Letter: Tito's mole

Sir: John Earle writes (Letters, 9 July) that James Klugmann briefed him for his mission to Serbia in a fair and balanced way. The reason was that Mr Earle was going to Serbia and would have been able to see for himself the situation there.

Mr Earle was not the only one who was impressed by Klugmann. Even Royal Yugoslav officers who were went to Serbia during 1942 and 1943, having been briefed by officers of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) in Cairo, found Klugmann charming and better informed on Yugoslavia than his colleagues.

However, the point is that from mid-1943 SOE Cairo were retransmitting to London reports on the situation in Serbia received from William Deakin and Fitzroy Maclean, who were with Tito in the western part of Yugoslavia and never set foot in Serbia. After the war British liaison officers who served with Mihailovic and his Serb fighters, including Brigadier Armstrong, Major Rootham, Major Jack and Captain Lees, complained that their important reports were either suppressed by SOE Cairo (later Bari) or sent with considerable delay to London.

ALEKSA GAVRILOVIC

Stafford