Democratic Party... They were all grouped together and, among them, there were communists. But it didn't have a company, something like "The Communist Party". There was only the Socialist Party and the Social-Democratic Party. Kind of like now, with the PSD. Back then there was the National Democratic Front, now we have the National Salvation Front… There are some things that make your head hurt… This shocks me because I remember how it was 50 years ago and I know how it all started…
But now they are democrats…
Well, they were still “democrats” back then. Back then there was the National Democratic Front, now it is the Social Democratic Party. But don't forget Voitec, who was a social democrat who stood right next to Ceausescu… You don't know, but look what was said back then, what the slogan was: it said that old lady Leana went with Voitec and Ceausescu to buy three pork heads from the Obor warehouses. And they saw that three pork heads had three different prices. And Leana noticed and asked why hers was cheaper, why the prices were different. And the butcher replied to Ceausescu: "Comrade First Secretary, yours has a tongue, but no brain. Comrade Voitec's has a brain, but no tongue. And Comrade Elena's has neither a tongue nor a brain." So that was the point, Voitec was there like a mannequin, just to show that he was a social democrat.
And I got there, to the Social Democrats. Now I'll make a parenthesis: the signature on my release from prison is given by Sadoveanu. Sadoveanu... a great poet. I liked and I like everything he wrote. But not as a politician, as he was active even though he didn't have a party membership card. If that's the case, I didn't have a membership card either. But I was active, I did everything for the communists. If someone asked me, I would say: "My membership card is in my heart!!!". That's what I said to everyone! And I worked firmly convinced for them, you know. I can't back down, to say that I wasn't a communist!
Let's go back then... You came back to Giurgiu and looked for the Communist Party...
Yes. Well, I found shelter with them. In Giurgiu I found work at the CFR, where they placed me. There was a guy, Heiselhoff called him, he was German, who didn't want to take me in, he knew I was sent by the communists. And I started working at the CFR, where they sent me. I was thin at the time, dystrophic, I was never fat. They made me work on sleepers and, as thin as I was, I would take the sleeper on my back... They told me: "Stay there for about two or three weeks, until we sort out your situation..." And they sorted it out so that, after a short time, I ended up working for the union. I no longer worked on sleepers, I was taken out of production and made to carry correspondence here and there... That was until Pavel Stefan arrived in town, who was first secretary, and I became his faithful dog.
What year was that?
I think it was in the fall of 1946, after the elections. Pavel Stefan was from Galati and was married to a woman from Ploiesti, Elena Pavel, who had been staying in Doftana. He wasn't a guy who knows what, I think he was promoted because of his wife (he was then promoted to Bucharest, became a minister, later he also reached the Central Committee). But as a basic profession he was an engineer, because it wasn't a big deal for the Party to give them a diploma, a license... Well, in Giurgiu too, when he came, there were all kinds of communists, about 30-40 years old, older than me. But I worked more than any of them. I worked with faith and with my heart.
What exactly did you do?
I was a kind of spy. I reported to Pavel Stefan everything that was happening in the institutions, where they were plotting… And I was also waiting for the promotion because they promised me that in 1949-1950 I would go to Moscow. But I didn't have time before the misfortune happened to my father. I killed my father!
How did this happen?
The Communist Party had won the elections in 1946, in November. That's when the change began. Institutions became state-owned, there were no longer any owners, they took their mills, the lands were confiscated and put together. They had to liquidate all the bourgeois by 1948. And in 1948 nationalization came. Around 1947, at the beginning of the year, I woke up with my father at my place, he asked me to come back home. In the meantime, he had kept about three or four women. He had about 30 sheep, he could no longer work alone, and he was calling me home. Pavel Stefan told me not to go to the sheep, because it would ruin my future. I had a future ahead of me, and Pavel said to me: "Where are you going now, are you becoming a shepherd?" I told him: "It's impossible. I'm going back to my father!" My father was crying, his tears were flowing. And he says to me: "If I were you, I would hit him in the head!"
That's what Pavel Stefan told you...
