Pickaxe and Rifle

Acknowledgements I wish to thank the Committee for Cultural Relations and Foreign Contacts, Tirana, for originally making possible the project of writing this book. The Fakulteti Shkencave Politike-Juridike of Tirana Uni versity helped me to correct many errors without being in any way responsible for remaining imperfections. And very sincere thanks to the people of Albania, of all ages and positions, who in answering my questions in such a frank and comradely spirit, supplied me with the information which has contributed to whatever understanding I have of socialism in practice. William Ash Albania’s difference with the Soviet Union over the issue of the true nature of socialism, coupled with its fraternal alliance with People’s China, has been at the very core of the split in the world communist movement. Yet, until William Ash wrote this book, no adequate history of Albania has been published in the West. PICKAXE AND RIFLE is more than an historical account of this interesting but little known country: it is a political and sociological study of the only socialist state in Europe. Having liberated themselves from fascist occupation, how did the Albanian people free themselves also from the whole system of exploitation and defend their new socialist state from the hostile countries all around them? What new social institutions and governmental organisation reflect the transfer of state power into the hands of the working people? What are the characteristics of real socialist society as developed by the Albanians, and how have they guaranteed it .gainst the distortions and deformations which have over taken the other East European peoples’ democracies? And as a result, what is the quality of life in Albania today? William Ash, author of MARXISM AND MORAL CONCEPTS, was invited to Albania in 1969 to tour the toiintry extensively and to collect material for this book. A),.mi, in 1971, the author had an opportunity of visiting Alli.mia at the time of the Sixth Congress of the Party of I ilium of Albania, and of checking the draft typescript of III* work with historians, with State and Party leaders and, 111 • * 'I t important of all, with the people in the factories and on tin i *illi i live farms. I In ii suit is a most compelling account of real socialism in Other books by William Ash Fiction THE LOTUS IN THE SKY CHOICE OF ARMS THE LONGEST WAY ROUND RIDE A PAPER TIGER TA K E-O FF Non-fiction: MARXISM AND MORAL CONCEPTS PICKAXE AND RIFLE William Ash HOWARD BAKER LONDON William Ash PICKAXE AND RIFLE First published by Howard Baker Press Ltd., 1974 A HOWARD BAKER BOOK ©Copyright: William Ash, 1974 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the Publisher, excepting quotes used in conncection with reviews written specifically for inclusion in a magazine or newspaper. IS UN 0 7080 0039 X I mI.Ii.Ih il 11 llnwiiril llnkci I'lriw Ltd., ^ 1 it V t i iIn il \ II mill, Win11ilriIon, I .oiuliin, S.W.20 I . | i « «• lit u lij 'i|i. i I ,i 11»i il I Him I Si i vli i •, I III-. Liverpool, in.I |-i in|• il In I ii i ill III lliiln liy I id , Miirlyi Mim il l iiillillm (I, Sin try. CONTENTS WHO ARE THE ALBANIANS? Chapter 1. From Illyria to the Turkish Conquest 2. Scanderbeg and the Growth of National Conscious ness. THE GREAT LIBERATION WAR 3. From the Turkish Conquest through the National Movement to the Italian Invasion. 4. Beginnings of Albanian National Resistance. 5. The Development of People’s War 6. Relations of the Liberation Leadership with other National Groups and with the Allies 7. The Liberation War against the Nazis and Final Victory ALBANIA AND THE POST-WAR WORLD 8. Results of the War in Albania: Relations with Britain and other Countries; the Struggle against Yugoslavia ALBANIA’S SOCIALIST SOCIETY !). The State 10. The Party I I . The Mass Organisations THE SOCIALIST ECONOMY OF ALBANIA IC re a tin g the Socialist Economic Base I '■ 1 >i‘veIopmcnt of Agriculture I I Development of Industry and the Relation between Economic Base and Social Superstructure THE SPLIT IN THE WORLD COMMUNIST MOVEMENT 15. Albania’s Relations with the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China THE QUALITY OF LIFE IN THE NEW ALBANIA 16. Socialist Man at Leisure 17. Youth and Education 18. Women and the Socialist Family 19. Health 20. Arts and Culture 21. A Genuinely Free Society PICKAXE AND RIFLE (The revolutionary slogan of the Party of Labour of Albania: ‘To build socialism hold ing a pickaxe in one hand and a rifle in the other.’) WHO ARE THE ALBANIANS Chapter One: From Illyria to the Turkish