Immediately after Germany annexed Austria (the Anschluss) in March 1938, the Foreign Office created a propaganda organisation known as Department EH (after Electra House, its headquarters), run by Canadian newspaper magnate Sir Campbell Stuart.
GS (R) was renamed MI(R) in early 1939. These three departments worked with few resources until the outbreak of war.
It was officially formed on 22 July 1940 under Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton, from the amalgamation of three existing secret organisations.
On 16 July, Hugh Dalton, the Minister of Economic Warfare, was appointed to take political responsibility for the new organisation, which was formally created on 22 July 1940.
A subsidiary headquarters initially known as "Force 133" was later set up in Bari in Southern Italy, under the Cairo headquarters, to control operations in the Balkans and Northern Italy. An SOE station, which was first called the India Mission, and was subsequently known as GS I(k) was set up in India late in 1940.
In August 1941, following quarrels between the Ministry of Economic Warfare and the Ministry of Information over their relative responsibilities, SO1 was removed from SOE and became an independent organisation, the Political Warfare Executive. Thereafter, a single, broad "Operations" department controlled the Sections operating into enemy and sometimes neutral territory, and the selection and training of agents.
However, there were difficulties with the Commanders in Chief in the Mediterranean, partly because of the complaints over impropriety at SOE's Cairo headquarters during 1941 and partly because both the supreme command in the Mediterranean and SOE's establishments were split in 1942 and 1943, leading to divisions of responsibility and authority. There was tension between SOE and SIS, which the Foreign Office controlled.
It originally conducted research and development but from 1941 it became a production, storage and distribution centre for devices already developed. Station XV, at the Thatched Barn near Borehamwood, was devoted to camouflage, which usually meant equipping agents with authentic local clothing and personal effects.
There he had also been engaged in undercover intelligence work. In February 1942 Dalton was removed as the political head of SOE (possibly because he was using the SOE's phone tapping facility to listen to conversations of fellow Labour ministers, or possibly because he was viewed as too “communistically inclined” and a threat to SIS) Dalton became President of the Board of Trade and was replaced as Minister of Economic Warfare by Lord Selborne.
Shortly after the Allied landings in North Africa, a station codenamed "Massingham" was established near Algiers in late 1942, which operated into Southern France.
However, there were difficulties with the Commanders in Chief in the Mediterranean, partly because of the complaints over impropriety at SOE's Cairo headquarters during 1941 and partly because both the supreme command in the Mediterranean and SOE's establishments were split in 1942 and 1943, leading to divisions of responsibility and authority. There was tension between SOE and SIS, which the Foreign Office controlled.
In early 1942, Donovan's organisation became the Office of Strategic Services.
As the work expanded, it became the central forgery department for SOE and the Poles eventually moved out on 1 April 1942.
Selborne and Hambro nevertheless cooperated closely until August 1943, when they fell out over the question of whether SOE should remain a separate body or co-ordinate its operations with those of the British Army in several theatres of war.
He was dismissed as director, and became head of a raw materials purchasing commission in Washington, D.C., which was involved in the exchange of nuclear information. As part of the subsequent closer ties between the Imperial General Staff and SOE (although SOE had no representation on the Chiefs of Staff Committee), Hambro's replacement as director from September 1943 was Gubbins, who had been promoted to Major-general.
However, there were difficulties with the Commanders in Chief in the Mediterranean, partly because of the complaints over impropriety at SOE's Cairo headquarters during 1941 and partly because both the supreme command in the Mediterranean and SOE's establishments were split in 1942 and 1943, leading to divisions of responsibility and authority. There was tension between SOE and SIS, which the Foreign Office controlled.
It finally became known in April 1944 as Special Operations (Mediterranean), or SO(M).
The organisation directly employed or controlled more than 13,000 people, about 3,200 of whom were women. After the war, the organisation was officially dissolved on 15 January 1946.
The official memorial to all those who served in the SOE during the Second World War was unveiled on 13 February 1996 on the wall of the west cloister of Westminster Abbey by Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother.
A further memorial to SOE's agents was unveiled in October 2009 on the Albert Embankment by Lambeth Palace in London. The Valençay SOE Memorial honours 104 SOE agents who lost their lives while working in France. ==History== ===Origins=== The organisation was formed from the merger of three existing secret departments, which had been formed shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War.
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