Editing Special Operations Executive (section)

===Leadership===
The director of SOE was usually referred to by the initials "CD". Nelson, the first director to be appointed, was a former head of a trading firm in India, a [[Backbencher|back bench]] [[Conservative Party (United Kingdom)|Conservative]] Member of Parliament and [[Consul (representative)|Consul]] in [[Basel]], Switzerland, where he had also been engaged in undercover intelligence work.{{Sfn|Milton|2016|p=89}}

In February 1942 Dalton was removed as the political head of SOE (possibly because he was using SOE's phone tapping facility to listen to conversations of fellow [[Labour Party (United Kingdom)|Labour]] ministers,{{Sfn|Seymour-Jones|2013|p=113}} or possibly because he was viewed as too "communistically inclined" and a threat to SIS).{{Sfn|Stevenson|2006|pages=193-194}} He became [[President of the Board of Trade]] and was replaced as Minister of Economic Warfare by [[Roundell Palmer, 3rd Earl of Selborne|Lord Selborne]]. Selborne in turn retired Nelson, who had suffered ill health as a result of his hard work, and appointed Sir [[Charles Jocelyn Hambro|Charles Hambro]], head of [[Hambros Bank]], to replace him. He also transferred Jebb back to the Foreign Office.{{Sfn|Foot|2004|p=31}}

Hambro had been a close friend of Churchill before the war and had won the [[Military Cross]] in the [[First World War]]. He retained several other interests, for example remaining chairman of Hambros and a director of the [[Great Western Railway]]. Some of his subordinates and associates expressed reservations that these interests distracted him from his duties as director.{{Sfn|Hastings|2015|p=264}}{{Sfn|Milton|2016|pp=170–171}} 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 coordinate its operations with those of the [[British Army]] in several theatres of war. Hambro felt that any loss of autonomy would cause a number of problems for SOE in the future. At the same time, Hambro was found to have failed to pass on vital information to Selborne. He was dismissed as director, and became head of a [[raw material]]s purchasing commission in [[Washington, D.C.]], which was involved in the exchange of nuclear information.{{Sfn|Foot|2004|p=32}}

[[File:ColinGubbins.jpg|right|thumb|upright|Major General [[Colin McVean Gubbins]], director of SOE from September 1943]]

As part of the subsequent closer ties between the [[Chief of the Imperial General Staff|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 (United Kingdom)|Major-general]]. Gubbins had wide experience of [[commando]] and [[clandestine operation]]s and had played a major part in MI(R)'s and SOE's early operations. He also put into practice many of the lessons he learned from the [[Irish Republican Army|IRA]] during the [[Irish War of Independence]].<ref name=Carr/>