Offbeat | Albania offers collectors its Communist-era airborne glory

If you want to buy a secondhand fighter jet, Albania’s the place to go right now.
The 40 obsolete Soviet and Chinese-made aircraft up for sale once roared over what was Europe’s most exclusive airspace. The Albanian pilots were members of an exalted military elite that had its own food-tasters and was tasked by Communist Albania’s paranoid regime with deterring countless enemies who never did come to this country on the Adriatic Sea.
Now a NATO member, Albania is auctioning off the rusting jets to pay for modernizing its military and to save space in its air bases. The Socialist government says it has received strong interest from aviation collectors and museums abroad — so much that it pushed back the initial auction date and is considering raising the starting bids, first set at 1.1 million to 1.9 million leks (USD8,600-14,800).
“It was a surprise for us,” Defense Minister Mimi Kodheli told The Associated Press, noting “a rush” of interest from prospective bidders in the United States, Germany, France, Italy and other countries.
In a corner of the Rinasi air base outside the capital of Tirana, 11 decrepit MiG-17 and MiG-19 jets are parked in neat rows, guarded by two military officers. Their silver-grey paint with the distinctive red, black and red roundels is fading, their tires are flat, the guns are rust-flecked and some of their glass canopies are broken.
Former jet mechanic Vasil Jongari, 55, seemed almost ashamed to show the planes to visiting journalists.
“There is nostalgia always,” he said, running his fingers over the 32 millimeter gun on a MiG-19. “But they cannot be kept only based on desire. They need money, and money we don’t have.”
Ilirjan Kola, 61, who flew Albanian air force MiG-15 to MiG-19 jets from 1976 until 1991, said the planes were always so expensive to operate.
“MiGs were so costly,” he told The Associated Press. “A twin-
engine MiG-19 consumed 52 liters of fuel a minute. With a normal flight of 30-40 minutes, imagine the expense … Better that they had sold them before.”
Albania’s air force was founded in 1951 and received MiGs from the Soviet Union until 1962. After Communist leader Enver Hoxha broke with the Russians, the country continued to be supplied with planes and spares from Communist China — until 1977, when Albania also severed ties with the Chinese. AP