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• History
of Christianization of Europe
• Soviet
Union, Communist influence
• Map
of European ethnic groups
• Map of Fascism
in Europe (1922-75)
• History
of Islamic conquest in Europe
• Religions
& ethnic groups in Russia
• Detailed
map of French colonization
• Detailed
map of British colonization
• Napoleon's
conquests & legacy
• Ethnic
& religious map of pre-Nazi Poland
--MORE &
NON-ENGLISH--

• Muhammad cartoon crisis in pictures
• Stalin's private summer home
• Ravenna: capital of Gothic empire
• Czar Nicholas II's Ukrainian palace
• European traditional costumes/dress
• Inside the Vatican, house of all wealth
--MORE
& NON-ENGLISH--

• Islamic Mujahidin
vs. Spain & El Cid
• Poland-Lithuania vs. Teutonic Order
• Nevskiy's Russia vs. German Crusaders
• Prussia
vs. France (Nazi Propaganda)
• Qadafi: Europe will soon be Islamic
• Ivan the Terrible
vs. Muslim Tatars
• Soviet
Propaganda: Defeat of Germany
--MORE
& NON-ENGLISH--

• The Gypsies in history and today,
Europe's public enemy
• History of Jihad in Chechnya & Caucasus vs. Russians
• Post-WWII expulsion of 8 million
ethnic German civilians
• Ethnic & religious history of Serbs, Croats, & Bosnians
• Breakaway
states and independence movements in Europe
• The ancient Germanic Runic alphabet and
Runestones
• Teutonic
Order and their 800-year legacy in Eastern Europe
• 510-year
struggle for Albanian homeland, and 552 for Kosovo
• 4,000-year-old white mummies of China,
bringers of Buddhism
--MORE
& NON-ENGLISH-- |
|
Albanians: The 510-year
struggle for a homeland, and
552 years in Kosovo
by James Mayfield (Chairman, European Heritage Library)
Print
this Article • About
the Author • Bibliography/Sources
This article shows the long
history of Albanian struggle for the establishment of an independent
national homeland in both Albania and Kosovo. It is an effort
not only to reveal the difficult and unique history of the
Albanian European people, but also to bring light to both
sides of the Kosovo conflict to balance with our other articles
like the Serb perspective.
You can get a rare inside
look (with pictures) of my experiences in the remote nation
of Albania in my article Inside
Albania.
The Albanians are easily Europe's most linguistically, culturally,
and historically unique ethnicity. They are Europe's only
Muslim culture (Bosnians having a slight Christian majority),
and live in Albania, Montenegro, Kosovo, Greece, Italy, and
Macedonia. They are often dismissed as backward, almost subhuman,
by Greeks and Slavs to whose nations they emigrate to seek
better economic opportunities. Despite this negative image,
the Albanians are a remarkably proud culture, drawing (at
least in their minds) from a history that stretches back to
ancient Greek cities and the Roman Empire. The struggle of
the Albanians for an independent homeland is outstanding in
history: in what is now Albania, Albanians endured foreign
rule for nearly 500 years before finally wresting themselves
of outside influences in only 1978, and in Kosovo, they only
attained their goal for independence from Serbia in 2008.
It is important to understand the Albanians' history of independence-seeking
conflict in order to appreciate the Albanian perspective on
the Kosovo issue, as well as the history of the Balkans altogether.

