The communists came to power by force. They won the civil war they initiated with the instigation of the Yugoslav communists[1] and carried it out by misusing the financial, logistical, and political support of the Allies, which was provided through the British missions to fight against the Germans in Albania.[2]

While most historians now acknowledge the existence of the civil war (which had been denied during the communist regime), they continue to promote the false narrative of a heroic liberation from Nazi Germany. The so-called 'liberation of the fatherland' occurred as follows: the Germans retreated to the north (Germany), and the partisans took their place. There were no significant battles, apart from some guerrilla fighting in the capital, preceded by the Allied bombing of a retreating German convoy in November 1944. With the departure of the German army, Albania transitioned from a state of semi-foreign occupation to strict domestic military rule. Of course, this occurred against the will of the people on both occasions.[3]

Throughout 1945, the primary objective of the communists was to consolidate power. The ACP used the partisan army and all state institutions to subjugate the portion of the population that did not support communism, which was, in fact, the majority. On December 2, 1945, Albania held general elections in a repressive climate, under the strict control of the partisan army. Only one political entity participated in the polls: the Democratic Front, which was merely a cover name for the ACP. At that time, the ACP did not openly acknowledge that it was in power, as it was aware that the Western Allies were opposed to communism. The main purpose of the elections was to present the Albanian regime to the outside world, particularly the Allies, as a democratic one.

The main characteristic of the Albanian communist regime was its disregard for the law. The Albanian Constitution (1946-1976) guaranteed freedom of speech, belief, movement, property, and private initiative. In reality, the regime punished citizens for criticizing the government, the party, or its leader; they were forbidden to move from their place of residence, whether abroad or within the country; private property and free enterprise were abolished; the regime banned religion; religious buildings were closed, destroyed, or repurposed.

The most significant symbol of illegality was the ACP, which operated as an illegal political entity until the end of its rule. In 1946, the communist regime approved a bill for registering political parties as well as social, sports, and cultural organizations, including those established prior to the bill’s enactment, such as the ACP. Registration under the legal provisions was mandatory to be eligible for political and financial activities. However, the ACP never met these legal requirements.

The Albanian communist regime had two other defining features: it was oppressive towards the local population and servile towards foreign powers.

Between 1944 and 1948, violence against the local population and the "friendship" with Yugoslavia dominated Albanian politics. In 1949, following the breakdown of relations with Yugoslavia, it was officially, and with some justification, labeled a colonizing country.[4]

After the split with Yugoslavia, Albania came under the influence of the Soviet Union. Soviet advisers replaced Yugoslav advisers; Albanians went to study in the Soviet Union and other communist countries; the regime borrowed most of its laws from Moscow; Moscow became the leading economic partner of Tirana, etc. In 1950, Albania revised its constitution, drawing heavily from the Soviet Constitution of 1936. The Soviet Embassy in Tirana became the actual headquarters of power in Albania.[5]

After Stalin’s death, the new Soviet leadership and the leadership of the ACP did not trust each other, but the latter had to obey. The Albanian leadership knew, however, that if they maintained close ties with the Soviet Union, the new Soviet leadership might try to impose a leadership change in the ACP. Still, they also knew that if they broke away, the entire regime would collapse due to their difficult financial situation. When they found another ally who could meet their financial needs, the Albanians began distancing themselves from the Soviet Union. This opportunity arose during the Sino-Soviet conflict, and they quickly sided with China.

The Albanian regime received loans and equipment from China, just as it did from the Soviet Union, and it would have lasted that way until the end of time if China had not changed its foreign policy. The Albanian leadership did not approve of American President Nixon's visit to China in 1971; it signified openness to capitalist countries, which they avoided at all costs. From that point on, China became an unreliable ally. The Albanians understood that this openness implied policy changes and the introduction of new ideas, possibly even leading to changes in the leadership of the ACP. Throughout the 1970s, some of the most brutal punishments were carried out within the upper ranks of the ACP leadership and government.

