Throughout the late 1950's relations between the USSR and Albania were deteriorating fast for a couple reasons.

Firstly was a response to the USSR's warming relations with Yugoslavia.

Secondly and more publicly was Enver Hoxha's move toward Maoism and China. A Chinese client so close to the Warsaw Pact and more worryingly so close to NATO, became an unacceptable eventuality for the USSR. In 1961 Albania withdrew support for the Warsaw Pact without officially leaving the bloc, but it only lead to even higher tensions with the Soviets. The next year 1962 the Warsaw Pact voted to expel Albania on the grounds that she had withdrawn all military cooperation with the bloc.





By early 1963 Albania invited Chinese Troops to open a radar station and other military points in the country. When the Soviet Union found out Khrushchev called Belgrade: two days later Yugoslavia declared war on Albania.





First the Yugoslav airforce attacked major air bases, bridges and government ministries,





Next Paratroopers were dropped along the Albania-Greece border,





Finally the main assault began from Montenegro





In response Albania deployed her fleet which was quickly destroyed by the Yugoslav navy. One torpedo boat strayed too close to Italy and NATO forces when an Italian patrol plane sank it bringing the alliance close to a major international incident, but thankfully Albania didn't (and couldn't) respond. Albania's most effective response to the Yugoslav invasion was inciting rebellion in Kosovo that threw Priština into chaos for a couple weeks but it never really took off.





Soviet Special Forces and Submarine based cruise missiles aided Yugoslavia whenever possible but the Soviet Union did not make any overt actions in an attempt to calm tensions in Western Europe.



There were some unconfirmed reports of Greek cross border artillery support for Yugoslav forces in northern Epirus

In 1964 Yugoslavia occupied all of Albania and was admitted into the Warsaw Pact, when eastern bloc forces aided with the occupation and rebuilding.





Albania was annexed into Yugoslavia as an autonomous part of Serbia in 1967.