The flag of Albania, based upon
the Byzantine emblem, that was designed by the Albanian unifier
Skanderbeg who rallied the Albanian Christians against Islamic
Jihad
Brief pre-history of the Albanians, or “Illyrians”:
The most intriguing feature
of the Albanians is their questionable origin. Although most
credible history dictates that the Albanian culture and people
entered the region far later (they may even have been Slavs
who emigrated in the 6th century, Albanians have created an
ancient heritage for themselves to justify their right to
existence. The territory of what is now Albania (formerly
called Illyria and Epirus) was in early history occupied by
the Illyrians, a coastal maritime state that profited from
pirate raids on the bounty of Phoenecian, Greek, and Italian
vessels. Even the ethnic roots of the Illyrians is difficult,
although it can be argued from their geography and culture
that they may have been Greeks. This early history is very
difficult considering that the modern Albanian culture and
language have no certified link to the Illyrians. So too,
many populations have settled this region since the destruction
of Illyria by the Romans in 168BCE, including the Thracians,
Italians, Germans, and especially the Slavs. There is no evidence
to indicate a link between Albanians and ancient Illyrians,
but Albanian nationalism finds great passion in supporting
these ancient roots in order to distinguish their proud identity
from being more than “just another ex-Yugoslav state” in popular
minds.

The geography of Albanians make
them vulnerable to more advanced powers

The resemblance with the Greeks
is blatant
An Albanian national consciousness emerges in the face of
Islamic Jihad:
Before the 15th century,
there was no unified Albanian state or culture. The region
was, as it remained even as late as the 20th century, bitterly
divided between warring tribes, clans, and principalities.
The mountains of Albania were divided between the Tosk tribe
of the south and the Gheg (pronounced “Jeg”) tribe of the
north and Kosovo. The tribes lived with virtual autonomy,
but were frequently de facto ruled by proximal ruling empires
such as Serbia and the Byzantines for centuries. The lack
of unified identity among “Albanians” has acted as a problematic
obstacle to the establishment of Albanian nationhood in both
Kosovo and Albania. Kosovo had no Albanian population until
the Turkish invasion, and remained firmly disputed between
Bulgarian and Serbian kingdoms for a half-millennium. The
Albanians were also highly divided in matters of religion.
Catholic missionaries from the Italian states, as well as
Orthodox clerics from Byzantium and Serbia brought both Christian
sects to the Albanian tribes, and the deadlock of religious
heterogeneity further stifled collective development and enculturation.

Our exclusive map of the history of Islamic conquest in Europe.
The red is the domain of the Turkish Muslims. (CLICK
TO ENLARGE)

My
photo of a reiatlvely old Christian church in Albania

My photo of a new and
obviously simple mosque in Albania
In the 15th century, the
Muslim Turks of the Ottoman empire began their awesome conquest
and conversion of southeastern Europe and the Balkans. What
is now Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, southern Ukraine (Crimea),
Serbia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Macedonia, and the Gheg and Tosk
tribes of Albania became Ottoman domains. The Muslim conquest
that was entirely unprovoked in the Balkans saw the emergence
of Albania's first unifier and cultural hero, SKANDERBEG.
Opposing the foreign domination of the Albanian peoples, Skanderbeg
rallied the Tosk and Gheg behind a common struggle for liberation.
He reverted from Islam to Christianity (as the Muslim rulers
not only conscripted Christian civilians but demanded that
families forfeit one of their children), and led a new pan-Albanian
“national” revolt against Muslim occupation. The revolution
ultimately failed, but imbued the Albanian tribes with a recurring
sense of struggle for liberation against alien oppression.
The Tosk and Ghegs thereafter remained firmly under Islamic
rule and gradual conversion for more than 400 years to follow.

