Me poshte kam postuar nje fragment te nje kritike librit te Berndt Fischerit per operacionet luftarake ne Shqiperi gjate luftes se dyte boterore. Libri eshte i '99.
On 8 September Italy left the war -- with 7-8 garrison divisions, amounting to some 100,000 troops, remaining in Albania -- and the next morning three German divisions occupied Albania against little resistance by the partisans or the Italians. Most of the Italians were promptly disarmed. A few managed to escape by sea. Approximately 15,000 surrendered to the partisans resulting in large quantities of weapons and equipment being seized by guerillas, especially the NLM/NLA. The Germans evacuated the bulk of the troops they disarmed, while the Allies also managed to evacuate many of the Italians who surrendered to the partisans; both groups of evacuees traveled to Italy. Fischer estimates that at the end of the war there remained "at large" in Albania over 20,000 former Italian soldiers, ragged and starving.
The Germans established a new "national committee" which duly issued a decree of Albanian independence (with wording approved by the German representative) and formed a new national government including members of the National Front anti-communist resistance movement, a group that heretofore had played little part on the battlefield. The new government declared Albania "free, neutral, and independent." More than pro-German, Prime Minister Rexhep Mitrovica and the majority of his ministers could be clearly identified as anti-communist nationalists. "Mitrovic's program was reasonably progressive. Margaret Hasluck, who advised SOE in Cairo, was moved to exclaim that 'the lines of government policy would meet with our warm approval if we were not at war with the country whose armed forces now occupy Albania.'"
More so than the Italians, the Germans exploited Albanian resources such as zinc, lead, magnesium, and quantities of oil, with Albanian chrome in particular proving to be essential to German war industries.
In general the Germans and the German-installed "independent" government were considerably better supported in Albania than the Italians, but the level of resistance activity continued to grow at an accelerating pace. The National Front, however, fragmented completely and for the most part its local leaders chose to cease their already limited resistance activities and collaborate with the occupiers. One communist-allied splinter group under Abaz Kupi (commander of the Durres gendarmerie which resisted the Italian invasion) parted with the NLM and moved to a pro-Zog stance and non-belligerence; until almost the very end Kupi offered himself to the British as an anti-communist alternative to the NLM although he consistently refused to commit himself to combat operations against the Germans and thoroughly compromised himself on their behalf. With the arrival of the Germans, it seems, the entire resistance movement grew more splintered and less effective. Like Kupi, most groups were eventually co-opted to one degree or another by the Germans, leaving only the communist NLM/NLA to carry on the fight. Indeed, the German policy was to demonstrate to all other political groups in Albania that the only effective alternative to communism was to support the Germans. By late 1943 civil war raged between the NLM/NLA and non-communist nationalist forces, the latter increasingly fighting with German military support. According to chief British Liaison Officer Brigadier E. F. "Trotsky" Davies, the entire Albanian resistance was "incredibly narrow-minded, bigoted, biased, stupid and touchy."
German anti-partisan operations, beginning in earnest in November 1943, were also more effective than Italian tactics. Large areas were wiped clean, at least temporarily, and Enver Hoxha and the NLM council were "nearly wiped out" before escaping from the German net. By January 1944 the British military mission to the partisans was also seriously disrupted.
In the spring of 1944 there was a resurgence of NLM/NLA partisan strength and activity, leading to a renewed German offensive conducted in this case by reinforcements from Greece (where they had already gained experience in anti-partisan operations). Due to increased strength, training, and equipment for the partisans, this offensive was less successful than earlier German efforts. It was also during this time that the NLM became the National Liberation Front.
In June Prime Minister Mitrovica resigned as his country slipped into chaos. The next government was formed by the Zogist Fiqri Dine as the Germans realized the last hope of staving off total collapse in Albania was to rely on the old-line, anti-communist, traditional power groups. Dine resigned in August as the pressure of internal politics, partisan successes against the Germans and their Albanian auxiliaries, and international developments proved the end was near for German occupation. The final puppet government was headed by Ibrahim Bicaku: "...he was...entirely without political instincts and quite incompetent."
In October the Germans began evacuating Albania. With them went frightened collaborators and others afraid of the NLF/NLA. The Bicaku government resigned. On 29 October Hoxha's partisans launched an attack on Tirana with RAF support. The battle raged for two weeks before the Germans were able to break out of the encirclement and withdraw to the north. "Bicaku, impractical to the end, could not decide which of his opera records to take with him: he delayed too long and was taken[,]...tried and executed by the Stalinist government."
As the Germans fled, Hoxha established a provisional government with himself at its head. On 28 November 1944 he entered Tirana, firmly in control of most of Albania. Hoxha and his new government moved promptly to tighten their grip by dealing with collaborators, war criminals, and non-communists. "While figures vary, the number of victims executed or imprisoned during those early years was certainly in the thousands." Before the war had ended Hoxha was already instituting land "reform", nationalizing Albania's tiny industrial base, destroying the remnants of the middle class, repressing religious figures, and re-making the nation into an isolated and backward corner of Europe barely emerged from the Middle Ages.
Despite initial widespread [international] complacency, Zog and the Albanian people seem to have been the last victims of appeasement, for the West drew something of a line at this point. A few days after the invasion, President Franklin Roosevelt made his first serious intervention into European politics by inviting Hitler and Mussolini to give assurances that they would not attack a list of twenty-nine countries for ten years. More important, Britain and France immediately moved to guarantee Greece and Romania against aggression. In Athens the British ambassador delivered to the Greek government unconditional guarantees that London would not allow any part of Greece to be taken by the Italians.
Ten days later the British announced the introduction of compulsory military training, a move that seemed to mark a fundamental change in London's foreign policy. Soon after this significant development, London signed a pact with Ankara. In a sense, then, events in Albania marked an important stage in the process by which a coalition gradually developed to destroy fascism. It can be argued that Albania's sacrifice was not in vain, although the Albanians would probably not have been consoled by the knowledge.
Fischer's book is full of scholarly material presented in an accessible, occasionally breezy style punctuated with quotes from the principals and droll, entertaining asides contributed by the author. While his analysis is thorough and serious, Fischer maintains a certain bemused attitude toward the subject, and -- given the huge cast of colorful characters -- how could he not?
Zog -- the dissolute monarch against whom more than 300 blood feuds were outstanding
Archbishop Vissarion -- dismissed by Zog, of all people, due to "scandalous behavior"
Foreign Minister Xhemil Bey Dino -- forced to resign as ambassador to the United Kingdom after his lover committed suicide on the steps of the Albanian embassy
Queen Geraldine -- whose larger-than-life recollections of Zog in the interviews for her authorized biography in the 1980s are often at odds with the official record
Maharren Bajraktari -- a tribal leader who "shot his way out of the meeting" after being informed he could either join the partisans or die
Prime Minister Ibrahim Bicaku -- captured by the partisans in Tirana while he tried to decide which opera records to take with him into exile
This is a fascinating book about an obscure nation, a "Land of the Eagles" with such an exotic cast of characters and such a complex story it seems almost like a crazed sort of medieval fantasy time-warped into the middle of the twentieth century. Evocative photos. A pithy conclusion (which could stand alone for anyone desiring the super-condensed version of Albania's war years). Fully footnoted. A thorough index. An educational bibliographic essay and an extensive bibliography. Albania at War is a marvelous model of how scholarly research and thoughtful, academic writing can inform, entertain, and even bring the fading years of a distant land brilliantly alive. Highly recommended as one of the most important WWII-related titles published this year.
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, dhe jo, nuk jam ushtarak.
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