From 1978 until its collapse, the Albanian communist regime was left without allies, and Albania became almost entirely isolated. The absence of a powerful ally meant Albania couldn't secure loans. In the 1980s, the regime reinstated food rationing. The economic crisis deepened to such an extent that the leaders of the ACP agreed with foreign powers to change the form of the regime. Using their privileged institutional positions, the communists managed to implement the change without giving up power. This process is known as "the fall of communism" or "the establishment of democracy."

When discussing the communist persecution in Albania, it is important to include a brief overview of the creation of the ACP and its leadership in the early years, up to 1948, in order to understand why the partisan army, the armed wing of the ACP, operated in its own country as a foreign military entity.

The ACP, the organization that controlled Albanian politics for half a century (1941–1991), was established on the orders of the Comintern after Germany's attack on the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941.[1] The task of founding a communist party in Albania was delegated to the Yugoslav Communist Party (YCP), as it was the party geographically closest to Albania and had long experience as a communist organization. The YCP sent two Central Committee members to Tirana, where they gathered a group of Albanian communists and founded the ACP on November 8, 1941. As a result, the ACP functioned as a satellite of the YCP until 1948. Miladin Popivič, one of the Yugoslav communists, was de facto the first chairman of the ACP until he left Albania in May 1944.[2] In 1948, Enver Hoxha declared before the Political Bureau that the general secretary of the ACP was Josip Broz Tito, who was also the general secretary of the YCP.[3] After breaking away from Yugoslavia in 1948, the ACP elected the first Albanian general secretary.[4]

The history of the ACP is a history of crime. At first, they killed their own party members who opposed the presence of Yugoslavs in the leadership.[5] Then, they began eliminating their political rivals outside the party, and thus the civil war began. The communists' war against the occupying Italian army, and later the German army, never reached significant proportions. They carried out only sporadic attacks under the pressure of the British, who supported them financially. The communists fought most seriously only against their Albanian political opponents.[6]

The primary enemies of the communists were two categories of the Albanian population: the wealthy and the educated. As masters of propaganda, the communist regime targeted these groups, labeling them as collaborators, war criminals, or enemies of the people. The communists presented themselves as the good guys, fighting for the well-being of the people.

Of all the forces that operated in Albania during and after WWII, the partisan army was the most ferocious toward the Albanian people. During the Italian occupation (1939-1943), the occupying forces killed 207 communists, [7] while the partisans killed over 350 people in 1945-1946, after the foreign invasion had ended and the war was supposed to be over. [8] During the same period, partisan military courts executed 794 people, [9] whereas executions carried out by military courts under the Italian occupation were limited to single-digit numbers. The victims of the civil war instigated by the communist regime are estimated to number in the thousands.

In the first decade of the communist regime, courts across the country sentenced 97,378 individuals to various punishments. Of these, civil courts convicted 78,510 people, military courts 18,390, and special courts 478. In 1945, military courts convicted 3,285 individuals, while civil courts convicted 640. In 1946, military courts convicted 4,621 individuals, while civilian courts convicted 3,951. In the early years, military and special courts tried most political cases. After 1948, however, civil courts began to dominate. As a result, the number of trials by military courts dropped significantly, while those by civilian courts tripled or quadrupled compared to 1946. Between 1945 and 1955, the courts, mainly civilian ones, issued 38,372 sentences involving fines and corrective work. Most of these sentences, particularly those involving fines, were for offenses such as non-payment of taxes and non-delivery of grain, and were largely a result of the economic repression imposed on the population.[10]

Prisoners, political or otherwise, were forced to work in violation of the UN Convention on the Prohibition of Forced Labor, even after Albania ratified it in 1957. Tens of thousands of people suffered internment or deportation throughout the communist regime. Thousands of children born in internment camps lived in those conditions until the end of the communist regime.

