If it were not for the usual attention to international politics or the reserve of geographical knowledge, you might not have noticed Albania, a small country with little presence.
Later, on the map of the geography book, I learned that Albania is a southeastern European country, and is located on the west coast of the Balkan Peninsula, known as the European powder keg, to the northeast is one of our friendly partners, Serbia, and to the southeast is Greece.
Although Albania is not a big country or a rich country, with a per capita GDP of only $5,200, the Albanian people have also seen hope for a better life in the last century, and even they once thought that they would be better off than developed countries such as Britain and the United States.
It's just that later all these hopes were shattered, and the person who shattered all these hopes was the same person who had given them hope - Enver Hoxha.
Hoxha
Bloody shadows hide in the dawn of the future
Although Europe basically uses Christianity as a religious belief, at most only in Catholicism, Orthodox and Protestantism, but Albania's absolute majority ethnic Albanian ethnic group believes in Islam like many countries in the Middle East, and only a few people will believe in Orthodox Christianity.
Enver Hoxha, born in 1908, grew up in a devout family of Islam.
When Hoxha was young, his father and brother entrusted Hoxha to his uncle Cheenin, and then went to the United States to do business.
He was greatly influenced by Hoxha's uncle Chening, who was a well-known local figure, a former mayor, highly respected, and a very rare atheist, who not only never went to the mosque himself, but also advised his nephew Hoxha not to be religious.
Hoxha
Hoxha's family is quite powerful and helps him complete his studies. By 1930, Hoxha was 22 years old, and he was studying botany in France, but Hoxha was not interested in those flowers and plants, but often liaised secretly with the Albanian Communist Party in France.
Hoxha was not a genius, and such truancy naturally prevented him from completing his studies. However, at this time, the luck of the cargo inspection was not bad, and the job of secretary of the embassy of the Kingdom of Albania in Belgium actually fell on him. During his tenure as embassy secretary, he maintained close ties with the French Communist Party.
In 1936, Hoxha returned home, when Italian fascists had occupied Albania, and in April 1939, Hoxha founded the Anti-Fascist Organization to mobilize the masses into the anti-fascist struggle.
The Italian government directly tried Hoxha in absentia, but the "limelight" Hoxha really took power and established prestige until two years later.
Hoxha
At that time, although there were already countless communist groups in Albania, the traditional performance of the "left" was to open up each other's leftists, and it was difficult for everyone to compromise and establish a democratic centralized organization, establish a common program, and establish a common theory and line.
Hoxha, who was relatively neutral in this situation and did not have such obvious tendencies, was once again fortunate enough to be the leader chosen by the groups at this founding meeting.
At this time, Hoxha performed quite well, not only did he continue to win victories in leading the anti-fascist struggle of the Albanian Communist Party, but also the tenacity he showed in the process of anti-imperialism and anti-blockade also made him exude leadership charm.
After the Albanian communists continued to win victories and defeat Italy, the Germans succeeded Italy and continued to control Albania. However, at this time, Germany was already at the end of the crossbow, and finally on November 29, 1944, the anti-fascist national liberation war was completely victorious, and the entire territory of Albania was liberated under the leadership of the Arab Communist Party.
Albania
On January 11, 1946, the People's Republic of Albania was founded, and after its establishment, Hoxha was still an excellent leader, in addition to making important contributions in the anti-fascist war, Hoxha also strictly suppressed the religious forces in Albania through his iron-fisted politics.
After de-Islamization, the custom of homophobic revenge and various ideological imprisonments were eliminated to a certain extent, so that Albania quickly achieved secularization and rule of law.
In addition, Hoxha also effectively cleaned up various colonial forces in Albania, confiscated all landlords and comprador economies into state ownership, carried out radical land reform, and severely cracked down on various unfavorable factors and bad elements that affected public security and economic development, including landlords.
However, there is a saying called Cheng Ye Xiao He, defeat also Xiao He, Albania seems to be thriving and vigorous at this moment, but in fact it has already buried various crises.
Hoxha
Huo has two major hobbies: blackening and purge
First of all, an important factor in Hoxha's rise to power at that time was the differences of opinion between the communist groups in Albania at that time, and the serious political struggle, which allowed him to obtain such an opportunity as a neutral.
