Legiunea Arhanghelului Mihail

  • League of the Archangel Michael
Identifier
479
Type of Entity
Corporate Body

History

One source of continued instability in Romania was Corneliu Zelea Codreanu’s pro-Nazi Legiunea Arhanghelului Mihail and its paramilitary wing, the Garda de Fier (Iron Guard). The Legionaires, as they were commonly known, operated much like the German Nazi Party’s Sturmabteilung in the 1920s and early 1930s. After the government banned it and other paramilitary groups in 1933, Codreanu transformed the league into a viable political party that garnered almost 16 percent of the popular vote in 1937 elections as part of the rightist coalition with Totul Pentru Tara (Everything for the Fatherland). Carol II responded to this rightist threat by outlawing the Iron Guard and executing Codreanu and other Iron Guard leaders.

Sources

  • The Holocaust : Roots, History, and Aftermath / D.M. Crowe. – Colorado, 2008. – p. 319