Yes. He predicted that I wouldn't be able to stay with my father. He had found out what my father did, where he worked, and he said that he was a worthless man. He probably was. Even though he was my father, I can't condemn him. But, as he was, he was my father, I looked at him like a father and I was happy that he turned to me with pity. I told myself that, after all, it was something that, at 17-18 years old, after so much time, he would turn to me with pity. I told myself that he had a soul, so I went. But I was wrong, it wasn't like that and I could only stay with him for about seven, eight months. And, one day, it happened that he was chasing me away. He was telling me to leave and take everything that was mine. But I had nothing, I hadn't achieved anything with him. He took his money, the same with food... I had nothing. What I had come with was torn, and I was also without clothes. I asked him: "Well, what are you giving me?" I wanted to take a hat and he didn't give it to me either: "That's my hat!" He was holding his, to leave with what I had come with. I hadn't come with much, I had almost nothing. And then I remembered what Pavel said, that he wasn't my father, and I said to myself: "Stefan was right, I'll finish him! I just have to finish him!" And, determined as I was, after the fight I ran away, took an axe and... in short! That was it!
Did you guys start a fight?
Yes. There was a fight. But I ran after the axe, outside. I came with the axe, and when he was about to leave the house, I hit him in the head with the axe and finished him off! It was a rage, an excess of madness, because these crimes are committed in excess of madness, you can't reason anymore. All crimes are committed like that, I think, you can't reason anymore. I recovered from the shock and said to myself: "I'm going to comrade Pavel immediately!". Pavel was in Bucharest, I only found his deputy, Costache Vasile, someone I had helped promote. I had thrown him in front of Pavel, I always said: "Uncle Costache is the right man. His place is here, in your place!". And that's how it happened. And I went to him, to Costache, and I said: "Look what I did, Uncle Costache. Comrade Pavel Stefan was right. I should have killed him earlier, but look, now I've killed him!". He said to me smiling: "Well, what, Comrade Pavel taught you to hit him in the head?! Don't mention this somewhere that you shouldn't have done that! But it's nothing. Go home, I'll make a phone call, you stay quiet and I'll send the militia. I'll take care of your father!". And that's exactly what happened.
I went home, I didn't tell anyone anything, and after a while, he had calculated how long it would take for the militia to come, they came and picked me up. They themselves were telling me what to declare: that my father had a knife, that he ran after me with the knife, all sorts of things that weren't true. The militia teaches me. At that time, there was a guy at the Security, his name was Marin Dumitru, who had been a legionnaire and, after the elections, had become a communist. This, Marin Dumitru, stood next to me and dictated to me what to say. It was a short statement because the next day they were going to send me to the penitentiary, to the investigation office.
When I arrived at the penitentiary, things were already arranged. The director of the penitentiary was Teohari Georgescu's brother. Teohari was the Minister of the Interior, and his brother had come to Giurgiu as director of the penitentiary. He also received me. He also knew the time when I would arrive. They must have given him that phone number. He just asked me: "Are you Tandara?" "Yes!" And he introduced me, told the first guard to take care of me, they gave me packages from the Party... I was very well looked after at that penitentiary! And, seeing this, I was waiting for my release, I thought to myself: "Eee, I'll get out of here quickly!". And so it was.
Initially, they told me I was going to Arad. They knew that the director was leaving for Arad and they wanted to transfer me with him. But I didn't get to do that because Pavel was looking for me at the prison, in Vacaresti.
But how did you get to Vacaresti?
I was sent. That's because criminal trials weren't tried in Giurgiu. That was only done at the Criminal Court in Bucharest. And they took me there, to try me. The communists assigned me a defense attorney, they taught me what to say... I couldn't get away cheaply. They told me I would get ten years in prison, but during the trial I got away with 12 years of hard labor and one year of interdiction. They said "hard labor", which I was going to do locked up in a cell, but I escaped, because in reality they put me in the kitchen, I don't know where... I wanted to appeal, but they told me to give up the appeal because I was going to Canal. I didn't really want to go to Canal because I was comfortable there, I had adapted to the underworld, to this environment I had entered, this pleasant environment. But I had to endure it and, under their pressure, I went to Canal.
At Canal it was good at first, it seemed like freedom to me. Pavel Stefan told me right from the start that my radius of action, where I could move freely, was 60 kilometers. I was not allowed to exceed this radius, to pass Cernavoda, for example, but I didn't need to. It was enough for me that I could go from Midia or Periprava to Constanta. I had nowhere to go. And they had told me: "You see that you are still confined. If you leave, I will bring you back and then you will have no chance of rehabilitation. You have a great chance of rehabilitation".
I understood them and listened to them. And they, from time to time, would talk to me about the Communist Party. This refreshed my feelings. I had forgotten about communism for a short period, but I was not fully cured.
What use were they in prison for you?
