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The People's Army 1970

The People's Army, which encompassed the ground, naval, and air arms of the regular armed forces, was under the Ministry of People's Defense, which, in turn, was within the Council of Ministers. The ministers were selected from the People's Assembly which, with its Presidium, was at the top of the governmental structure. In mid-1970 the minister of defense, Beqir Balluku, was also a deputy prime minister and a member of the Political Bureau (Politburo) of the Albanian Workers' Party. Balluku had a military career background and held the rank of colonel general in the army before its ranks were abolished in 1966. As defense minister he exercised direct operational and administrative control over all elements of the military establishment.

The army claimed no antecedents in the forces of the pre-Communist regimes and dates itself from July 10, 1943, when a General Staff was formed within the guerrilla forces resisting the Italian occupation. Petrit Dume, its chief of staff in 1970, had commanded the People's Army for about twenty years. He was second only to Balluku in the defense hierarchy and was also a candidate member of the Politburo of the Party organization. Enver Hoxha, first secretary of the Albanian Workers' Party, held the rank of general of the army until rank designations were abolished but, although he could exercise personal direction of the armed forces as their commander in chief, he was not considered a member of the defense establishment.

All of the regular military forces were within the People's Army. The air and naval arms were usually treated separately because of their distinctive functions and equipment, but their men were sometimes referred to as naval and air soldiers. Major subcommands, such as the army's directorates of Political Affairs and Rear Services (Logistics), served all service components. The same was the case with such organizations as the medical service that have functions applicable to all of the armed forces.

At lower levels, where the functions of the forces were specialized in relation to their weapons, organizational patterns appeared to be similar to those in most of the other armed forces throughout the Communist world. During the post-World War II formative years, force structures were adapted from those of the Soviet Union. Realignments after 1961 to cooperate with the Communist Chinese were not believed to have affected them to any appreciable degree. Some unit designations, such as army division, are not used in the peacetime organization and, in other situations, the sizes of units may be scaled down somewhat from normal international practice.

Rank designations were abolished in 1966. Since then, according to the governmental decree that effected the change, position in the military hierarchy was based on the responsibilities stipulated in the relevant tables of organization of the armed forces. Most of the personnel who would have fallen into the lower rank categories were acquired by conscription. Men without highly skilled specialties were retained for two years; noncommissioned officers and others who received special training were required to serve for longer periods.

The stated mission of the armed forces in general and the ground forces in particular was to defend the country and to secure its governing system. The stated mission notwithstanding, support of the system was primarily the responsibility of the security police forces and, against an external opponent, the armed forces were believed to have only a defensive capability. Unless Albanian forces engaged an enemy that was also committed against a third party in a more general conflict, they would, of necessity, revert to guerrilla fighting. Most of the training and much of the propaganda directed at the local population indicated that the leadership anticipated the possibility of guerrilla warfare.

The Party slogan, "the pick in one hand and the rifle in the other," also illustrated the dual use of service personnel in peacetime. They assist in the construction of industrial enterprises and hydroelectric plants and in land reclamation projects, crop harvests, and the like. They were used during the early 1960s, for example, in the construction of the oil refinery at Cerrik; in building a sugar factory, a lumber combine, and a textile factory; and in the draining of Lake Maliq to acquire additional agricultural land in a marshy lake district area north of Korce.

The ground forces contained about three-quarters of the regular personnel and were the backbone of the armed forces. Consequently, many of the People's Army functions that applied to all of the service components were administered within the ground force organization.

Because the active personnel strength of the ground forces was around 30,000 — sufficient to man only about two divisions — the brigade had been chosen as the basic tactical unit. The brigades were manned with approximately 3,000 men each, and there were probably one tank and five infantry brigades. The infantry brigades were believed to contain three infantry battalions and a lightly equipped artillery regiment. The tank brigade had Soviet-built weapons. Most of them were World War II T-34 medium tanks, but there are a few of the later model T-54s.

Almost all artillery was light and small caliber, since movement of heavy equipment is nearly impossible over much of the terrain. In addition, heavy weapons, their transport, or even their ammunition could not be produced locally, and little resupply from external sources could be expected in any lengthy conflict. In so small an area the rapid movement of forces would serve little purpose. The minimal amount of transport equipment available included small numbers of Soviet-designed armored personnel carriers, command cars, and a few types of trucks.

Before 1961 training was based on Soviet methods, and specialized schools were scaled-down copies of those in the Soviet army. Training manuals were translated from the Russian. Although external support of the forces has been transferred from the Soviet Union to Communist China, the Chinese have apparently not required basic changes in the training programs. Most conscripts have been exposed to a considerable amount of drill and elementary basic training in school and in Communist youth organizations, permitting the forces to concentrate on tactical exercises. These consist mostly of small unit activities and involve fighting techniques appropriate to the defense of the mountainous interior. Physical conditioning, tactics involving light weapons, and operations using a minimum of materiel support are emphasized on a continuing basis. Political indoctrination, conducted or supervised by the political commissars, is heavily administered in all training programs.

In the event of total mobilization there are just under 500,000 males between the ages of fifteen and fifty. Of the total group approximately 75 percent, or nearly 375,000, are physically fit. More than half of these have had some military service, and a sizable group participates in military reserve activities. Information as to how the existing establishment would be expanded is not available. Units active in 1970 could be enlarged to about double their peacetime strengths because all units are usually maintained at considerably below combat readiness strengths. New units would probably be created in infantry or guerrilla forces. Additional tank, air, and naval units would require more of their special equipment before they could become operational. Some women probably would be mobilized. The national economy, however, could not provide logistic support for the number of male personnel available, and external support would be necessary. At the time of the Communist takeover in 1944 and in the years immediately thereafter, political commissars were an integral part of the military organization. They were considered essential in order to assure that ideological beliefs were constant and were adhered to without deviation. As the years passed they lost their early importance and were eventually done away with, but they were reinstated in 1966 when alignment with Communist China brought renewed revolutionary fervor. How much their organization and operations in 1970 differed from what they were in 1944 is not clearly understood, but the fact that they were still called political commissars was a strong indication that they performed basically the same functions. There is no question but that the justification for their existence was the same—that is, to ensure that the ideological and political orientation of the troops and of their leaders did not deviate from the Party line. The decree that reinstated the commissars stated that they would be assigned in all units, subunits, and military establishments. This presumably means that there are commissars in all base organizations and in tactical units down at least to the company level. It is also known that Political Directorates in both the Ministry of People's Defense and the Ministry of the Interior control the commissars in the armed forces and the security forces, respectively. Political commissars are carefully selected from the standpoint of ideological reliability. Those appointed since 1966 must have had five years of unblemished Party membership. Those in the armed forces who are attached to the lower levels of the organizational structure are responsible to the Political Directorate and the Party organization rather than to superior officers within the military command channels. Hito Cako was chief of the People's Army Political Directorate in 1970. In addition to the military court system, discipline is enforced as part of the educational and ideological training program by the political workers who act in conjunction with the Party organizations in service units. They are invited to take measures necessary against individuals whose attitude or conduct is considered harmful to the effectiveness of, or discipline within, the army. The 50,000 men in the regular and security forces in 1970 represented about 2.4 percent of the population, but each annual draft took a number that was equal to roughly one-half of the young men that become nineteen years old during the year. There was no reliable information as to how willingly the average citizen performed his military service or whether or not his contribution is appreciated by the remainder of the people. The controlled-communications media do everything possible to promote good morale among those in the service and to show that the public supports them.