A statue of Skanderbeg
in Tirana
Albanians unify culturally and religiously under Islamic occupation:
Despite formally ruling the
Albanians from 1468 until 1912, the Albanian tribes operated
with ultimate autonomy, although they depended upon the political
authority of the Muslim rulers in Istanbul for survival and
protection from Christian rivals. The autonomy of the Albanian
Christian tribes, as well as the problematic mountainous geography
of Albania, allowed the Tosk and Ghegs to retain and protect
the distinct cultural Albanian identity without being assimilated
into greater Turkish or even European culture. It is this
unique experience that has made Albanians, fascinatingly,
easily Europe's most independent cultures despite being ruled
by so many empires for millennia.
Foreign Islamic occupation
for four centuries led to the Islamization of the Albanian
tribes. Non-Muslims (kafiruna/infidels) were forced to pay
exorbitant taxes called the jizyah in order to enrich the
Islamic state as well as to foster conversion through stable
and practical means. It was highly difficult for Balkan farmers,
barely capable of subsistence farming in many regions, to
forfeit large portions of their yields and income to occupying
forces. The Ottoman devshirme system required (at different
frequencies) European Christian families to forfeit a varying
number of their children to be converted to Islam and conscripted
into the Janissary units. Thereafter, they would never see
their families again, and to would be used by Turks to fight
their own Christian brothers in Europe to serve the interests
of the occupying sultanate that conquered their homelands.
Although the Turks are unique in history for their practical
allowance of limited forms of free worship of their conquered
subjects, Turkish economic policy made conversion to Islam
inevitable and necessary for social and financial survival.
The squabbling lack of cohesion among Albanians, and their
lack of unified traditions and statehood, led to mass conversions
of Albanians from Christendom to Islam. Albanian warlords
recognized the benefit of conversion as a way to gain prominence
over Albanian rival chieftains with Turkish support. The religious
homogenization of the Albanian tribes led to the creation
of a common culture, identity, heritage, language, and religion
for the first time. Interestingly, with the exception of Albania's
very Turkish-sounding music and Sufi-style traditional dress,
Albanian culture is vastly unique and distinct from both Turkish
and European roots. This is a source of pride for this resilient
and battered people ever since.

White Europeans forcibly converted
to Islam and taken from Europe to fight their brethren
Kosovo and the peripheral
regions of what is now Albania had no Albanian populations
until Islamic rule. Kosovo was an integral part of the Serbian
cultural and national heritage until 2008, and is the site
of some of the Slavic Orthodox world's greatest Christian
artwork and religious artifacts. During Islamic rule of the
entire region, the demographic situation changed. Albanians,
recently converted to Islam, were given dominance over the
second-class Christians of the Balkans, and were encouraged
to settle in Kosovo to undermine staunch Serbian revolt. Albanian
Muslim persecution of Christian Serbs led to the mass exodus
of Slavs from Kosovo northward to Serbia. This is the reason
for Kosovo's shift from being a firmly Slavic Christian land
to the very Muslim Albanian region of today. Here lies the
source of the modern Kosovo conflict: Serbs emphasize their
longstanding claim to the region before Muslim imperial hegemony,
and Albanians espouse the glory of the Albanian identity and
their majority presence in the region.The Muslim occupation
incited the coalescence of a singular Albanian identity. The
Tosk and Gheg more and more looked at themselves as a common
community, although still equally plagued by regional warlordry
and clan honor killings. With increasing frequency, the struggle
of the Albanian tribes went from one of liberation struggle
to one seeking the establishment of a sovereign Albanian nation.

The EHL map of Kosovo. Note that
Albanian nationalists consider a land almost twice this size
to be proper Albanian land
The birth of an illusory
Albanian “nation”, and its domination by European powers:
As the Ottoman empire gradually
collapsed in the face of European burgeoning supremacy in
the 19th and 20th centuries, the Albanian experience changed.
The quest for an independent nation largely ceased as Christian
powers like Serbia, Bulgaria, Austria-Hungary, and Italy more
and more viewed Albania as a crucial buffer zone to continental
dominance. Albanians now aligned with the Islamic Ottoman
state for protection. Although the Tosk and Gheg intensely
pushed for local autonomy within the empire, Albanians willingly
affiliated with the power that had occupied, pillaged, and
converted their “ancient Illyrian” homeland for centuries.
The devshirme system of forced conversion and conscription
of native European families placed Albanians in high station
in the Ottoman government because of their acceptance of Islam.
The 19th-century schism of Ottoman Egypt from the Istanbul
sultanate that saw Egyptian independence was led by the Albanian
Muhammad Ali Pasha. This convenient alliance to be spared
from European Christian conquest reversed yet again as the
Ottoman government reformed in the late 19th and 20th centuries.
The new Turkish ultranationalism and centralization turned
Albanians to the European powers for support despite their
previous tensions. This dissolved all Albanian hopes for recognition
of their own distinct culture and identity.

