ABSTRACT
Albania’s predicament between the two world wars was hardly enviable and in some ways it faced even more challenges than the rest of the Balkans. After all, Albanian independence came late, in 1912 and was confirmed by the great powers only in 1913. The Albanians, like the Bulgarians, Greeks, and Romanians, got a new German king of sorts, Prince Wilhelm of Wied, who stayed only briefly before Albanian political intrigue and the onset of the First World War sent him back to Germany, never to return although he was not without a few supporters in Albania. In the aftermath of the war, Albania regained its independence, although its borders were still in flux and its very existence was consistently challenged by Greece and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (Yugoslavia after 1929). Greece was particularly keen to use the Greek minority living in the south (Northern Epirus) to foment both instability and potential border revision in their favor. Yugoslavia was particularly interested to get as much control of Albania’s north as possible while limiting Italian influence. The Kingdom of Italy was more or less given paramount influence in Albania in so far as they were ultimately the guarantors of Albanian independence – very ironic in so far as it would be Mussolini’s Italy that would invade and then annex Albania in April 1939. Only a few of Albania’s emerging elite were prescient enough to foresee the dangers Italy’s role played.
