Within a fortnight, the army had capitulated, King Peter II and the Royal Government left for exile in London together with the SOE agents posted in the country.
Disjointed snippets of news of uprisings, resistance and civilian suffering were reaching both British and Yugoslav Government-in-Exile (YGE) who realised that they needed a more comprehensive picture and had arranged for a direct mission to the region.
Maj Lalatović was a Royal Yugoslav Air Force (RYAF) officer who had flown with a squadron of planes from Nikšić (Montenegro) via Greece to Cairo in April 1941.
On 9 Oct 1941 Hudson received a signal from Cairo (via Malta) to move to Suvobor in Western Serbia and deliver safe ciphers to Col Draža Mihailović and his Chetnik movement who had been sending un-encrypted radio messages.
On 13 Oct 1941 Lalatović and Ostojić sent the message to Malta (in French):[10] "Colonel Mihailović is receiving orders to refrain from sabotage except against railway tracks, locomotives, etc., where explosives are not needed, so that the population will not be too exposed to reprisals.
Tito, on the other hand, demanded an immediate fight against the occupiers, no subordination but common operational activities with chetniks or at the worst - their promise that they would leave partisans alone in their war against the Germans.
[14] On 29 Oct 1941 Mihailović sent a telegram asking for help "while the weather is good" so he could form an army corps "in a short time" and gave the impression that an offensive against the Germans was imminent.
[15] Fearing the escalation of conflict between the two groups, and worried that the military aid would be used to fight partisans rather than the Germans, on 13 Nov 1941 Hudson asked for it to be suspended unless Mihailović attempted to incorporate all anti-fascist elements under his command.
He volunteered to go to Užice to assist and asked the British Government to influence partisan leadership to work under Mihailović's command via Radio Moscow message which was broadcast shortly afterwards.
[18] Cut off from the outside world, Hudson made his way to southern Serbia and spent the following four winter months in Ivanjica surviving mainly on potatoes and fully dependent on local population.
In early Sep 1942, Hudson reported: "In general, the partisan organization is miles ahead of Mihailović's, and, after chasing each other round Yugoslavia, the final scene will probably take place in Belgrade.
He was also to persuade Mihailović to undertake active sabotage, study his political intentions and propose how British policy of creating a united resistance front could be implemented.
In early 1942, he was on a mission to the USA and Canada, together with Capt William Stuart from the SIS (who later became co-chief of Operation Typical and was killed during German bombardment of Tito's HQ in May 1943[24]), trying to recruit Yugoslav ex-pats for potential engagement in the Balkans.
[28] Overall, early reports indicated that Bailey got off to a good start with Mihailović, who agreed to receive British sub-missions to his regional commands, such as Mission Greenwood-Rootham in Eastern Serbia, and pass agents onto other countries.
Unfortunately, Bailey's inability to pause BBC broadcasts praising the partisan resistance, or to increase the supply drops (affected by the lack of serviceable long-range aircraft and poor weather) meant that the relationship began to deteriorate quickly.
[29] Finally, at a christening in Lipovo, on 28th Feb 1943, Mihailović made a speech highly critical of "perfidious Albion", requiring the Serbs to fight to the last, without adequate aid, his only source of supply being the Italian occupiers.
Bailey reacted on the spot and later reported the content of the speech to London which caused a major furore between the British Government, YGE and Mihailović whose list of priorities was in reverse order of what was expected.
[30] In Mar 1943, as the Axis troops and their collaborators pushed partisan forces from Bihać in North-west Bosnia to Herzegovina in the south, Mihailović left his HQ to take direct command, and spent the next few weeks in Kalinovik, Konjic and Foča.
British PM Winston Churchill had obtained ten Halifax bombers to add to the four Liberators and ease the delivery of military aid and in Apr 1943 sub-missions with Mihailović's commanders throughout Serbia were established.
[33] The British government then decided to back both sides with equal support, sending a senior officer to each HQ, Brigadier Charles Armstrong to Mihailović and Brig Fitzroy Maclean to Tito.
At Berane, place of Venezia Division's HQ, its commander General Oxilia agreed with Mihailović's representative and Bailey to come over to Allies' cause together with his troops and arms.
[35] Armstrong was present on 5 Oct 1943 when Mihailović's troops overtook the German garrison in Višegrad allowing Maj Archie Jack to blow up a large railway bridge nearby.
Together with blowing up of four railway bridges at Mokra Gora this was the first significant and overt anti-German action by Mihailović's troops since the beginning of the war, although in Bosnia rather than Serbia as originally planned.