Well, in prison I was also a kind of informant, I gave information. And I had the right to choose the first brigadiers, for example. I chose one, a gypsy. Everyone who did political imprisonment at the White Gate and who is still alive knows who Marin Stanciugel was, this gypsy. I don't have much to tell you about him, he was a man... a man, a teacher, put this in the brick oven... The poor man had just arrived in the colony, he had been brought on a two-day trip, and Stanciugel mistreated him and killed him. I wasn't there then, but I saw his bones in the oven, that they were already burned.
Wait a minute... Did you arrive at Canal as a prisoner?
Yes, as a prisoner!
And by what right could you appoint this brigadier?
Well, at Canal there was self-management. That's what it was called. There was the technical office, the administrative office, the site managers, the technicians and the brigadiers. the latter kept track of the quota, how much was excavated, how much was dug, the loading and unloading, how much stone was broken, all this work. Each brigade had about 80-90 prisoners and there were about 110 brigades. There were never more than 12,000 prisoners at the White Gate, it couldn't handle more. It was already quite crowded, they couldn't bring more. Initially there were 32 barracks, 16 on one side and 16 on the other, and then they made some H-shaped ones, that's what they were called, where they brought the politically convicted.
And this Stanciugel killed a teacher?
Here's how it was: at each barracks, at the entrance, there was a fence and on the left and right were some flower plots. But those plots looked like graves. This professor, a young man, about 30 years old, would have said to the other prisoners: "Look, the prisoners are buried here!". I didn't know this man, I only saw his bones in the oven. A Hungarian gypsy called me, Horvath called him, and he said to me: "Come here and see that they burned one in the oven...". "Well, who put him in the bath?" "You don't mean me?" "I won't say you!" "Marin burned him!" I mean Stanciugel, you understand? I then asked him: "Well, how did he get there?" He said: "I don't know!". When I went to the oven, I saw that the professor had been pushed in with his head forward, that the bones of his legs were still visible. I took a willow stick, pulled out his leg, looked at it and then threw it back into the fire. Since it was very hot, he had put two-meter pieces of wood inside, willow sticks, in the brick ovens.
The next day the check began, the counting, because not one came out. A count was done at the exit and then, after the brigades came out, the inside was also done. And I went and told Paun, who had counted three times by then: "Stop counting, because one is missing!". "What's wrong with him?" And then I put him aside so that the platoon leader, who was the head of the guard and took over the interior, wouldn't hear, and I said to the commander: "Well, let me tell you, Marin put one in..." "Did you see?" "I saw the leg, I smelled it! And the people who went to the toilet smelled it!" Okay, the gypsy was also among those where they were counting, he was outside, in the square, made like a football field. There they were also counted from the auxiliary, in the infirmary, in the kitchen... Only the platoons in front of the barracks remained. They counted them with the platoons, they had entered the bedroom, they had looked under the beds... "Where is one?"
The commander understood the situation then and stopped the counting, not to count anymore. So, at around half past nine the counting was finished, the search in various places and they said: "That's it, that's it..."
They called Marin and he sensed what the matter was and recognized it. What they did next I don't know because I, for example, was never called out of nowhere to be asked what I knew about this man's disappearance, how this man disappeared. That, normally, the Constanta prosecutor's office, to which I belonged, should have been notified, but no one from the prosecutor's office showed up. I was also asked about other things, but no one asked me anything about this case. Although it is said that the prosecutor's office knows something about this case. But I don't know what and how.
Look, all the work started from here. Because I, from here, in 1950, was transferred to Culmea. There came one, my close collaborator, with whom I worked a lot. His name was Nicolau, he was from Bessarabia, he had a Bessarabian accent. You could say he was Russian, I don't know if he was, but he spoke Romanian with an accent. He was a blond guy. He came after me, to Culmea, to tell me that I was going to Bucharest. He explained to me, he told me what it was about… He asked me if I had ever seen a madman, how a madman talks, how he acts… When I heard, being young, I kind of liked these adventures. And I went with him to Bucharest.
When I got to Bucharest, he handed me over to someone, his name was Cocos, who was a doctor, he knew some specialty. Now, do I know if he was Cocos or was that a conspiratorial name? Because they worked under conspiratorial names there.
