LETTER TO IVO OMRCANIN FROM ROBERTA KNAPP

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP01-00569R000100020055-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 17, 2009
• Sequence Number: 55
• Publication Date: February 12, 1981
• Content Type: LETTER

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or IT
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20505
12 February 1981
Dr. No Omrcanin
This is in response to your letter of 4 February 1981
to Mr. William Casey, Director, CIA, inquiring about the
availability of sources pertaining to the period of World
War II.
From your description, it appears you are referring to
the records of the OSS. These currently are held by CIA,
where a team has been at work for several years reviewing
them for declassification and accession to the National
Archives. The target date for completion of the class-
ification review is mid-1982, after which the Archives must
process the material for release to the public. The above
information pertains only to US Government records.
Sincerely,
Roberta Knapp
CIA History Staff
Distribution:
0-Addressee
1-HS Chrono
1-Ben Evans
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DR. IVO OMRCANIN
February 4, 1981
Mr. William Casey
Director, CIA
Langley, Virginia
Dear Mr. Casey:
In the book, A MAN CALLED INTREPID, on page 19 of the
photographs, between pages 230-231, the author, William
Stevenson, carries the photostats of the British documents
with false identity for Josip Broz Tito. On page 209, the
author says that how this happened "is still classified
information."
Researching the question in the National Archives, I was
told that there are materials still confidential at the CIA.
I am asking, Sir, if you would be so kind and inform me
about the availability of sources for my studies at your
Thank you.
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 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2009/11/20: CIA-RDPO1-00569ROO0100020055-0
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British genius in espionage. The forged documents seemed, to prove that
Donovan was stirring up trouble on a British Secret Service mission that
combined a survey of the political and
military any American intervention with ilitary conditions that might
offensive in the area. an Anglo-American diplomatic
The success of Donovan's mission could be followed step by step
by Churchill, reading the exchanges between the German High Com
mand and German diplomats, between German intelligence and Hit-
ler. Most of this material came through Bletchley, were read to him directly by telephone
y' and the highlights
other
tapped: a Communist international radio network source was also being
which some material came from Yugoslavia. run from Moscow, in
When Donovan arrived in Belgrade he found Prince-Regent Paul
preparing to join the Axis, after being summoned to Hitler's Presence.
Hitler had imposed upon Paul the full force of the intimidating Nazi
presence, subjecting the Prince to a display of military power, totali-
tarian efficiency, and the whole range of the Fiihrer's histrionic talents.
Churchill, reading the blow-by-blow reports of Nazi leaders, in-
cluding Hitler himself, commented to Roosevelt that "Prince Paul's atti-
tude looks like that of an unfortunate man in a cage with a tiger, hoping
not to provoke him while steadily dinnertime approaches."
The President replied through INTREPID that he would apply what
counterpressure he could. Perhaps Yugoslavia would dig in her heels?
Deliberately using the commercial cables that he knew the Germans
tapped, Roosevelt wired Donovan: "Any nation which tamely submits
will be regarded less sympathetically when the United States comes to
settle accounts than any nation resisting the Nazis." Informed of this,
Prince Paul told Donovan that any German move into Yugoslavia
would be merely to secure Hitler's flank for an imminent attack on
Russia. Hitler had told him so.
This was the kind of reasoning that Churchill most feared. Prince
Paul was anti-Bolshevik. "Patriots may be robbed of any reason to rally
to a resistance army," Churchill had already warned Donovan. "A mass
uprising can result only from some violent Nazi action."
There was one group in Yugoslavia capable of resistance: Tito's
Communists. Tito was then only a name. Some said he did not exist at
all. He had returned from the Soviet Union a year earlier, disguised as
Spiridon Mekas and carrying a British passport issued in Canada. How
this came about is still classified information. Tito had been deeply
FIGHT ON 209
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This passport gave protection to a naturalized Canadian citizen, Spiridon
Mekas, who was able to travel in non-Occupied Europe and to enter Yugo-
slavia just before the Nazi invasion. This passport was a forgery. Its subject
was a resistance leader, then hardly known, but now familiar as Tito.
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