By the early 1960s, with the collectivization of most of the land, the communists transformed almost all of Albania's inhabitants into proletarians, making everyone financially dependent on the state. Until the fall of the communist regime, Albania was essentially a large concentration camp, surrounded by barbed wire and guarded by the military. Escaping from Albania was considered a serious crime, labeled as a 'crime against the state.' Those who were caught attempting to escape faced imprisonment or execution.

The economic activity of the communists started as a criminal enterprise. Archival documents reveal that, following the establishment of the ACP, its members acquired money and goods of interest to the party through blackmail[1] and robbery.[2] There are documented instructions and orders from the ACP or partisan command directing the robbery of money and various goods.[3] During the Civil War, the economic goal of the ACP was to secure victory at any cost. After the war, the focus shifted to preserving power at all costs. In essence, the economic reforms of the communist regime were a continuation of the civil war.

The Albanian communists did not have an economic program because they did not need one. They seized power by force, and neither the economy nor any other program was of concern. As the day of triumph in the civil war approached, and with it the seizure of power, the communists had to reassure the public, who feared them. The Anti-Fascist National Liberation Council (ANLC), the communist legislative body, assured the public that the communists were committed to establishing a democratic state that would uphold freedoms such as speech, religion, and the right to vote. Regarding the economy, the ANLC promised that a communist government would guarantee “private property and personal security... as well as freedom of private initiative.”[4]

In reality, the ACP’s economic vision was primarily driven by its financial needs. Initially, when the party was established and its financial requirements were modest, the communists resorted to blackmail and robberies. As the number of communists and partisans grew, and the ACP’s needs could no longer be met through sporadic blackmail and robberies, they began to formalize their criminal activities. This included implementing regulations, instructions, and, after taking control of institutions, establishing codes, laws, and decrees.

The economic vision of the communist regime is summed up in the statement issued by the Central Committee of the ACP on February 21, 1946:  “The state should take over foreign trade and wholesale domestic trade through special entities that will also serve to regulate and control retail trade. The state should exercise strict control over the private sector and increasingly limit [its activities].”[5] The philosophy of financial policies was: “Our finances should target the richest.”[6] As a result, the financial institutions in the hands of the communists turned into instruments of violence.

The immediate consequence of the regime's violent economic policies was a food shortage that emerged about two years later, followed by widespread poverty in the long term. In August 1946, the government implemented a food rationing law for the first time in Albania’s history. A year later, a law on clothing rationing was introduced. These measures signaled the official onset of poverty in the country.

In agriculture, as in other sectors of the economy, the communist regime exploited the processes to strengthen its control. The agrarian reform of 1945 expropriated large and medium-sized landowners, dismantled large estates, and redistributed the land to peasants with little or no property, temporarily turning them into supporters of the regime. In 1961, when the communist regime declared that it had fully completed the collectivization of land and established the economic foundation of socialism, it had effectively achieved the complete centralization of both property and the labor market. In practice, the Albanian communists carried out the very things that Marx and Engels had accused the bourgeoisie of: the concentration of the means of production in a few hands and the increase of wage workers.[7]

With the disappearance of private property, class distinctions did not disappear; they merely changed form. The political caste replaced the bourgeoisie, who had once controlled everything (illegally), while the masses, owning nothing, survived by working for a monthly salary in service to the caste.

The main economic outcome of communism was widespread poverty, which was almost equally distributed. The number of victims of poverty was virtually equal to the number of casualties from six atomic bombs, if we use the number of victims from the two nuclear bombs ever used as a unit of measurement. According to official statistics, between 1946 and 1991,[8] 210,689 infants (aged 0-1) died. During the period from 1951 to 1955, children aged 1-4 accounted for half of the annual deaths nationwide (50.6%). Between 1951 and 1991, 455,104 abortions were performed, the vast majority of which were voluntary. The primary causes of high infant mortality and the large number of abortions were poverty.[9]

The Albanian communist regime ruled using two instruments: violence and propaganda. It used violence against anyone who dared to oppose or question the communist doctrine and power, while propaganda was used to mask this violence. The discrepancy between reality and propaganda kept the regime in a state of permanent uncertainty. It was particularly threatened by the criticism of the “traditional man,” who, despite his ignorance, instinctively valued freedom, family, property, and God.

