I enclose for your information copy of a report I have received from the Counsellor of the Embassy, Mr. Molloy,¹ regarding a luncheon he had last week with Mr. Rodionov of the Soviet Embassy.

2. Soviet diplomatic agents do not arrange social contacts of this kind without the specific authority and instructions of their superiors, so it is a safe assumption that Mr. Rodionov’s systematic cultivation of his contact with Mr. Molloy is not without some specific object. As you will see from the enclosed report however, the object in view became no clearer in the course of Mr. Molloy’s lunch with Mr. Rodionov on 24th June.
3. What is clear however is that Mr. Rodionov’s hospitality and forthcomingness is by no means confined to the Counsellor of this Embassy and that, in fact, Mr. Rodionov is devoting himself to activity of this kind in London to the point of attracting international notice for himself.
4. I would refer you in this connection to the Associated Press report headed ‘Yugoslavs say Russians feign friendliness’ on page 7 of the Paris edition of the New York Herald Tribune of the 18th June. You will see from that report that the Belgrade Radio recently cited Mr. Rodionov by name as an example of a new Russian tactic which consists in Russian diplomats exhibiting an insincere attitude of goodwill in personal contacts abroad.
5. If there is a new Soviet tactic as the Belgrade Radio suggests, it may be part of the Cominform decision to subordinate the struggle for Communism to the struggle for ‘peace’ or it may be part of an effort to disarm apprehensions abroad on the eve of a major Soviet initiative. I hope to find out in the course of the next few days what some of the other Ambassadors and Ministers here think of Mr. Rodionov’s activities.