I arrived at Hospital No. 9 where I had my first assignment, on August 8, 1951. At that time, there were all sorts of events in the country: problems with students, with the "Black Sumanele" organization, with all sorts of organizations against communism. There were all kinds of young people like that and we were trying, through various methods, to get information from them, to make them confess. That is, to tell about this and that, about who knows what case, about who knows what organization, about how many members there are in a certain organization... The security service couldn't do that and we did it... After torturing them, they would bring them here, to this section No. 9. This section hadn't been established for a long time, they had set it up a few months before I came there. It was led by a certain Tomorug, a forensic doctor at the Ministry of Internal Affairs. He was of Greek origin. This man never tried to approach me or ask me what I was doing there. But he knew, especially since I hadn't come there with a file. A patient, normally, should have had a file. I saw, at the common law there were some who came for an expertise, that he would send them to us for an expertise. But this doctor didn't deal with the "politicians", I know that for sure. I was with a nurse and I was able to glance at the registers, to see. And I saw that the "politicians" were not treated there.
There were three common law cells, three cells with four beds. That means 12 patients. There were never more. As soon as they finished the treatment there, a treatment that was short, not long-term, they would send you back. But we still had three cells that were at the disposal of the Securitate. I was also on that side.
So this doctor had nothing to do with me, to ask me what I was doing there or why I came. That I was only working for a month. That was the agreement with them, with Nicolau and with Major Jidic, that I wouldn't stay more than a month. I couldn't stay. Although I had the freedom to go out during the day and there was incredibly good and plentiful food (there were three types of food: first, second and third class). I took from first class and took from the chosen ones: today I served in installments. I took installments, two or three installments and I also gave to the guards. The sick, my patient, whom I had to liquidate, wouldn't eat. Well, did I give that guy food?! I was trying to finish him off as much as possible. Since I had an order, we weren't supposed to keep him for two days. We had to do something to him in 24 hours.
They would bring him in at 11 at night, at the latest 11 at night he would come, and the next day, also at 11 o'clock, he would leave there, but he would leave cold. He would come in hot and leave cold. That's how it happens. I remember that many times Nicolau would ask me: "How many chapatini have you done this month? How many chapatini?". I mean to give him the report.
I couldn't remember anymore. So you would do one, two a night. It was like that, one chapatini a night. Many times I would tell him: "Well, I only did about 19...". "Didn't you do 30?" I mean, if I stayed for 30 days I had to do 30 chapatini. But I didn't do that much.
This man, Nicolau - I don't know if he's still alive, but in 1951 he was about 38-39 years old - might have ended up like Colonel Craciun, who said that he did nothing but good for the prisoners. But he didn't do them. Maybe he would have done them well in common law, but he didn't do them in politics, because he wasn't interested. That interest was in 1950: to cut down on intellectuals! It was class struggle then and all the philistines had to be eliminated. As he called them: "philistines who studied in Paris!" Whether they had or not, they would tell me that they had studied in Paris. Maybe they had studied in Iasi, Cluj, Timisoara or Bucharest, but they would tell us that they had studied in Paris. Because we didn't look favorably on those people.
And you had to liquidate them...
Yes! And I was liquidating them. But it wasn't just me. That's the problem: this communism wasn't made with me. Communism was made with many people like me. And there were people who knew how to incite you to misfortunes, who managed to do that.
So... patients, detainees who had to be eliminated came to Hospital No. 9...
They weren't prisoners sent with a file, you know. They only had a card.
They were probably jumped off the street...
No one knew where they came from. I wasn't told who I was either. They didn't even have a name. They just had a card. And on that card it only said: 45. Or 59. That was his card.
A number.
A number, that's all. He would come, the van would drop him off...
So you didn't know who he was, what his name was...
If you knew, you would have found out from him.
To torture?
Yes. He didn't say otherwise. Two Securitate officers in uniform would bring him. They would accompany him and hand him over here, to us.
That was after they were tortured?
No. before. Although some people came beaten.
I mean, they tortured them and then brought them to you?
Yes. They were started there, and we finished them.
How do you finish them?
By different methods. We didn't have a single style. There were the electric shocks, but around 1952, they took away the device. I myself had told them: "Take it, there's no need for that!". We had other methods. For example, beating the testicles (that was the worst beating).
The problem was that they didn't want to have marks. But some came with marks and we reported this, that they came with marks. Then, when they died, we didn't know where they were taking them. The common law dead were taken to the hospital morgue, to have an autopsy done. But the "political" ones were no longer taken for an autopsy. The same prison van, a Praga car, would come and take them away.
It was a pleasure to torture
in the volume The Black Lexicon, your file says this: "As a torturer, he applied the following torture methods to his victims: crushing fingers with a door...