And this political struggle and sectarian situation was not well handled after Hoxha came to power, but intensified, and many elders and talents were constantly consumed in sectarian internal friction and repeated purges.
Hoxha himself was actually not very proficient in Marxism-Leninism, let alone comprehended the principles of testing truth in practice.
Therefore, the so-called Hoxhaism was more of a political speculation, and at first Hoxha used his important position to ask for a lot of aid from Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, as well as China, so that the Albanian people could live a good life.
Hoxha
But Hoxha is essentially an extreme nationalist, suppressing religious forces relies on these nationalist forces (driving tigers and devouring wolves), Hoxhaism and Hoxha are essentially a stitching monster in name left and right, so that Hoxha in his later years while purging internally, he also fainted externally, constantly blocking other countries.
This not only caused Hoxha to encounter all kinds of reviling after his death, but also caused Albania's socialist construction cause to encounter various setbacks, took many detours, and did not escape the impact of the great changes in Eastern Europe after his death.
Enver Hoxha struggled to suppress the so-called National Front supported by Britain and the United States, and at this time he was in a state of shock and desperate to break the diplomatic isolation and find his allies.
Yugoslavia was a socialist country with itself, and it was the first to recognize the People's Republic of Albania after the establishment of Albania, so it was very necessary to establish friendly relations with Yugoslavia.
Since Greece is a monarchy, Hoxha felt that the two sides must be incompatible, and Greece was a potential enemy of Albania.
Hoxha
But the friendly relationship between Hoxha and the Yugoslav leader Tito did not last long, because Tito himself had only a lot more iron fists than Hoxha.
Once Hoxha got three guns that Tito liked very much, originally he wanted to give one to Tito, so he asked the Yugoslav ambassador to choose, but he did not expect that the Yugoslav ambassador did not choose, but wanted all. Hoxha eats people with short mouths and short hands, so he has to reluctantly do shunshui favors.
After Hoxha achieved the title of good brother of Yugoslavia, he could be said to have made the most of it, and he not only asked Yugoslavia to help them build railways, build steel mills and provide food assistance.
With such a bottomless pit, Yugoslavia gradually began to get impatient.
Tito
For Hoxha, impatience is impatience, because this house is gone, and there is still the next home, and by this time Stalin had expelled the Yugoslav Communist Party led by Tito from the socialist camp.
Hoxha immediately jumped to Stalin's side, saying that he had been fighting against the Yugoslav forces, and took the opportunity to eliminate the pro-Yugoslav forces, and incidentally strangled his number one political enemy, George Zhi, to death.
Stalin was very satisfied with Hoxha's loyalty and gave Albania a lot of aid with a wave of his hand.
It stands to reason that just blackening Britain, the United States and Yugoslavia will not affect the development of Albania, such a small country is enough to eat and drink with Soviet aid alone, but people will die, after Stalin's death, Khrushchev began to take the lead in completely denying Stalin, and also asked Hoxha to rehabilitate George.
Stalin
In Huo, your Soviet Union is just a cash machine for me, and you actually let me rehabilitate my political enemies, isn't this nonsense?
However, at this time, Hoxha did not dare to show it, and could only ask for assistance with a face, and on the other hand, he resolutely disagreed to rehabilitate his political enemies.
Later, in 1960, when Sino-Soviet relations broke down in the context of the great international controversy in the socialist camp, Hoxha immediately jumped to the side of the mainland and criticized the Soviet Union wave after wave, saying that Khrushchev was revisionist.
It is worth mentioning that at the June 1960 meeting of the Communist and Workers' Parties of the Socialist Countries, Khrushchev's proposal to isolate the mainland was also aborted because of Albanian opposition, and most of the proposals for the mainland to restore its lawful seat in the United Nations were submitted by Albania.
Khrushchev
"Big Man" under the torrent of history
Unfortunately, the good times did not last long, Hoxha in order to stabilize his party position, constantly carried out the great purge, after George is more worth mentioning twice, one is the purge of Baluku, as the third figure of the Albanian Communist Party, has a better relationship with many leaders on the mainland, and it is also the most restrained one of the leaders of the Arab Party when they want to help.