To ensure its longevity, the communist regime needed a society made up of individuals unable to recognize the discrepancy between reality and propaganda. This individual, called the 'new man,' did not exist, so the communist regime made his creation a goal.

Creating the 'new man' was a difficult challenge. The immediate obstacle was the wealthy and educated men, who possessed the knowledge and resources to resist the new regime. These individuals and their followers were capable of defending their world. Consequently, communists targeted them with urgency and ferocity, employing methods such as execution, imprisonment, exile, and deportation.

The Special Trial (March 1 - April 14, 1945) symbolized the war against success and tradition, resulting in the sentencing of about 60 individuals, 17 of whom were sentenced to death. The members of the court, including the judges and prosecutor, were poor and either uneducated or semi-educated. In contrast, the defendants were affluent and well-educated, or both. The judicial body lacked any law graduates, while five of the defendants held law degrees from European universities. During the trial, the prosecutor resided in the occupied home of one of the defendants.[1] One of the victims, executed by the court, had graduated in law from the University of Urbino, Italy, in 1904.

The second obstacle to creating the new man was the circulation of books that did not align with communist ideology. These books posed a threat if the 'new man' were exposed to them. In the early years, the communist regime systematically removed numerous book titles from circulation. All publications under the regime—including books, newspapers, and periodicals—were tightly controlled by the state.

Religion posed a significant obstacle to the establishment of the communist regime in the long run. Consequently, from the outset, the regime dealt harshly with religious authorities, targeting clergy of all ranks. Simultaneously, it halted the publication of newspapers and magazines by religious institutions and nationalized their printing presses.

The regime did not immediately remove religious lessons from schools, but teachers used to instruct the students not to attend religious classes. Later, the regime took control of the religious communities, interfering with their charters, appointing communist-affiliated religious leaders, and exerting influence in other ways. The period from 1962 to 1967 marked the final phase of religious activity.[2]

In 1962, a magazine dedicated to anti-religious propaganda was launched. Titled “Science and Religion” (1962-1966), its mission was to explain why religious morality was against the interests of workers, how Islamic teachings conflicted with Marxist-Leninist ideology, and how religion obstructed the construction of socialism. The magazine also argued that the Bible hindered the development of the “new man,” discussed the harms of Bektashism (an Islamic order), and outlined methods for atheistic education. The articles were primarily based on lectures by Marxist-Leninist philosophy educators. In 1967, the People’s Assembly issued a decree banning religion. The government punished anyone practicing religion, even though the right to religious belief was constitutionally protected until 1976.

Control through violence proved effective in the short and medium term; however, over the long term, a different approach became necessary. This new strategy focused on shaping societal control through the manipulation of public opinion, with schools serving as the primary tool for influencing citizens' views.

The communist regime placed great importance on the widespread dissemination of education at the primary level, focusing on basic literacy—reading and writing. A person's ability to read created the necessary infrastructure for indoctrination through textbooks, the press, and other written sources. In 1960, Marxism-Leninism became compulsory in schools. This subject consisted solely of texts by Marx and Lenin, which were presented without critical analysis.

In 1962, at the IV Congress of ALP, some moral principles for the young man were articulated,[3] which were later completed by the Academy of Sciences.[4] According to them, the new man was expected to 1) be loyal to the communist regime (party line), (2) have no sense of individualism, (3) recognize that the source of his existence was solely his work, based on the constitutional principle "He who works, eats"; (4) possess nothing and be unaware of private property; (5) worship whatever the regime dictated; and (6) have no awareness of national affiliation.

