🇦🇱💵 Kushner’s Albanian fortress island: cushy resort or critical chokepoint?
On the face of it, the #Trump son-in-law’s plan for a $1.4B “eco-resort” on the island of #Sazan, and a $4.7B sprawl of hotels, flats and villas dotting the adjacent Zvernec Peninsula is an odd investment choice.
Wracked by judicial corruption and nonexistent property rights transparency, #Albania isn’t exactly a global investment or holiday top spot, struggling with basic transport, water and waste infrastructure issues, not to mention organized crime.
What if it’s all just a cover?
➡️ But Sazan was a heavily fortified military outpost during the Cold War, designed to withstand a full-scale nuclear war, and amphibious invasion by both #NATO and Warsaw Pact forces.
➡️ The 5.7 sq. km fortress island housed 3k+ servicemen, and was dotted with 3.6k concrete bunkers, 16 km+ of concrete-reinforced underground tunnels and a subterranean command center.
➡️ It hosted Albania’s most advanced naval artillery, SAM and radars, plus a small naval harbor for patrol and torpedo boats.
➡️ The Zvernec Peninsula featured elaborate coastal defenses, including a fire control bunker on a cliff overlooking the Adriatic Sea.
➡️ Sazan sits at the entrance to the Bay of Vlore, Albania’s most significant deep-water bay (50-70M), providing protection for warships.
Gateway to the Adriatic
🔴 The distance between Sazan and the southeastern ‘heel’ of the Italian boot across Otranto Strait is just 75 km, comparable to Hormuz (39 km) and Bab al-Mandab (32 km).
🔴 The Adriatic Sea has 11 major ports handling bulk oil, LPG and LNG, including Trieste (crude via the Transalpine Pipeline, and Venice (offshore LNG regasification terminal).
🔴 #Israel is looking to build a mega pipeline to Europe from the Leviathan Gas Field – connecting to #Cyprus, Crete, the #Greek mainland and #Italy, with its final leg situated precisely where #Kushner & co are looking to build their “resort.”
🔴 In effect, what may be disguised as just another real estate venture may be a plot to control a critical maritime energy and trade chokepoint in southern and central #Europe.
👍 Boost us
@Franklin_Graham@sanuzis How many people died since Trump and Musk stop aid?
“Early Mortality Modeling: Projects tracking the immediate aftermath estimate that between 600,000 and 762,000 people (about two-thirds of whom were children)…
Talk to the hand. ✋