In 1978, Romanian president Nicolae Ceausescu made a state visit to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, where Kim Il-sung feted him with dinners, receptions and
this massive parade in Pyongyang.
The video is chilling and serves as a reminder of the pageantry on a grand scale that totalitarian governments can create with their ability to marshal people and resources at a moment's notice.
Hundreds of thousands of North Koreans, armed with cardboard placards, twirling ribbons, pompoms and fans, create everything from rainbows to flags as Kim and his guest of honor ride through the streets of Pyongyang. Their arrival at the parade grounds is greeted with living tableaux of the history of Romania. Ceausescu is impressed, and, towards the end of the video, appears somewhat unsettled by it (evidenced by his look of discomfort as "Great Leader" Kim grabs his arm and encourages him to wave to the crowd).
Combined with an earlier summit in China with Mao Zedong and his wife Jiang Qing, the East Asia trip may have left an impression on Ceausescu and his wife. Upon their return to Romania, they began constructing an equally cartoonish personally cult for themselves, which was all the more of a spectacle in the Eastern Bloc, where post-Stalin leaders tended to operate in relative anonymity.
