Albanian Navy

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Albanian Navy
Forcat Detare Shqiptare
coat of arms

Coat of arms of the Albanian Navy
active
Country AlbaniaAlbania Albania
Armed forces Albanian Armed Forces
Type Armed forces ( navy )
Strength 1,100
management
Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces President of the Republic of Albania
Military Commander of the Armed Forces Chief of Staff Brigadier General Bardhyl Kollçaku
Navy Commander Major General Ylber Dogjani

The Albanian Navy ( Albanian  Forcat Detare Shqiptare ) represent the naval component of the Albanian armed forces .

history

1912-1939

After Albania's declaration of independence on November 28, 1912, the government of Ismail Qemali made the first attempts to create its own navy, but the beginning of the First World War initially put an end to these efforts.

Task, structure and organization

Only after the end of the Principality of Albania and the declaration as a presidential republic in 1925 by Ahmet Zogu were the Albanian armed forces, including a naval component, created. The main task of the navy was coastal protection and the fight against smuggling. However, their scope remained very small due to the country's financial constraints. The only figures on the number of crews are from 1939 - at that time the Navy consisted of 17 officers and 140 seamen.

In 1928 the central naval command was created. The naval commander was always an Italian officer, the deputy commander came from Albania. It was only shortly before the Italian occupation of Albania that an Albanian officer whose name was unknown was in charge of the naval forces. The naval headquarters was in Durrës , and there were naval locations in Shëngjin , Durrës, Vlora and Saranda , each with its own port command. The ships of the Navy were also distributed to these four ports. The first recruits were accepted in November 1928.

equipment

Against the background of the Italian endeavors to gain influence over the country and also the military, much of the military equipment of the armed forces comes from Italy.

On December 25, 1925, the first two ships of the Albanian Navy arrived from Italy, which had been bought through a Bucharest bank. The two former German minesweepers FM-16 and FM-23 of the type flat minesweeper were given the names Shqipnia and Skënderbeu . Shqipnia means Albania , Skënderbeu is the Albanian form of the name of Prince Skanderbeg from the 15th century. In Albania, the two ships were classified as gunboats and manned by seafarers who had previously been used against smugglers on the Albanian coast. The two units were decommissioned as early as 1935 because their sea characteristics left a lot to be desired, the consumption of oil and boiler water was too high and they were too slow. Both ships were scrapped between 1935 and April 1939 when the country was occupied by the Italians.

The purchase of the two ships in Italy already documents the attempt by the western neighbor to expand its influence in Albania. These attempts also included offers to deliver weapons, for example six speedboats and a state yacht for the Albanian Navy in June 1926. As equipment, the Albanian Navy initially received two identical Italian coastal defense boats in 1928 and two more in 1934, which were named Tirana , Saranda , Durrës and Shëngjin . These were built at SVAN in Venice in 1926 and, with their 46 tons and a 76 mm gun, corresponded to the comparable coastal defense boats ( motor launch ) of the British Royal Navy or the mine clearance boats of the Navy. During the Italian occupation of the country in April 1939, the Regia Marina took over the four boats and returned three to Albania after the end of the war, where they were used until 1970.

The last ship Italy handed over as part of the Tiranapaktes still a state yacht with the name Illiria . This was the former French minesweeper Lamproie the Gardon class from 1918 with 654 tons. After the First World War, it was privately converted into the White Diamond yacht , bought by the Regia Marina in 1938 and made available to the King of Albania. In April 1939, the Regia Marina took over the ship again and used it as an auxiliary gunboat for guard duty. In 1958 it was scrapped in Italy.

In 1930 there were individual press reports that Albania intended to acquire a light cruiser from Italy. Against the background of the small navy with few motor boats, such a project seems rather unrealistic.

1945–1990

From the time when Albania the Warsaw Pact was a member, the country had four ex-Soviet submarines of the Romeo class , which were operated until the late 1980s and now are no longer in the portfolio of the Albanian Navy.

organization

The Albanian Navy is divided into a brigade and has naval ports in Durrës ( Headquarters , Command 1st Naval District), Himara and the nearby Porto Palermo , Saranda , Shëngjin, as well as the Pashaliman Naval Base , Command 2nd Naval District, and the island of Sazan near Vlora .

equipment

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Patrol boat Iliria

To carry out its tasks, the Albanian Navy has, among other things, five patrol boats , two of which are of the Shanghai II class .

Coast guard

In addition to the navy, Albania has a coast guard , which has 34 patrol boats .

See also

literature

  • Artur Meçollari, Asllan Zemani: Historia e Flotës Ushtarake Detare [History of the Military Fleet] . In: Tirana Observer . January 22, 2015 ( tiranaobserver.al [accessed October 3, 2017]).
  • Robert Gardiner, Roger Chesneau: Conway's All the world's fighting ships 1922-1946 . Conway Maritime Press, London 1980, ISBN 0-8317-0303-2 .
  • Maurizio Brescia: Mussolini's Navy. A Reference Guide to the Regia Marina 1930-1945 . Kindle Edition, 2012, ISBN 978-1-84832-115-1 (e-book).
  • Erich Gröner , Dieter Jung, Martin Maass: The German warships 1815-1945 . tape 2 : torpedo boats, destroyers, speedboats, minesweepers, mine clearance boats . Bernard & Graefe, Koblenz 1983, ISBN 3-7637-4801-6 .
  • Owen Pearson: Albania in the Twentieth Century, A History . Volume I: Albania and King Zog, Independence, Republic from Monarchy 1908–1939 . IB Tauris, London / New York 2004, ISBN 1-84511-013-7 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).
  • Charles D. Pettibone: The organization and order of battle of Militaries in World War II. Vol. IX: The overrun & neutral nations of Europa and Latin American Allies . Trafford Publishing, Bloomington 2014, ISBN 1-4907-3386-8 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).

Web links

Commons : Albanian Navy  - Collection of Images

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Navy History. In: Armed Forces of Albania. Retrieved October 3, 2017 .
  2. ↑ a b c d e Meçollari / Zemani
  3. ↑ Pettibone, p. 15
  4. ↑ cf. Gröner, p. 171, Gardiner, p. 424
  5. ^ Pearson, p. 258
  6. ↑ Jeffrey Charles: The "Movies" The Ships and Men of the Royal Navy Motor Launch Patrol, 1914-1919: Lists of Particulars. In: motorlaunchpatrol.net. Retrieved October 3, 2017 .
  7. ^ Gardiner, p. 424.
  8. ↑ a b NO510 submarines (1956 / 1960-1961) - Albanian Navy (Albania). In: navypedia.org. Retrieved October 3, 2017 .
  9. ↑ GARDON patrol vessels (1917 - 1918) - French Navy (France). In: Navypedia. Retrieved October 3, 2017 .
  10. ↑ cf. Brescia
  11. ↑ Country information from the Austrian Ministry of Defense
  12. ↑ Information on the Coast Guard