But because of his good relations with us, Hoxha began to conspire with the second-in-command Shehu to get rid of Baluku on trumped-up charges of treason, and the purge executed more than 30,000 people, while the population of Albania at this time was only two million.
Due to the treatment of Baluku and their huge appetite that could not be satisfied, the mainland cut its aid to them, and Hoxha began to turn his face and call us ungrateful, and listed us as evil blockers along with the so-called Soviet revisionists, southern revisionists, and American imperialism.
And Shehu, who wore a pair of pants with Hoxha, was later cleansed by him and forced to commit suicide, and Hoxha achieved his achievement: four of the five permanent members.
The reason why France was not blocked was simply because it did not add friends at all.
Hoxha
During his 40 years of dictatorship, there were 14 purges, and after the death of his former political partner, Shehu, Hoxha either imprisoned his family or continued to force suicide, in short, the cruelty of the past, these past events are forever painful in Albanian history.
After Hoxha's death, the Albanian party and government not only held a state funeral for him, but also renamed the University of Tirana as Hoxha University, and the Young Pioneers to Hoxha Young Pioneers.
Hoxha's love after his death is not entirely illusory, because Hoxha was quite humane during his lifetime, and once the daughter of the Albanian ambassador to North Korea fell in love with a young man in North Korea.
The young man was taken away by the North Korean police, and after pleading to no avail, the ambassador's daughter wrote a suicide note and decided to throw herself into the sea.
After being rescued, the ambassador wrote to Hoxha, who sent a telegram to Kim Il Sung, and finally saved the marriage.
Hoxha
But before the collapse of the Soviet Union and the great changes in Eastern Europe, Hoxha's posthumous memorials and glory were all confiscated by imitators of the great changes in Eastern Europe, who dug up Hoxha's grave, called his son over, asked him to identify the body, and removed Hoxha's grave before a specified time.
Because they thought that Hoxha was not a martyr, so he did not deserve to be buried in the martyr's tomb, his son had to do so, moving Hoxha's remains into an ordinary cemetery for hastily burial, and then finding a broken cement board in front of his grave and inserting it on the ground, writing Enver Hoxha's name in chalk.
The reason why Hoxha likes to carry out the Great Purge so much is not because Hoxha himself is a thug, but because the sectarianism of the Communist Party has never experienced effective suppression since its inception, but has been temporarily shelved.
When everyone has a common enemy, the factions within the CPP can still unite, but after the founding of the People's Republic of China, the factions of the CPP began to accuse each other and did not form a unified program and line.
Hoxha
If Hoxha had replaced all the purges with ideological emancipation movements similar to the Yan'an Rectification and completely eliminated sectarianism, perhaps there would not have been so many bloody political struggles, let alone the loss of so many experienced and prestigious leaders.
After Hoxha's death, there may not be a color revolution in Albania.
The reason why Hoxha keeps blocking countries is not entirely because of the so-called Hoxhaism, which is actually just a tool invented by Hoxha.
In the Hoxhaists' view, Trotskyism, Titoism, Khrushchevism, Eurocommunism, Castro and Guevara are all revisionists, in addition to Stalin's claims.
This is clearly a far-left ideology that ignores the facts of the customer, and is a tool for his sectarian struggle within.
Albania
If it were not for the Soviet Union forcing him to rehabilitate Georgia, he would not have blacklisted the Soviet Union, and if it were not for Baluku and China's better relations with China and China's reduction of aid to him, he would not have blacked out China, so Albania's diplomatic tragedy is fundamentally due to the disunity of the Arab Communist Party.
As for Hoxha himself, he is just a tool man wrapped in the torrent of history, a so-called big man who has four and a half points of merit and five and a half points of error.
Resources
[1] Chen Jiao, A Study of Hoxhaism and Its Historical Impact on the International Communist Movement
[2] Yuan Canxing Enver Hoxha: A fickle dictator
[3] Yu Weihai Chen Jiao, An important platform for the international alliance of contemporary Hoxhaist forces--"International Conference of Marxist-Leninist Parties and Organizations", development overview and review
[4] Baidu Encyclopedia entry Republic of Albania
[5] Baidu Encyclopedia entry Enver Hoxha
[6] Wang Hongqi The Ups and Downs of the Hoxha Family