Yes. We couldn't fight some of them. There were two of us and we couldn't fight the prisoner, he didn't want to put his fingers in the door. Some of them would come in eaten, stronger and you couldn't fight them. And I told them not to bring them eaten anymore, because we wouldn't be able to resist them... So, after a while, they would send them to us exhausted, not having eaten for seven, eight, ten days. It was known that these people hadn't eaten for so long, they couldn't hold themselves up, they were wobbly on their feet. Then I would quickly put my hand in theirs and squeeze them as hard as I could, at the door.
Here it also says about beating them in the testicles...
It was a satisfaction for us to beat them in the testicles! That's what I learned from a woman...
What exactly?
This idea came from a woman. She, they say, would beat them with a pencil. I, not having a pencil, made myself a stick. There was a tree in the hospital yard and from those branches I made myself a stick about 50 centimeters long, about the thickness of a pen. I would beat them with that. I would beat them until they fainted. Many times most of them died. Their testicles would swell and they would die. Few escaped this beating with their lives.
But, even if they escaped this beating, they did not escape unscathed. That was by no means the case. It was a pleasure to torture.
A pastime, a game…
Yes. It was fun. I admit that, I can't go back. Never. That's why I say I can't repent for all the bad things I've done. That I can't say: "God forgive me!". It's hard for me to tell him to forgive me, because he has nothing to forgive me for.
Here it is also mentioned, as methods of torture, strangulation, asphyxiation, hitting with sandbags and wet sheets...
Yes. They were little bags made of a kind of overalls, a very hard material. They were eight, nine centimeters in diameter and were packed with sand. You would hit them on the back with those little bags until they said what they had to say. You would wait to get something out of them… And if in an hour or two you didn't get anything out of them, I would tell my colleagues: "Fuck him, there's no point in continuing! Finish him! Can't you see that we're going to spend 12 nights with him here?!"
And if he confessed, if he told you what you wanted to know, would he get away?
Don't escape!
So you killed him anyway?
Yes. But we had to have something written down: a name, an address, if he had weapons, a gun...
What did he confess... And then you still killed him?
Of course. You had no reason to let him live!
I've heard of cases of prisoners who escaped with their lives. But I'll tell you one thing honestly: people with pure souls didn't escape! We finished them all off! In 1953 we had nothing left to liquidate! What was left was Coposu, who was a piece of nothing… Coposu… Or Diaconescu… What a piece of nothing was he?! He actually showed himself… I'll tell you this: we finished off the real politicians!
There were young people in prison, people of about 30, 40 years old, whom I have to feel sorry for because they were my victims… those were real intellectuals!!!
I get sick when I hear that "prophet", Brucan, making "prophecies" about the past. Sir, how can you talk, make prophecies about the past?! Well, let him tell his past, not the one of a week, two… Let him tell his past, as I tell it to myself now.
Do you remember Iliescu when, during his first candidacy, he told his biography? He said that he started communism at the age of 12. Ceausescu had started at 10, he at 12 and I at 15. Iliescu told us then that he became a communist out of conviction! And I did the same, you know! Ceausescu also became a communist out of conviction. But we were opportunists, pure opportunists! We were not pure people at heart. Neither was Ceausescu! Well, there was no common law detainee at that time who did not know Ceausescu from trains, from stations… Ceausescu was a common law detainee.
This other one, Iliescu, went to Russia… What was he looking for in Russia? He went to study… But what did he learn there, how the waters flow or how to muddy the waters? What did he learn?! He learned only one thing: Leninism. Not Marxism, Leninism!!!
This is what the youth in colleges and everywhere must know!!!
And why don't young people know this? It's been said on TV, in magazines, in newspapers...
It's not enough!
So what more do we need to do?
in all schools, let's talk about what communism really meant. Let's make real history! Let's not talk to students about that phase with the peasants who shot three people in 1929 and about the story with Roaita's siren...
Well, let's not forget who fired in 22 and after 22... Who fired at us? Who fired at us, not the communists? Who is he, where is that guy caught??? Well, they made me sick then, I said: "Sir, these are my dead!". I said: "They are my dead!". I'm not lying to you! That if it weren't for me and that guy and that guy, these people wouldn't have died like this, innocently... Because they threw away their party cards...
Iliescu shouldn't forget this, how young people tore up their party cards and threw them away. He still keeps his card! I assure you that he didn't break it! I assure you that he didn't break it!!!
That's why I tell you, too little is talked about the real history. I saw only heroes. Too few victims and too many heroes, too many torturers. Because I was terrible, sir!
