Nicolae Ceaucescu joined Romania's then-illegal Communist Party in 1933. He was arrested twice for his politcal activities by the pro-German Romanian government. After the war, he rose rapidly in the Communist Party and in 1965 became the Party Secretary General, rising in 1968 to become President. Ceaucescu maintained a foreign policy independent from that of Moscow, while implementing a strict Communist regime at home. He was executed in 1989 after being overthrown in a coup. Bibliography: Behr, Edward. Kiss The Hand You Cannot Bite: The Rise and Fall of the Ceausescus. New York : Villard Books, c1991. Fischer, Mary Ellen. Nicolae Ceausescu: A Study in Political Leadership. Boulder: Rienner, c1989. Pacepa, Ion Mihai, Red Horizons: Chronicles of a Communist Spy Chief. Washington, D.C. : Regnery Gateway; New York, NY: Distributed to the trade by Kampmann, c1987.