The Communist Party, engaged in a massive recruitment campaign, was able to attract ethnic Romanians in large numbers—workers and intellectuals alike, including some former members of the fascist Iron Guard. By 1947, it grew to around 710,000 members. Although the PCR was still highly disorganized and factionalized, it benefited from Soviet backing (including that of Vladislav Petrovich Vinogradov and other Soviet appointees to the Allied Commission). After 1944, it was leading a paramilitary wing, the Patriotic Defense ("Apărarea Patriotică", disbanded in 1948), and a cultural society, the Romanian Society for Friendship with the Soviet Union.