Conquest It has been said of the Albanians that they have ‘hacked their way through history, sword in hand’. This little country, somewhat larger than Wales, has been the scene of fierce wars of resistance from the very beginning of European history. These people, numbering till recently fewer than two million, have an unmatched record of struggle down the centuries to achieve their national integrity, to win and hold for them selves the right to develop their own resources, their own skills and talents without any interference from outside their own borders. The Albanians, descendants of the ancient Illyrians, are the oldest inhabitants of the Balkans going right back to the early Bronze Age; but it was only half way through the Twentieth Century that Enver Hoxha, who had led them in the liberation war against fascism, could at last say: ‘The Albanian people will never again allow themselves to be trampled on as in the bitter past. They have their rights, dignity and honour; they have the right to live, to take their own decisions on any matter, just as any other people.’ The Albanians take their name from an old Illyrian tribe, the Albanoi, who inhabited the region from Durrës on the Adriatic coast to mountainous Dibra — the central portion of the present State of Albania. The Illyrians were an Indo- I uropean people who in the great migrations from north to Moutli Europe in the second millenium B .C . settled in the western Balkans. They had their own Illyrian language from which, though influenced by the speech of various invaders, modern Albanian is directly derived. Shkodra in northern Alban ia was the ancient capital of the Illyrian kingdom which vv.in incorporated in the Roman Empire in 1 6 8 B .C . and Mipplied five Illyrians, including Diocletian, to rule as Roman • nmiTors. I lie culture of the Albanians has enriched itself from many 11 sources, Thracian, Greek, Roman, Slav, Byzantine and Islamic, without ever losing its identity. Their history is the account of their fight for survival. The development of their national character is intimately bound up with their rugged, scenically spectacular homeland which lay like a stumbling block across the old imperial routes of trade and conquest. This abrupt dramatic land of lofty peaks dropping sheer into the sea, of deep valleys and bottomless lakes was in the path of the northward sweep of Greek colonisers; it lay across the main road, the Via Egnatia, which connected Rome with its eastern empire; it was overrun by Visigoths, Huns and slavs in their drive to the south; it blocked the invasion of western Europe by the Turks. The resistance of the Illyrians to the Roman Empire contributed, together with the revolts of slaves and colonists and the invasion of barbarian tribes, to its final overthrow. The Illyrian uprising of the first few years of the Christian era, in which women fought side by side with their menfolk, was the most terrible, except for that against Carthage, of all the wars Rome waged abroad. In mediaeval times there were successive revolts of the Arberesh, the Albanians, against Byzantine bondage. And in 1185 the Albanian feudal chiefs threw off the yoke of Byzantium and formed their first state, the principality of Arberia with Kruja as its capital. But none of the feudal dynasties, constantly warring with each other, was strong enough to unify the country; and the intervention of such mercantile states as Venice, eager to control the Albanian coast, was a further hindrance to centralisation. During this time Albania did, however, achieve consider able economic progress. Arable land was extended and the (liltivalion of cereals, olive groves, vineyards and silk all Ili>iii mhed; (here were big herds of sheep and cattle; and the Im M i n i >1 ,i)*i it ullural and dairy products made it possible to i'0 |nH l 11111 nl i ,n li annual yield. In the revival of the cities of rtMlltlllil V, i I In' v I'l'i •»llie centres of artisan production #II|mVHIM 1 I'*1' mM1«III .ifcs prosperity, Dyrrachion thrived riti mi m h u m Vulmi i, Vlm.t, Skodra as Shkodra and old A u | «in i i it* I In 111 iv11 liii"i\ n I hen and m >w as Herat. I l«l m Wilt i In M l mu I in ill it ........ w In n i In (>111 mi. in lurks in I ' i t the middle of the Fourteenth Century bypassed Constant inople and spread over the Balkan peninsula. In the year 1389 a coalition of feudal rulers, Albanian, Serbian, Bulgarian, Rumanian and Hungarian, met the Turks in a bloody encounter on the plain of Kossovo and were completely crushed.

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