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In 1919, Vatra, a pan-Albanian association functioning as something of a shadow Albanian government in the United States, made an unprecedented request to Secretary of State Robert Lansing: Albania should become an American protectorate. Just three months later, at the Paris Peace Conference, President Woodrow Wilson rejected the Secret Treaty of London, which would have effectively erased Albania from the map as an independent state. Thereafter, in the autumn of 1946, Albania issued an ultimatum to the US to withdraw its diplomatic mission, forcing its members to flee under the protection of American warships. For the next 50 years, the…