In 1943–1944, the communists succeeded in creating a significant military force, which they sustained through two primary means: (1) financial and logistical support from the Allies[1], and (2) robbery. Despite the Allies’ intentions, [2] the ACP utilized the partisan army to eliminate political rivals, including nationalists, royalists, the national army, gendarmerie forces, and state administration. The partisan army ultimately won the civil war, and following the communist takeover, it replaced the national military.

Since 1945, November 29, 1944, has been officially commemorated as Albania's Liberation Day. However, the "liberation" was more a product of propaganda than reality. Following the withdrawal of German military forces, Albania transitioned from one military regime (German) to a partisan-controlled military regime. On November 21, 1944, the partisan high command divided Albania into three military zones, each governed by 2–3 partisan brigades. Within these zones, the partisan forces held supreme authority.[3]

In 1945, the partisan army, known as the National Army, carried out purges of political opponents in areas that had been outside its influence during the war. The campaigns in the northern region, where the communists had limited access during the war, are well documented.[4]

The partisans had the practice of carrying lists of people they would execute when they entered cities for the first time, typically targeting the most influential individuals.[5]

Between November 19, 1944, and October 20, 1949, the communist regime employed a specific military formation to combat political opponents. Ironically named the People’s Defense Division, this unit had a strength of about 8,000 personnel.

Military courts were the primary judicial bodies in 1945, responsible for handling both military and civilian cases. They maintained a dominant role for several years, with exclusive authority over political matters. The number of individuals executed for political reasons by military court decisions in 1945 was 2.7 times higher than the total number of people killed by the Italian army during the 1939-1943 war.

The militaristic orientation of the communist regime was reflected in the distribution of state finances. Between 1945 and 1948, the Ministry of Defense had the highest expenses in the state budget. In 1945-1946, the Ministry of Defense, which covered all military expenditures, consumed 60 percent of the budget. In the subsequent years, military spending decreased to 47 percent in 1947 and 23 percent in 1948.[6]

The prime minister and government officials wore military uniforms in public until 1954, when Enver Hoxha, at the request of the Soviets, relinquished his roles as Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, and Defense Minister—positions he had held since 1944. Hoxha stepped down from these government posts, retaining only his position as General Secretary of the Albanian Communist Party (ACP), Chairman of the Democratic Front, and Commander of the Armed Forces.

The year 1954 can be considered the year when the communist regime transitioned from a military government to a police regime. The Ministry of the Interior gradually assumed responsibility for safeguarding the regime and its leaders. This included the police, which maintained public order; the State Security, which functioned as a political police; and the border forces, which prevented citizens from fleeing Albania. The Ministry of the Interior and all its structures operated under the orders of the Political Bureau until the collapse of the communist regime in 1991, despite this practice violating the constitution. In 1990, the Politburo acknowledged that the State Security had acted illegally.[7]

After 1954, the communist regime used the army to maintain a state of terror among the population, fueled by propaganda about the risk of attack from outside powers. The philosophy of terror was as follows: the larger the army, the greater the imagined enemy; the more frequently the army and civilian population conducted military exercises (which they did periodically), the more imminent the perceived danger became.

According to statistics, the army had 44,015 personnel in 1946. [8] Over the next four decades, while the total population grew by approximately 250%, the armed forces saw a modest increase of 0.2 times or 21.5%. By 1984, the strength of the army was 53,502 personnel.[9]

Dr. Çelo Hoxha has been an employee of the Institute for the Study of the Crimes and Consequences of Communism in Albania (ISKK) since its establishment (2010). He has worked as a journalist and columnist for several newspapers, the crimes of communism have been a constant concern in his articles. He studied at the master's and doctoral level at the Institute of History, Academy of Albanological Studies, Tirana. His master's and doctoral theses were themed from the period of the communist regime in Albania. He is the author of several studies, many scientific articles, all on the topic of the history of the communist regime, and one of the leaders and authors of the 12 volume project, "Encyclopedia of Victims of Communist Terror", published by ISKK. His book "Crimes of the Communists during the War, 1941-45" (2014) has been one of the most debated study books in the post-communist period in Albania.