It was already early when we went to bed, leaving, as customary, the gate open. That was for carol singers, whoever they were. Also sometimes friends or relatives came, even at three or four in the morning. But my father called it a day. He was sure that on that particular night, when the good people of Romania and its soldiers under the command of Iliescu, were battling terrorists and vicious forces of the former regime, we would have no visitors. So I got into my warm bed in which my mother had placed as usual at my feet a fire heated ceramic tile wrapped in towels. That would keep warm for hours, and I happily welcomed sleep. I was free, I had a happy and loving family, and I had nothing to fear. The only thing ahead was Christmas Day, the most peaceful and full of love day of the year.
Strange as it is, those warm feelings of love and peace were utterly absent from Colonel Kamenici’s head in Targoviste. Not that he was dead or he wasn’t capable of feeling love and peace. He could, but not on that bloody night. He was still cursing Boboc and Stoica for their lack of guts. Why didn’t those two suckers kill Nicolae and Elena? He could’t understand it. His orders were clear. At least clearer than those he gave to Tecu and Mares on the morning of the 23rd. Why the hell did them sonsof-bitches not comply?
“It’s you or him! You got it?” “You are finished”. “Only one of you will survive this Revolution alive”. The words of General Voinea, the head of the First Army, were banging ever louder in his head.
Half an hour later, as if his prayers had been answered by the God he didn’t believe in, their unit was attacked with gunfire from the north. So he took a TAB and drove it to the tanks’ positions where he had a long discussion with the tanks commander, lieutenant-colonel Mutu.
“How many tanks could he count on if they were to take the two Ceauşescus in a march to Bucharest?” was his question. “Sixteen” was the answer.
“And, if we are attacked on our way there?” he asked again. “Then we will stop, group the tanks together and fight”, was the answer.
“And, if we are outnumbered and overpowered?” he asked again and lieutenant-colonel Mutu said calmly:
“Then we kill Ceauşescu.”
Twenty years after that night we can only guess that that plan wasn’t pursued because it was impossible to overpower 16 heavy TR80 Army Tanks. To overpower them one had to have 16 brand new soviet tanks or 20 brand new Abraham tanks, and it wasn’t likely the invisible terrorists could get their hands on heavier artillery.
Maybe that was the reason why the two Ceauşescus didn’t spend their last night in military beds, as they had spent the two nights before, but seated inside a TAB armored personnel carrier, along with their impossibly stinky and sleepy guards. Kamenici ordered Nicolae and Elena to get in a TAB. They would be in danger, if the headquarters were stormed by hostile forces. First they didn’t want to but they had to comply. With them, their guards Stoica and Boboc and another one, an officer with Tragoviste’s Militia. The driver was a civilian. Those were the times. The Army started to fight for the people and not against them so they had to welcome civilians that wanted to lend a hand, not that they were in any need of civilians there. So the TAB started its noisy engine to start its heater and everybody tried to sleep while they waited for morning.
But that TAB wasn’t the only one with a running engine there. Behind it was another one and in this one Kamenici was waiting. He had with him lieutenant-colonel Dinu, and as a driver he had private Stoican; another one, named Birtan was holding an AKM. There was a radio man and another soldier. It wasn’t crowded, but they all started to breathe easy when Kamenici went out for a smoke, everybody thought. But as Kamenici was smoking he called his driver.
Many years after that night, private Stoican recalled: “Kamenici was smoking. He was wearing a pufoaică”. It was the same kind of winter coat that was turned into alcohol after being dipped in urine and shit by the Revolution-loving Romanian people.
“He had his hands in his pockets, and he asked me:” “You, you know who’s in that TAB?”
“So what could I possibly say? So I said:”
“Sir, I heard something but I can’t be sure, sir!”
“And he told me:”
“If you want a place in the history books, go over there and shoot them both”.
Stoican was trying to control his fear when Kamenici went to the TAB holding Ceauşescu and pulled the driver out. He told the man he was a civilian and it was Christmas Eve.
“Go to your wife and kids, thank you for what you did for the Revolution, Merry Christmas and God bless you and your family” he said, and asked the reluctant Stoican to take his place. “I didn’t want to, but I had no power to say no. I was almost crying. I begged my commander to change his mind because I wasn’t shaved and I couldn’t present myself before our supreme commander in the shape I was in. But there I was inside. Kamenici had to push me to get me in, but once I was in the driver’s seat I saw them. They were wearing military clothes and looked at me with bright eyes. Stoica and Boboc had guns on their knees but they were almost asleep. They tried to open their eyes but they were so tired that they couldn’t. If Ceauşescu had wanted to take one of their guns he could have done it. Paisie however wasn’t sleeping but his gun was sticking out a crenel (a shooting hole), and sometimes he would just speak with Ceauşescu”.
Stoican was awake almost all night and so was Paisie and Ceauşescu. He tried to decide whether he should kill Ceauşescu and his wife or not.
“Should I kill them or should I not kill them?” that was his dilemma. He tried to find a reason for doing it or a reason for not doing it, but he couldn’t come to a conclusion, so the morning found him unprepared and undecided.
In 1998 Iulian Stoica officially declared that Stoican confessed that night that his orders were to kill everyone in the TAB, and it made sense. Both Stoica and Boboc were the traitors that didn’t follow similar orders the previous afternoon, weren’t they? But all of them were still alive and an angry Colonel Kamenici called the mission off and invited the half frozen people into his headquarters and phoned Bucharest to report that Ceauşescu and his wife were alive and well and asked for advice. But the killing machine that had been created to assassinate Ceauşescu was already rolling, without his knowledge. A team was being put together at that very hour, and everything was to go as planned, the long transition, the economic crises were all about to begin.
5. DECEMBER 25TH
On Christmas Day I woke up at 4 am. Liviu, my godfather and his brother Dan, together with their young wives were singing carols at the top of their voices under our window. I only got up to greet them with the traditional “Merry Christmas” and went back my bed while my parents went down for an early breakfast with our unexpected guests.
Later that day my dad said that Dan looked like a ghost. He was worried about him but the reason behind those haunted eyes, that had scared my father, we found out only months later, when Dan was finally ready to talk.