THE BALKANS: Salute for Tito

General Sir Henry Maitland Wilson, Commander in Chief in the Middle East, had heard enough. For a year the rival claims of General Draja Mihailovich’s Chetniks and Drug (Comrade) Tito’s Partisans had blurred the picture of resistance in Yugoslavia. For a year the Yugoslav Government in Exile had sought to bury the fact that its War Minister, Serb Mihailovich, was doing little or nothing, that all or most of the pressure on the Nazis was coming from Tito’s guerrillas, who call themselves the Army of Liberation (TIME, Dec. 14, 1942). Each band has accused the other of working with the Germans.

Across General Wilson’s desk flow all reports from U.S. and British liaison officers attached to Balkan guerrilla bands. Last week Cairo radio beamed at the hills and valleys of Yugoslavia General Wilson’s considered judgment:

“I salute [the] notable successes of the Yugoslav forces of liberation. . . . [But] I have learned that in some areas . . . certain men are dishonoring the Chetniks and helping the Germans in their vain attempts to subdue the forces of liberation. These men are shamefully betraying the cause of their country and adding to this shame by claiming that their actions have British approval. This declaration is entirely false.”

The blunt words fell hard on the youthful ears of King Peter II, patiently waiting in Cairo for a chance to resume his overturned throne in Belgrade. Last month Peter had announced that his war minister. Mihailovich, had promised not to fight the Partisans again unless attacked. Peter likewise made it plain that he looked forward to a postwar revival of the triune kingdom of Yugoslavia. But liaison officers recently in Yugoslavia had reported only one possible wartime solution: separate areas for the rivals to defend. The prospects for Peter in the postwar world seemed as dim last week as those of his fellow exile, George II of Greece.