Chapter XVI: Final Operations

The armistice with Bulgaria marked the final collapse of German influence in that country. The Tzar Ferdinand abdicated and went into exile, and was succeeded by his son Boris. The capitulation created a profound impression in Germany. The Press published violent invectives against the “treacherous” ally, there was a panic on the stock exchange, and on September 30th the Imperial Chancellor, von Hertling, resigned, and was succeeded by Prince Max of Baden. Marshal von Hindenburg, in a letter addressed to the latter on October 5th, admitted that the collapse of the Macedonian front was one of the causes which excluded all hope--as far as man can judge, of forcing the enemy to make peace. Some German papers demanded that Bulgaria should be driven back into the fold by force. But the necessary force was now wanting. There was nothing for it but to reconstitute a new front in Serbia and Roumania, and this the Germans and Austrians tried to do.

The German units of the XI Army who had escaped capture, withdrew into Serbia to join the other German and Austrian forces already there or on their way from other sectors. Thus the 21st Infantry Regiment, elements of the 256th Reserve Regiment (the one which had appeared recently on the Struma front), of the 275th Regiment, which was in Macedonia, and of the 12th Landwehr concentrated in Serbia. From France the Alpen Corps arrived, which had only just come out of the line after much hard fighting, the 50th Landwehr from Minsk, and from South Russia the 217th and 219th Infantry Divisions, while Austria sent the 9th Division withdrawn from Italy, and the 25th. But these troops did not all reach the new front at the same time, except those who were already in Serbia or who had retreated from Macedonia; the other reinforcements arrived _par petits paquets_. In Roumania there was a still more numerous Army--on paper--commanded by Marshal von Mackensen, consisting of 3 German divisions, strengthened by 7 Landwehr divisions from Russia. This force, echeloned along the Danube from the Iron Gates to Cernavoda and along the railway from Cernavoda to Constantza, was divided into two armies, one of which assumed the name of the XI German Army which had gone to pieces in Macedonia, and was commanded by General von Scholtz himself, and the other, called the Army of Occupation in Roumania, commanded by General Koch. These forces were, in appearance, by no means negligible, but were spread over too vast a front, and the difficulties of communications south of Belgrade rendered their concentration very slow. Many of the men, moreover, belonged to the older classes and were partially unfit.

Even for the Allies communications were now extremely difficult. As far as the line of the old front they were comparatively good. But beyond it the retreating enemy had destroyed the railways, and the roads were in an appalling condition. From Ghevgheli to Veles the line was destroyed in many places, but it was repaired fairly quickly, so that by October 15th trains were already running with one interruption. From Veles to Uskub the destruction had been almost complete, as was also the case north of Uskub. The Constantinople railway was interrupted at Demir Hissar, where the bridge, as we have seen, had been blown up by the French early in the war. The C.A.A. had therefore to limit the number of troops pushing north to an indispensable minimum. Nothing, however, could restrain the Serbs, irresistibly drawn forward by the longing to return to their homeland. For supplies they had to rely on lorries, and the British provided them with 300 Fords, carrying 500 kilograms each, for the roads over which heavier vehicles could not pass.

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The objectives of the Allies were now four: the liberation of Serbia, the occupation of Bulgaria, the liberation of Roumania, and the capture of Constantinople. The territory over which the Armée d’Orient was operating, already vast before the Bulgarian capitulation, had now become immense; it was, we may say, the whole of the Balkan Peninsula, except Albania, which was left to the Italian XVI Corps, and Eastern Thrace, still in Turkish hands. To the north its operations were intended to link up eventually with those of the Italian Army, and General Franchet d’Espérey said that he hoped soon to shake hands with General Diaz in Croatia.

