Early in 1941 the vice consul at Skopje provided the Foreign Office with an even more extensive and perceptive analysis of the current state of the Macedonian problem. He claimed that the vast majority of the Macedonians belonged to the national movement; indeed, he estimated "that 90 percent of all Slav Macedonians were autonomists in one sense or another...." Because the movement was wrapped in secrecy, however, it was extremely difficult to gauge the relative strength of its various currents, except that it could be assumed that IMRO had lost ground since it was banned in Bulgaria and its leaders exiled. While the vice consul acknowledged the close relationship between communism and "autonomism" or nationalism in Macedonia, he downplayed the frequently expressed contention that the communists used the Macedonian movement for their own ends. Instead, he argued that since virtually every Macedonian was an autonomist, it was almost certain "that the Communists and autonomists are the same people..."; and, in any case, that Macedonian communists were not doctrinaire and were "regarded by other Balkan communists as weaker brethren...." "My own opinion," wrote Thomas, "is that they are autonomists in the first place and Communists only in the second."[95] He concluded his lengthy report by stressing what by then should have been obvious: the Macedonian problem was "a real one" and "an acute one" and that it "has in no way been artificially created by interested propaganda." He considered change unavoidable and felt that it was "in the interest of Jugoslavia to satisfy the aspirations of Macedonia." He was equally convinced, however, that it was highly improbable, "in view of the instinctive dislike of the Serbs engendered by twenty years of Serbian rule, that anything short of autonomy would be acceptable.'' [96]