The Albanian Muhammad Ali Pasha
of Egypt
Although Christian Serbia,
Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and newly-unified Italy had no
interest in rescuing this “wild frontier” heathen culture,
they realized the significance of Albania as a coastal region
crucial in the battle for colonial supremacy. Kosovo and what
is now Macedonia were the last Slavic province under Ottoman
rule. In order to liberate their Slavic Christian brothers
from Islamic domination, Bulgaria, Montenegro, Serbia, and
Greece launched the First Balkan War in 1913. By the end of
the triumphant war, Kosovo and Macedonia were liberated from
Ottoman rule. Kosovo, Macedonia, and later Montenegro became
integral parts of Serbia (and thus later Yugoslavia) until
2008, and their huge Muslim Albanian populations with them.
Seizing the opportunity after
finally being free from Turkish rule, Albanian political lobbyists
under Ismail Kemal formally declared the establishment of
an independent and unified Albania for the first time in history.
This was merely a hopeful illusion; Albanians would not see
full statehood until 1928. Nonetheless, the declaration of
an Albanian nation saw the birth of a unified cultural and
political consciousness.

Ismail Kemal, the first "president"
of Albania
As Albanians owed their independence
to European powers, it was the British, Italians, and Germans
(Austrians) who agreed to place the German prince Wied on
the illusory throne of Albania as the king of the new nation.
Bulgaria, Albania, and the new nation of Greece were all ruled
by German kings. This puppet king was considered illegitimate
in comparison with the “legitimate” council government under
Kemal and Essad Pasha. Albania was effectively a vassal under
the Italian, German, and British authority. The situation
in Albania deteriorated so rapidly that King Wied of Albania
left and never returned, leaving Albania in a state of total
civil war, still far from the goal of the establishment of
the first Albanian nation. Albania was a warzone of local
warring clans under the fanciful regulation of an imaginary
parliament. From 1912 until 1928, Albania lacked a functional
government.

The German prince Wied, King
of Albania
Albanians in Serbia (i.e.
Kosovo, Montenegro, and Macedonia) suffered as impoverished
and disenfranchised second-class citizens under Slavic Christian
rule. Muslim massacres of Christian civilians in Kosovo were
met with bitter reprisals by the Serbian military. In the
early years alone following “independence”, some 12,371 Albanians
were killed by the Serbs, and 22,000 jailed (Swire, Albania,
291).
Albania finally established under King Zog, and the end
of independence in WWII:
The so-called “nation” of
Albania still remained a buffer zone between colonial expanding
empires. Mussolini's ultranationalist and expansionist Italy,
seeking to reverse the humiliation of being the nation with
the only colonial failure in Africa (Ethiopia), gradually
began to erode the partial autonomy of Albanians altogether.
Intense development and investment by Italian entrepreneurs
and politicians created a dependency that ultimately made
Albania an Italian colony. This fiscal expansion also allowed
for the stabilization of the Albanian warring clans under
government authority. By 1925, an upstanding local Muslim
leader and political lobbyist for Albanian independence called
Ahmed Zogu was elected leader of the Albanian people. In 1928,
in reaction to Albanian fears of being colonized by the next
imperial power, Zogu formally declared the total independence
of the Albanian nation, changed his name to the more Europeanized
Zog, and was crowned the king of the first united Albanian
nation as KING ZOG I. A strict dictator was necessary in Albania,
as it was under Enver Hoxha, as the weakness of liberal democracy
were unable to ensure stability as seen in modern democratic
Albania. The struggle for independence of the Albanian people
was finally complete by 1930, nearly 20 years after Albania
was firstly “established” after the First Balkan War.


