IS TIRANA PREPARING FOR WAR?

AIM Tirana, 11 July, 1998

Just a few days after the flight of NATO airplanes across the sky over Albanian, prime minister Fatos Nano declared to Reuters: "We are on the verge of war". Although in case of a possible conflict, Albania has directed all its hopes towards the protective umbrella of the Atlantic Alliance, it is striving to show its force although it still appears highly fragile.

Four days after the NATO airplanes, for the first time after a long time, Albanian air force also soared into the sky. The flight of MIG 15 and MIG 19 planes was an attempt to prove that after destruction it experienced a year ago, the Albanian army has stood up on its feet again. Large publicity in state media and presence of high officials of the Albanian state at the manoeuvres is a clear sign that Tirana wishes to prepare psychologically the public for hard times which may lies ahead.

A high army officer declared for Albanian daily Koha jone that Albania has an arsenal of sophisticated conventinal armament which is capable of putting up resistance in a possible armed conflict with Milosevic and Serbia. On the other hand, Albanian minister of defence Luan Haydaraga said in a parliamentary debate "we are ready and we have all military potentials to defend our country from every possible aggression".

Army uniforms which had practically disappeared from the streets and TV screens are back again. General fear that the conflict in Kosovo is threatening to spread to Albania seems to be taken seriously in Tirana. Only during the month of June, four times army manoeuvres were organized in the north of Albania, which were attentively monitored by military attaches of military forces accredited in Tirana. The latest military exercise last week was the most comprehensive one ever organized by the Albanian army with the participation of tanks, airplanes, artillery and special forces.

Along with great publicity and army preparations, the government is making an attempt to improve the image of military forces of the country making it clear that during last-year's crisis, rockets and other conventional armament have not been destroyed. Such propaganda, although not especially intensive, is partly calculated to prepare the domestic public which is somehow paralysed with fear of a possible war. On the other hand, this is partly a response to the attacks of the opposition headed by Berisha which accuses the government for indifference in its attitude to Kosovo. Nevertheless, such propaganda is believed to be a specific moral support to Kosovo Albanians.

However, regardless of manoeuvres and uniforms which are appearing on TV screens, conviction prevails that there is little chance of a conflict with Serbia. Hope is still high that diplomatic and military intervention of the international community will prevent spreading of the conflict. More attention is devoted by newspapers in Tirana to visits of NATO officials and its manoeuvres than to manoeuvres of the Albanian army, which clearly reflects the stand that the solution of the question of Kosovo and prevention of spreading of the conflict to Albania depends on what NATO will or will not do.

During the latest visit of Havier Solana to Albania, the official Tirana reconfirmed that it was offering the Alliance all airport privileges and its military bases. American spy airplanes which are observing the sky over the Balkans are back at the Albanian airport in Gjadri. Gjadri is considered to be one of the most modern air-force bases in the region. Heading four NATO warships, general Wesley Clark, commander of ally forces for Europe, arrived in the Albanian port of Durres. Clark is the highest NATO military official who has visited Albania. NATO warships, Italian, Spanish, Greek and Turkish, have commenced the greatest manoeuvres in the Adriatic since the end of the war in Bosnia. They are part of the NATO forces for quick interventions and they are coordinating action with other eight warships of the Alliance in the port of Bari, the Italian port which is closest to Durres.

Regardless of the level of readiness military preparations in Tirana have reached, and what developments in Kosovo may bring in the foreseeable future, war has in a sense already begun. Media in Albania are openly appealing for offering support to the Liberation Army of Kosovo (OVK). The government has also abandoned its scruples and without much ado is treating the OVK as the force and party in conflict which deserves to be supported.

Open support to the OVK is accompanied by appeals of a part of the opposition that general mobilization be proclaimed in Albania. Nevertheless, of course, one cannot say that Tirana wishes for the war. The difficult economic situation and the damage done last year are greatly limiting possibilities for military expenditures. The country still has not recovered from the crisis and anarchy. But, with no doubt, preparations for the worst have become the choice imposed on Tirana, on the one hand dictated by the threat coming from the direction of Milosevic, and on the other by the necessity to become a partner of certain significance in a possible international intervention.

If the NATO is going to interevene (which will, all things considered, happen too late), it will be something similar to air-raids in Bosnia a few years ago, that is, with no troops in the field. It is difficult to predict what would happen after such air-raids on the border of Albania! In a labyrinth in which NATO generals, soldiers and officers of the Albanian army, and members of the OVK are moving, it is hard to say whether war will actually break out or not.

AIM TIRANA

Bardhyl MINXHOZI