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hostilities approached, Leonard Richardson, an Intelligence Corps colo-
nel, was sent out from London to inspect and inventory the entire Middle
East organization, most of which was by then in the capable hands of Pat
Domvile, while overall control had been transferred from Cairo to
London. Richardson’s report, released in March 1945, provides a lucid
summary of the state of things in Baghdad as SOE faced its inevitable
decline. He spent three days in Baghdad, where he found Teddy Hodgkin
in charge of South Gate, together with Seton and Hydie Lloyd, whose
exclusive home it was soon to become, and Daphne Keeble, who accord-
ing to Richardson was badly in need of relief and UK leave after two hell-
ishly hot Baghdad summers. John Chapman was still on the payroll in
Kirkuk, now functioning as the British ‘bagman,’ bribing the Kurds to
resist the Russians. By now Hodgkin considered his primary role as field
commander to be the maintenance of an organization of agents for the
ambassador’s use as a supplement to his other civil and military organiza-
tions for the influencing of public opinion. Hodgkin’s principal agent was
the director general of the Iraqi police, who controlled a wide network of
subagents throughout the country drawn from the army, police, govern-
ment, Sunni and Shia religious leaders, and the professions. This organiza-
tion was used for the oral dissemination of pro-British views.^56
As for the future, Richardson discussed further scope for SOE work
with the chargé, Geoffrey Thompson, who, while generally supportive,
did not appear anxious to know too much about SOE or to make any
specific suggestions. Thompson merely dropped some broad hints as to
‘points of likely interest,’ which can be summarized as follows: (1) although
Iraq appeared quiet, the situation could change overnight, so continued
vigilance was necessary; (2) unfavourable influence by the Soviets had to
be minimized; (3) as Iraq was ‘a land of bribery and corruption,’ a deni-
able organization was needed to deal with this aspect of Iraqi life; (4) Iraq
was in a vital strategic location and was an important source of oil; (5) the
dissemination of oral propaganda was valuable because the Iraqis were 90
per cent illiterate; (6) on the ambassador’s behalf, SOE could handle
meetings with certain personalities whom he could not meet officially; and
(7) SOE could liaise and deal with troublesome elements of Iraqi society,
placating them if necessary. Thompson concluded by saying that the SOE
organization should be maintained in Iraq, not just for a few months, but
on a permanent basis. He also emphasized that Chapman had to continue
his current job of distributing funds among the Kurds, because it was
essential to counteract Soviet political influence. After their meeting,