King Zog (Ahmed Zogu) of Albania,
its first true modern leader, indeed responsible for stability
Albania's vulnerability and
geographic significance made the region an inevitable target
of Axis conquest during World War II. In 1939, Albania's united
Tosk and Gheg tribes under King Zog were conquered by Fascist
Italy with ease. Albania remained one of Italy's few formal
holdings in the war until 1944. With the defeat of the Italians
in 1944 and the murder of Mussolini by Communist rebels, Germany
occupied Albania with brutal policies that pushed the Albanians
towards a system of anti-capitalist, anti-Fascist equity and
security that was manifest in Communist theory.
Albanians of Kosovo and Macedonia,
both regions being part of Serbia's then-capitalist Kingdom
of Yugoslavia, were conquered by the Germans by 1940. This
forever changed the demographic and political situation of
the Albanian community. Albanians of Albania and Macedonia
became greatly entrenched in rebellious Communist ideology
with the goal of ultimate liberation from Fascist domination.
Albanian Muslims of Kosovo, however, offered broad support
for the German invasion in hopes of being liberated from Serbian
Christian rule. The Skanderbeg legion of the SS was one of
many ethnic Albanian units who joined Hitler's war against
Communist hegemony. The Albanian struggle for cohesive nationhood,
so disrupted before by Tosk-Gheg divisions, would for the
next decade be stifled by Communist-Fascist agitations that
prevented all coalescence of the Albanian people. The ignition
of violent revolt in Kosovo has, in part, the German invasion
to thank.

Skanderbeg-SS emblem. Albanians
in Kosovo, as with most of the Muslim world from the Grand
Mutfi of Jerusalem to the Tatars of Russia, supported the
Nazi invasion

SS Muslim soldiers from Kosovo or Greater Albania
Kosovars and Albania under socialist rule, and Albania
under Soviet dominance:
The end of World War II and
the triumph of the Soviet Union and its ideology again completely
redesigned the political experience of Albanians. The Communist
guerrilla campaigns of Jozip “Broz” Tito in the Balkans led
to the reestablishment of Yugoslavia as a new socialist state.
This new socialist realm included the Albanians of Kosovo,
Montenegro, and Macedonia, and would remain as such until
the fall of Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Albania itself, so harshly
divided between Communists, Islamists, and royalist during
Italian Axis rule, was also seized by Communist militias exploiting
the vulnerability of Mussolini's retreat. Yugoslavia was ruled
by the Serb-dominated Communist Party, and Albania endured
total supremacy of the socialist vanguard party under ENVER
HOXHA (pronounced “Hoe-d-ja”).

Enver Hoxha, Communist dictator
of Albania. Despite being often viewed as the source of Albania's
economic collapse (although it is difficult to collapse a
bankrupt nation in the first place), Hoxha is often considered
Albania's national hero because he, finally, created a completely
stable and free Albania.
The Albanian nation was re-established
with a stable and distinctly Albanian government free of Italian
and German dominance. Albanian hopes of a vivid future for
their distinct identity were yet again stifled by the wicked
poverty, extreme underdevelopment, borderline starvation,
and land access inequity of the nation. This dire situation
forced independent Albania, yet again, to become dependent
upon foreign powers for survival, especially under the aura
of fear of the coming “Western capitalist invasion”. Although
not occupied by Russian or Yugoslav troops, Albania would
remain economically and political aligned and reliant upon
socialist Yugoslavia and the USSR for more than a decade.
Excluding the few years of independence under King Zog, the
“Albanian nation” still had yet to exist with total independence.
Enver Hoxha's reign would epitomize the struggle for Albanian
self-determination and total freedom, making Hoxha the Albanians'
one cultural hero next to Skanderbeg.
Yugoslavia under president
Tito politically considered Albania – with Kosovo and Macedonia
– dependent vassal regions of the Socialist People's Republic
of Yugoslavia. Although Albania enjoyed its own government,
it was de facto ruled by the more powerful, wealthy, and stable
Yugoslav state. As a part of the Soviet Communist sphere of
world influence, Albania was equally dependent upon the USSR.
It was a member of the Warsaw Pact, the mutual alliance of
Soviet vassal states in Eastern Europe that gave the illusion
of freedom, from 1955-1968. Because of China's early bond
with the Soviet Union, Albania enjoyed a relationship of friendship
and economic aid with the People's Republic of China that
remained even after Albanian schism from the USSR and Yugoslavia.
Billions of dollars in investment and economic subsidy were
poured into Albania to the great revelry of Hoxha and the
Albanian population so battered by poverty and starvation.
For Albanians, the dream of a universally independent and
sovereign homeland was still no more than a dream.

