Why did Romania miss out on becoming a powerful nation that can dominate the Balkans...

European France today is almost twice the size of today's Romania. For interwar Romania to have as much territory as France they'd probably have to transform into the First Bulgarian Empire or grab more territories than in pic related.

There was the intention of Bulgaria uniting with Romania to form a confederacy right after it declared it's independence from the Ottoman empire. But Russia, who wanted the balkans for themselves meddled in these attempts and all further negociations were dropped.

Not much beyond that, although the romanians did form a single state with the bulgarians at one point in history

Can you show me a map of what it would’ve looked like? Why did Russians want to meddle in the Balkans? Can’t they just fuck around in China and Asia?

When german barbarians invaded rome, and gave us modern italy, the romans fled and created ROMania. But having already reached peak power, all they could do now was decline.

You do realize that your theory kinda goes to the drain when you see that in two different times in history, the three regions - Transylvania, Moldova and Wallachia - were united under one ruler (domnitor); moreover, the native populations that inhabited the lands kept trade routes and open contact between themselves, and they clearly knew that they spoke the same language - same goes for istroromanians or meglenoromanians, that have lived outside of Romania for more than 700 years, yet they have retained their language (albeit as a different dialect altogether) and their Orthodox and pagan traditions, even moreso than actual Romanians.

"Ruman" doesn't have that meaning - the first attestation of the term is recorded in the Nibelungenlied (1204) as "Ramunch" (old german) meaning "leader of Romanians". The next big attestation comes from Tranquillo Andronico, who in 1534 notes that the "Valachi" call themselves "Romani" in their language - as a bonus, there's also a Romanian question in his note - "Sti rominest?" which literally means "Do you know romanian?". I can go like this forever. The serf attribution came later on in the 16th century, when Romania finally started developing under a feudal society, while the rest of the West was already miles ahead of us in terms of industrialization and social advancements.

If the Romanians that lived in Wallachia, Transylvania and Moldova were not aware that they were actual Romanians, then their national unity would have been shattered centuries ago, due to massive uncontrolled migration (with numbers higher than the actual population of the lands) and large-scale wars. Instead, everybody that moved here got assimilated completely.

They were late to unify and had much bigger and powerful neighbors, the Russians had Moldova, the Austrians held Transylvania and they contested Dobruja with Bulgaria, Serbia was probably their only fairly friendly neighbor.

>Serbia was probably their only fairly friendly neighbor.

Not really a friend after the second balkan war. During WW1 and WW2 there were a lot of tensions between the countries, with events that almost triggered a couple of wars. The Serbs always had territorial gains on Timisoara, and the fact that more than 300.000 Romanians lived near the boarder (Bugeac Region) in Serbia made them very paranoid about Romanian intentions. Nowadays, there are still more than 170+ pure Romanian villages in Serbia, with a population of over 250.000+. You won't hear about them tho', as the Serbs have led a policy of complete assimilation via the Serbian Orthodox Church (literally Slavizising the family names of Romanians); education was never provided to them in their native language (not like Voievodina) etc.

We have a saying in Romanian: "Our only friends - the Black Sea, the Danube River and the Carpathian Mountains."

i'll post the timeline for you, so you can understand.

I don't know if the subject of a possible Romanian-Bulgarian union in 1886-1887 under Romanian king Carol I was discussed before, but i think it's a very interesting subject. The union was motivated by the common fear of Russia and the goal was to create a stronger state, capable of containing the Russian influence in the region.

Here is a brief chronology:
- from 1885, Bulgarian prince Alexander of Battemberg starts to dismiss his Russian advisors, weakening the Russian influence in his country
- June 1886 - Alexander of Battemberg suggests to Carol I the creation of a Romanian-Bulgarian federation, with separate governments but a common leadership in case of war, the supreme commander would have been Carol I
- 9 August 1886 - pro-Russian officers stage a coup, forcing the Bulgarian prince to abdicate, he is sent to Reni (in Bessarabia)
- one week later, Bulgarian politician Stefan Stambulov stages another coup, removes the new pro-Russian government and recalls the prince
- 17 August 1886 - Alexander of Battemberg arrives in Bucharest, where he is given an ostentatious welcome
- 4 September 1886 - failed attempt to assasinate Romanian Prime Minister Ion C. Bratianu, probably ordered by Russia.
- 5 September 1886 - only Bratianu's personal intervention stops an angry mob from devastating the Russian embassy in Bucharest, the mob attacks instead the pro-Russian newspapers, devastating their headquarters and beating up the journalists.
- 7 September 1886 - Alexander of Battemberg is forced to abdicate, Stambulov becomes regent of Bulgaria.
- November 1886 - Russia cuts diplomatic relations with Bulgaria (to be re-established only ten years later)

(cont)

- October 1886 - Stambulov starts negotiations with Carol I, for the union of the two countries under the Romanian king. The new state was to have a single government, in which the ministries of "force" (like Army, Justice, Internal Affairs) would have always been held by Romanians.
- March 1887 - Russian attempt to assasinate the prefect of Rusciuk, Mantov, who was the Bulgarian negotiator of the union. In the same month, Zamfir Arbore, a Bessarabian, gets the secret correspondence of the Russian ambassador in Romania, proving their involvment in the Mantov case and revealing other Russian espionage activities in the two countries as well as most of the Russian agents. The Great Powers demand an explanation from Russia, any kind of Russian influence in the region is on the verge of total collapse.
- 10 June 1887 - Russia threatens to cut diplomatic relations with Romania.
- 15 June 1887 - Carol I rejects the Bulgarian crown, after consultations with Germany and Austria, which warned him that Russia is ready to invade Romania if he accepts the union.
- 25 June 1887 - Ferdinand of Saxa-Coburg becomes the new prince of Bulgaria.
- March 1888 - revolt of the Romanian peasants in the villages near Bucharest, started by opposition members and Russian agents.
- 25 April 1888 - failed attempt to kill Carol I, some historians believed the assasination was ordered by Russia.
- 1888 - Romania starts to build strong fortifications to prevent a Russian attack:the fortified line Focsani-Namoloasa-Galati and the Bucharest forts.

It had one momentum after the great unity and then the world wars happened.

>tfw you will never see a death match between Austria-Hungary and Romania-Bulgaria

...

That sounds believable because you site sources.

romania is actually about 3 times smaller than france

Maybe Romania is nothing like France and Spain. Maybe the Romance language connection is very loose.

It always bothered me how Romania was an orthodox Christian nation when Latin Speaking countries are majority catholic

Is*

You shouldn't be bothered by something like that.

The Romanian population in Serbia was refused citizenship in Romania proper though. These guys can't become citizens of Romania, and get an EU passport. So it's a case of being abandoned by it's mother nation.

And also the Romanian population has kept all it's names/customs/language.

well duh, france and spain were empires that constantly fucked with and exploited ppl.
romania was constantly fucked with and exploited by at least 1 empire at a time, for the better part of 2000 years.