Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio, Hey Brainstuff Lauren
Speaker 1: Vogelbaum here. In the wake of World War II, Albanian
Speaker 1: dictator Enver Hooja began remaking his war torn country in
Speaker 1: the image of Stalin's Soviet Union, which is to say
Speaker 1: that he ruled with terrifying menace, stoking isolationism and Cold
Speaker 1: War paranoia. In the nineteen seventies, with an ominous national
Speaker 1: mood firmly in place, he began building the bunkers, large
Speaker 1: bunkers and small ones. Underground bunkers and bunkers scattered openly
Speaker 1: through the countryside, obvious bunkers and secret ones, all made
Speaker 1: of reinforced concrete, most with a domed roof, as though
Speaker 1: a strange spate of mushrooms had popped up all over
Speaker 1: the republic. The stated idea was that these bunkers would
Speaker 1: serve as defensive positions during an enemy invasion supposedly coming
Speaker 1: any day. Ordinary civilians were trained to rush to the
Speaker 1: bunkers in case of emergency, and conditioned by propaganda to
Speaker 1: be ever vigilant against any and all foreign enemies. It
Speaker 1: was part of Hoja's strategy of a people's war, which
Speaker 1: relied on guerrilla war tactics executed by non soldiers. He
Speaker 1: wanted his citizens always ready, and most were required to
Speaker 1: do at least a little military training each year. Ultimately, though,
Speaker 1: what was really happening was that they were being conditioned
Speaker 1: to obey the hard line regime. There's a story that
Speaker 1: says that after the first prototype bunker was built in
Speaker 1: the nineteen fifties, Hoja asked the lead engineer how confident
Speaker 1: he was in his creation. The engineer replied, very confident.
Speaker 1: Hoja then ordered the engineer inside the bunker and instructed
Speaker 1: a tank attack to test the building's integrity. The engineer
Speaker 1: walked out unharmed, but no doubt shaken. After that, Albania
Speaker 1: began its bunker building frenzy in earnest. Because of the
Speaker 1: perpetual secrecy surrounding Hoje's administration, the bunkers were planned and
Speaker 1: built with few public details. Engineers were moved among different
Speaker 1: work sites to make it impossible for any one person
Speaker 1: to fully understand the scope of the project. As such,
Speaker 1: records are scarce and no one knows how many were constructed.
Speaker 1: Numbers ranged from roughly one hundred and seventy five thousand
Speaker 1: to nearly seven hundred and fifty thousand at the top end,
Speaker 1: that would mean one for every four Albanians at the time.
Speaker 1: Factory employees worked around the clock to make the necessary materials.
Speaker 1: Some bunker designs were light enough to be carried piecemeal
Speaker 1: into the mountains by mule. Others had to be dropped
Speaker 1: into place by helicopter. Some expanded into entire underground towns
Speaker 1: meant to survive nuclear strikes. The project was so massive
Speaker 1: that it may have required three times as much concrete
Speaker 1: as France's equally incredible Magino line, which tried and failed
Speaker 1: to dwart Nazi hordes, which we'll have to do a
Speaker 1: whole other episode about some time, and some experts estimate
Speaker 1: that Albania's bunkers cost twice as much as the Magineu. Notably,
Speaker 1: the bunker's strategy didn't sit well with officials in the
Speaker 1: standing army, in part because the clunky and often cramped
Speaker 1: bunkers weren't actually useful for professional soldiers, but that, of course,
Speaker 1: was beside the point for the article. This episode is
Speaker 1: based on How Stuff Works. Spoke by email with Elidor Mheely,
Speaker 1: an associate professor of history at Hunter College, he said.
Speaker 1: The bunkers were also about showing off the regime's military,
Speaker 1: technical and strategic ability at a time when Albania was
Speaker 1: increasingly alone geopolitically, and in that sense they did serve
Speaker 1: a function. They were concrete things, but they also cared
Speaker 1: read a kind of symbolic value. The official party propaganda
Speaker 1: spoke of Albania as a fortress. The regime meant that
Speaker 1: metaphorically in the sense of defending communism. Indeed, Hoja had
Speaker 1: cut off relations with neighboring Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, and
Speaker 1: even China, feeling these countries had either strayed from the
Speaker 1: hardline socialist path or else were warming relations with Western countries.
Speaker 1: Having no allies made Albania one of the most isolated
Speaker 1: countries on earth. The bunkers were allegedly to keep the
Speaker 1: country safe from its many enemies, but they were in
Speaker 1: reality just another form of propaganda. The regime knew that
Speaker 1: they wouldn't have stood up contemporary war practices or technologies.
Speaker 1: At one site, what started as a series of bomb
Speaker 1: bunkers slowly evolved into what became an underground town. It
Speaker 1: had huge rooms, interconnected tunnels and command centers and it
Speaker 1: was meant to provide self sufficient shell for up to
Speaker 1: ten thousand people. For half a year, the government regularly
Speaker 1: conducted drills in which townspeople rushed to this huge labyrinth. Eventually,
Speaker 1: they were so proficient in this exercise that the entire
Speaker 1: town could sequester itself within seven minutes. Yet, because of
Speaker 1: the way the underground city was intentionally segmented, no one
Speaker 1: had any idea of how large it really was, not
Speaker 1: even the construction workers who built it. Once inside, residents
Speaker 1: were forbidden to move around. The bunker project ended with
Speaker 1: the dictator's death in nineteen eighty five. In nineteen ninety,
Speaker 1: the communist regime began to collapse. Two decades later, they
Speaker 1: had joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and applied for
Speaker 1: membership with the European Union. Today they have official candidate status.
Speaker 1: Mihili said, Albania has undergone dramatic changes. Albania has become
Speaker 1: an open society, which is a big deal since it
Speaker 1: was one of Europe's most unforgiving dictatorships. At the same time,
Speaker 1: the transition has not been easy. Many Albanians have left
Speaker 1: the country since, seeking opportunities elsewhere, including here in the US.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, the old bunkers remain. Given their inherent ruggedness,
Speaker 1: it's too costly and time consuming to remove most of them. Instead,
Speaker 1: Albanians are converting them, often in spite of government opposition,
Speaker 1: for other purposes. In rural areas. Farmers use them to
Speaker 1: shelter livestock or store grain around cities. Houseless people shelter
Speaker 1: in them, kids play around them, teens smooth in them,
Speaker 1: and beachgoers use their roofs as extra sunbathing space. Some
Speaker 1: bunkers now serve as memorials and museums, which put the
Speaker 1: horrors of the communist regime on display or bring beautiful
Speaker 1: new artwork to communities. Others have been painted with murals
Speaker 1: which were banned during the regime, or converted into coffee shops, bars,
Speaker 1: pizzerias or lodging for tourists. And how do Albanians perceive
Speaker 1: the bunkers today, Miheli said, I am not sure most
Speaker 1: Albanians care about them. It's mostly tourists who are obsessed
Speaker 1: with the bunkers as a kind of curiosity. Most Albanians,
Speaker 1: i would say, are worried about corruption, poverty, and whether
Speaker 1: there will be a better future for their children. Today's
Speaker 1: episode is based on the article Albania's Doomsday bunkers fed
Speaker 1: a Dictator's Paranoia on how stuffworks dot Com, written by
Speaker 1: Nathan Chandler. Brain Stuff is production of iHeartRadio in partnership
Speaker 1: with how stuffworks dot Com and is produced by Tyler Klang.
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