Vasile Cijevschi information

Vasile Cijevschi
Cijevschi, photographed ca. 1930
Born	(1880-10-17)October 17, 1880 Zaim, Bender County, Bessarabia Governorate, Russian Empire
Died	July 14, 1931(1931-07-14) (aged 50) Chișinău, Kingdom of Romania
Buried	Central Cemetery, Chișinău
Allegiance	Russian Empire Russian Republic Moldavian Democratic Republic
Service/branch	Cavalry
Rank	Major (Russian Cavalry) Comissar (Bessarabian Army)
Battles/wars	Russo-Japanese War World War I Battle of Tannenberg Russian Civil War
Other work	Politician, civil servant, diplomat, philologist, writer

Vasile Gheorghe Cijevschi^[1] (Russian: Василий Георгиевич Чижевский, romanized: Vasiliy Georgevich Chizhevsky; also credited as Cișevschi, Cijevschii, Cijevski, Cijewsky, or Tchizhevsky; October 17, 1880 – July 14, 1931) was a Bessarabian and Romanian politician, administrator and writer. Originally a career officer and Orientalist in service to the Russian Empire, he was dispatched to the Far East, in Vladivostok and Khabarovsk, seeing action in the Russo-Japanese War. He was wounded and shielded from active duty, but returned with the start of World War I, managing to survive the Battle of Tannenberg. By the time of the February Revolution, he was a civil servant in Bessarabia, and an affiliate of the Octobrist Party.

Later in 1917, Cijevschi was active within the ethnic Romanian political movement, being increasingly supportive of Romanian nationalism as espoused by the National Moldavian Party; as president of the Soldiers' Congress, he mapped out a plan for Bessarabia's emancipation, and fought against the influence of leftist factions, Esers and Bolsheviks alike. On this platform, he joined the regional assembly, called Sfatul Țării, as well as the executive leadership of the Moldavian Democratic Republic. As the government-appointed Commissar, Cijevschi helped organize defense against leftist insurrection, but denounce Bolshevik infiltration of the Bessarabian troops, which had compromised his plan for action. Ultimately supportive of the Romanian military expedition, he contributed decisively to the Bessarabian–Romanian union in March 1918. He then drifted away from the mainstream nationalist platform, establishing his own National-Democratic Party, and then affiliating with Vladimir Herța's short-lived Romanian League.

Cijevschi was much upset with the centralizing policies of Greater Romania, and in particular with the dissolution of Sfatul—though he continued to work as a civil administrator, and joined the mainstream People's Party, as well as, briefly, the Romanian National Party. Turning to Russian-language journalism, and earning reputation as a polemicist and alleged blackmailer, he is also remembered for his endorsement of Bessarabian identity within Romania, while also still frequenting the nationalist club ASTRA. His critics were alarmed by what they saw as "anti-Romanian" activities, and circulated allegations that he was cultivating known communists. A man of literary and scholarly ambitions, during the early interwar period Cijevschi was a patron of the Bessarabian Art Academy. His various projects were cut short by his death at age 50, reportedly caused by a combination of his old war wounds and disease.