In the days of the revolution when they started to defend themselves in my block, I told them: "Who are you defending yourself from?" "From terrorists!" "From which terrorists? You are defending yourself from communists!" I have witnesses, there are about seven, eight who are still alive! And they were party members. I cried, I cried in those days. But I didn't know that so many would die.
I knew that they died in Timisoara and I said that they were my dead. And those were my dead! The dead of 22 and all the dead of 1989 are still mine. I take them all upon myself. Because if it weren't for us, these people wouldn't die. Because they were shouting in the squares: "No to communism!" and this bothered me, because they were shouting like that. I haven't forgotten this to this day: "No communism!". It's painful!
And today, when I see Iliescu triumphing at the head of the country, saying that he has won Romania, that we will join NATO, that we will join the EU, I feel like a madman. He won't get anywhere, that he is dirty at heart...
I'm running away from Vadim, you know. I'm running away from Vadim Tudor! Because he's also a kind of nothing, a troubled mind like mine.
Maybe he'll hear you and get angry...
It's okay, he can get angry! I would like Paunescu to get angry too, because he did "Singing Romania"! These are dirty people, sir!
Well, you see, they say they did only good for the country!
How did they do good?! Well, they are still doing good!
Don't get mad at me, but it is the right of young people to be in this country. I would be happy to see only people under 40 in the Romanian Parliament. Not to see anyone over 40. That's the only way the mentality will change.
I often say that it was better under communism, but then I ask myself: "how was it good?" Because the Romanian has a big flaw: he forgets quickly. I've forgotten too, but I haven't forgotten the bad deeds I did, you know. I know almost all of them, completely. That I avoid them is another thing because, you know, a criminal avoids them a lot. A criminal runs away. But the truth always appears in front of him and that is very painful.
And I, if I told you all this, it is because I know that a man who doesn't have his past sorted out cannot have a future. He is not that kind of man.
The communists were not all bad… There were also decent people among them, people who minded their own business, professionals. Because they were activists and paying members. Those paying members minded their own business. And Iliescu says that there were 3,800,000 communists! That's impossible! We shouldn't put them all in the same pot. There were members who did harm to this country and members who minded their own business.
And, for now at least, the only one who did harm to the country is you…
Only me! Well, I wonder too: only me???
An interview by Fabian Anton
March 21, 2002
Giurgiu
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* Torturer Frant Tandara passed away on May 2, 2004, in Giurgiu, without ever being investigated by the competent authorities for the crimes he committed. This interview was the last testimony he wanted to leave for the Romanian media.
User comments
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Diana Bertha Krausser historian January 19, 2020 at 7:55 pm
Since my father "Berthold Krausser", a pharmacist, was killed by the "Brasov Security" (arrested Dec. 24, 1949, died Sept. 1950) I must add the following: from Targoviste you had to come to Brasov (1949 "Stalin City"!) where there was still a mass of "capitalists" who had to disappear...Nobody "climbs" to the mountains, then "comes down" to Giurgiu again!...The Brasov Security had about 2000 torturers - many from Moldova, Braila, Focsani, Buzau, etc., who came to Targoviste...-, whose "descendants" still live today in the nationalized houses in the historic center! If this criminal was in Giurgiu at the time of the interview, then perhaps a "housing accident" had occurred... Anyway, sad and scandalous for a "normal" European state, with a so-called Justice... to let these monsters die unpunished for their crimes?
Notes
*) This astonishing interview is the only evidence recognized and assumed by a single torturer of the social hell created by communism, which left deep traces in the mentality and psyche of Romanians.
Intrucat tatal meu „Berthold Krausser”, farmacist, a fost ucis de „Securitatea Brasov” (arestat 24 dec.1949, deced. sept.1950) trebuie sa adaug urmatoarele : de la Targoviste se venea neaparat la Brasov (1949 „Orasul Stalin”!) unde era inca o masa de „capitalisti” care trebuiau sa dispara…Nimeni nu „urca” pana la munti, pt. ca apoi sa „coboare” din nou la Giurgiu!…Securitatea Brasov a avut circa 2000 de tortionari – multi din Moldova, Braila, Focsani, Buzau etc., veniti pe la Targoviste…-, ai caror „descendenti” traiesc si astazi in casele nationalizate din centrul istoric! Daca acest criminal era la Giurgiu in momentul interviului atunci poate ca aparuse un „accident locativ”… Oricum, trist si scandalos pt. un stat „normal” European, cu o asa-zisa Justitie… sa lase acesti monstri sa moara nepenalizati pt. crimele lor?