Albanian Assignment [Illustrated] [Hardcover]

David Smiley (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

This engrossing memoir recounts British intelligence agent Smiley's two missions in 1943 and 1944 to Albanian resistance fighters. First with communist partisans and then with nationalist and monarchist groups, he helped organize and arm the Albanians against Italian and German occupation forces. By late 1943 the Albanian groups were falling into internecine civil war. Though Smiley professes indifference to politics, his sympathies are clearly with the anticommunists. This overly brief account, replete with high adventure, is told laconically. The policy of the London authorities and the murderous strife among Albanian factions are passed over, but various escapades with the guerrillas, by turns tragic, ludicrous, and touching, come wonderfully to life. Recommended for public and academic libraries. James B. Street, Santa Cruz P.L., Cal.
Copyright 1985 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Chatto & Windus; illustrated edition edition (September 1985)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0701128690
• ISBN-13: 978-0701128692
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,936,236 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Liasing with medieval "warriors" in 1940s Albania, February 23, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Albanian Assignment (Hardcover)

David Smiley had two active covert adventures with Albania, one inside and one outside that long-troubled Balkan nation. This book rather thoroughly portrays the first, laying out in detail his adventures as a British Liaison Officer with mountain chieftain Abbas Kupi's royalist cetas (guerrilla forces). The major benefit of Smiley's work is that it tantalizingly bridges the BLO adventures in Albania during WWII to the Cold War's major test of what became known as the "roll back" policy (forcing Soviet influence back within Soviet borders. It gives him a chance for a bit of self-justification, placing the blame for the failure of MI6 ops in Albania at the plate of alleged superspy Harold A.R. 'Kim' Philby. Smiley's work is not as thorough in its treatment of this wartime episode as Julian Amery's 1948 tome, "Sons of the Eagle", but its brevity is also a point for those impatient with esoteric Balkan names and terms. Like some of his World War II cohorts, Smiley became enamored of Albanians and sees them for what they are, charming survivors with a touch of hubris. One can only wish Smiley's autobiography or memoir would trace his colorful life from Sandhurst to his walnut farm near Alicante in Spain.