Tito, president of Yugoslavia
and, in his mind, de facto leader of Albania

Our map of the Warsaw Pact. Notice Albania's schism from the
Warsaw Pact, as well as the fact that Albania was part of
the Warsaw Pact (i.e. foreign-ruled) without even bordering
the USSR.
The break of Albania from Yugoslavia, USSR, and China:
Albania's close relationship
with China, the USSR, and Yugoslavia led to the booming development
of the impoverished state. Industry, agriculture, and education
grew to relatively modern proportions, and the Albanian starvation
situation had improved into one in which Albania even exported
food supplies to Yugoslavia. The new stability of Communist
Albania under Hoxha's rule allowed Albania, for the first
time, to pursue its own political interests without subservience
to foreign influence. Yugoslavia and the USSR had regressed
from one of intranational cooperation and collective prosperity
to one of increasing centralization. Tito's successors in
Yugoslavia reversed Tito's relative friendship with Kosovar
Albanians by refusing to allow regional autonomy for Kosovo,
and even intimated that Albania should be absorbed into Yugoslavia.
Khrushchev demanded total political subordination to Moscow
from Soviet vassals in the Warsaw Pact (including Albania).
Albanian perceptions of the increasing belligerence of Yugoslavia
and the USSR as the next phase of colonial rule led to Albania's
estrangement from the Soviet world. The Russian invasion of
Hungary and Czechoslovakia to reverse “bourgeois” political
liberalization led to Albania's total divorce from the Soviet
Union and the Warsaw Pact in 1968.

Nikita Khrushchev
As a result of Yugoslavia's
intensifying move towards political centralization, Albanian
Muslims in Kosovo, Montenegro, and Macedonia initiated violent
campaigns of slaughter of Serbian civilians and the burning
of churches in the hopes of merging with Albania. This created
the image of Albanians as enemies of the Yugoslav state, which
resulted in massacres performed both by Slavic Christians
and Albanian Muslims. Kosovo would remain a domain of Yugoslavia
and Serbia thereafter until 2008.

Hoxha's Albania and their bond
with Mao's China (from http://www.iisg.nl/~landsberger/ff-al.html)
Enver Hoxha's intense paranoia
of foreign invasion led to a total dissolution of relations
with all nations except for Mao's China on which Albania still
depended for foreign aid. Hoxha became incensed by the cooperative
peace talks between the hated capitalist United States and
Mao's more liberal successors. In 1978, Hoxha's perception
of Chinese “betrayal” of Communism led to Albania's formal
divorce from all relations with China.
Albanians finally establish their permanent independence,
and absolute isolation:
The Albanian community had
struggled so long for complete self-determination that they,
under Enver Hoxha, pursued a policy of absolute economic and
political socialist isolation in order to ensure this independence.
Albania was an autarky, or closed economy, with virtually
no trade, a closed border, almost no tourism, no political
elections, and absolutely no social liberal rights. Hoxha
considered Albania the only true socialist state, and thus
Albania in the 1980s can be viewed in many ways as the only
legitimate Communist experiment. Truly paranoid, Hoxha ordered
the construction of tens of thousands of family concrete bunkers
(my photo seen below) not only to energize Albanians behind
a common cause but to defend against invasion. Oddly, they
all faced towards Greece and Yugoslavia (both countries nearly
at war with Albania), even though both countries could easily
have invaded from the sea. As the “first atheist state”, Islam
and Christendom were declared illegal, all land was redistributed,
universal equality of men and women was granted, and all companies
were nationalized. For the first time in history, Albania
was truly and indisputably free, albeit not internally.

My photograph of an Albanian
family concrete bunker built under the isolation
Albanians living in Yugoslavia
(Macedonia, Montenegro, and Kosovo) endured a very different
social and religious experience. Yugoslavia did not persecute
nor abolish religion, and thus Albanian Islam survived in
Kosovo as opposed to Communist Albania. The lack of strict
abolition of religion, as well as the intense feeling of foreign
Christian oppression from the Serbs, has caused Kosovar Albanians
to be a far more conservatively Islamic and militant people
than their brothers in Albania. Liberation struggles during
Milosevic's reign for Kosovar independence was often imbued
with Islamic rhetoric, including jihad, and enjoyed the support
of foreign Mujahidin (Jihadists) from Saudi Arabia and Bosnia.
The struggle for Albanian sovereignty in diaspora communities
outside Albania has lasted far longer than in Albania itself.
In 1985, Enver Hoxha died.
The hasty liberalization of Albania under his successor Alia
struck Albanians with the reality of their sociopolitical
situation. Although it was Hoxha who had made Albania – for
the first time – totally independent, his isolation policy
had set the nation back technologically to the feudal age.
This reality, plus the cronyism of Hoxha's successors, led
to the complete dismissal of the Communist government by 1992.
The Republic of Albania under Berisha endured so much corruption
in the new “democracy” that it approached civil war and total
collapse. Pyramid schemes, closely linked with the Berisha
government, left tens of thousands homeless. Greek minorities
massacred Albanian civilians in Epirus and seized whole parts
of southern Albania for Magna Grecia. Corruption and instability
caused by the crippling weakness of the democratic structure
has made Albania one of the very poorest nation of Europe
with massive hyperinflation, unemployment, and extreme public
debt. To get an inside look at this wickedly poor nation from
my vacation to Albania, read my article Inside
Albania. Albania is finally independent and free of foreign
hegemony, but at great economic and social cost. After enjoying
only two decades of total freedom, Albania now has joined
the European Union, and its sovereignty is now yet again being
eroded.

My photo of Albania. It is horrifically
poor outside of the capital of Tirana.
Albanians in diaspora have,
as always, endured a very different experience. The Albanian
nationalistic struggle for irredentist, pan-Albanian sovereignty
still survives today as it did when the Muslims first invaded
in the 15th century over 500 years ago. Albanian communities
still live in Macedonia (33% of the population), Kosovo (90%),
Montenegro (>17%), and northern Greece (Epirus), where
they engage in violent revolt for “liberation” (CIA World
Factbook). Kosovo, ruled by NATO (in reality, the United
States) since 1999 under the Clinton administration, was given
freedom in 2008 as Europe's newest Muslim nation without any
approval of the sovereign nation of Serbia from which it was
seized. Most nations refuse to recognize the breakaway state
as the next example of colonial domination of sovereign nations.The
Albanian experience is unique in the fact that the Albanian
community has played a role in the history of the Balkans
for more than 500 years, but only achieved a totally free
and recognized state in 1978. From their perspective, the
violent revolt (and even jihad) performed by Albanians throughout
the region is a response to foreign oppression and imperialism.
In the mind of the nations to which they flock to enjoy superior
economic opportunities, they will remain a hated and backward
community secluded to ghettos and housing projects outside
Athens, Sofia, Belgrade, and Sarajevo.

________________________________________
ABOUT
THE AUTHOR:
James Mayfield is the owner
and Chairman of the European Heritage Library. I am working
for a doctorate in history, with a specific emphasis on Islamic
and European histories. I am well versed in all world cultures,
ethnicities, religions, languages, politics, and historical
evolution in relation to and against each other.
BIBLIOGRAPHY/SOURCES
USED:
-CIA World Factbook
-Our History of Islamic
Conquest in Europe Map
-Our Islamic populations
in Europe Map
-The Albanians, by Miranda Vickers
-Albania, by Swire
-images that are not photographed by me in Albania are given
credit below
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