The I Serbian Army, the Danube Division leading, undertook the first of these tasks, supported by the French and Serbian cavalry, while the II Army still remained for a little to mount guard on the Bulgarian western frontier. The left flank of the I Army in the Mitrovitza area was covered by the Tranié Group, which, however, was relieved between the 5th and the 20th of October by the II Serbian Army and moved eastward. On the 7th the I Army was at Leskovatz in Old Serbia[47] and advancing on Nish, which the Austro-Germans had orders to hold at all costs, as it was the chief centre of the area, with immense depots and dumps, and the junction of the Belgrade-Salonica railway with the line towards Sofia and Constantinople; a local line also branches off to Zayetchar. A force consisting of troops of 3 German divisions (217th, 219th and Alpen Corps) and of 2 Austrian divisions (9th and 25th) tried to hold back the Serbs. But the latter on the 11th had occupied the heights dominating the town from the south, thus obliging the enemy to evacuate it after a brief engagement. The I Army continued its advance along the Morava valley, preceded by the cavalry, and did not trouble to await the two forces that were to support its flanks--the II Army on the left and the French divisions of the A.F.O. on the right, which had been delayed by the state of the roads--but was content with the support afforded by the Serbian and French cavalry. The enemy offered some resistance at Bukovich, and then at Parachin, where the fighting was more obstinate (October 23rd-24th); but the Serbs, although inferior in numbers, inflicted a serious defeat on them. This obliged them to evacuate even their positions at Kraguyevatz to the west of the railway, with its important arsenal. This town was occupied by the Drina Division on the 26th, which the following day conquered Mounts Ovchar and Chablatz, dominating positions and the scene of Voivod Michich’s great victory in the winter of 1914. On the 30th the I Army reached the Danube, and occupied the Biskuplje-Semendria line, while other detachments, after a sharp struggle, captured Mount Kosmaj and then Stoinik, 38 km. from Belgrade, whose outer defences are dominated from that point. On November 1st the Serbs re-entered their capital in triumph.

In the meanwhile the II Army was advancing through the Sanjak of Novibazar and Western Serbia, while the Tranié Group was pushing on towards Montenegro and Bosnia. On October 7th it had reached Ferizovich, on the 12th, after a sharp fight, Mitrovitza, and on the 15th, Ipek (Montenegro), where it captured 600 prisoners; 900 more fell into its hands on the 20th, after which it effected a conversion to the east, leaving the Yugoslav Division in charge of that area. The only French detachment remaining there was the 58th Battalion of Chasseurs à pied, while the 57th Division returned to Macedonia to be broken up.

The II Group of Divisions (General Patey), comprising the 17th Colonial and the 76th Divisions, to which the Tranié Group was now also attached, extended its occupation to Western Serbia and Eastern Bulgaria, which it entered by rail. On the 17th it was at Pirot, whence it pushed on an advanced force to Kniazhevatz, and on the 19th it reached Zayetchar. The 76th Division reached the Danube, and occupied the loop of the river between Vidin and Lom Palanka, thus interrupting the navigation on the Danube for the Central Empires. General Jouinot-Gambetta’s cavalry group had already reached the river, after a fantastic raid from Uskub. On the 27th it occupied Mount Antonov-Kladenatz, beyond Zayetchar, and then Dolnji Milanovatz near the Danube. On the 30th it was north-west of Negotin and in liaison with the Serbian cavalry, followed at a short distance by the 17th Colonial Division.

By November 1st the whole of Serbia was free of the enemy, except the north-west territory; but out of this, too, they were soon driven by the II Serbian Army, which then spread over into Bosnia and Montenegro. The remnants of the German and Austrian Divisions, exhausted and without supplies, recrossed the Danube and the Save. The whole of Bosnia arose in favour of the Yugoslav State, and also in Croatia and Slavonia there were demonstrations in the same sense. In the Banat, which the Serbs entered after crossing the Danube at Moldova and Basiatz, some final engagements occurred with the German troops, who were invariably defeated.

The demonstrations in Bosnia-Herzegovina, in Croatia-Slavonia, and in the Banat were in favour of a Yugoslav Federation. This was the idea that united the various peoples of Yugoslav race, of whose aspirations Serbia had made herself the standard-bearer. It would have been more difficult to raise similar enthusiasm for the purely pan-Serb idea, which the Government, and above all the Army, always had in mind, even though they did not proclaim it openly. To this fact are due, to a large extent, the conflicts which subsequently divided the different parts of the new kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.

It should be borne in mind that the Serbian advance was enormously facilitated by the events on the Italian front. If Austria could only send weak and totally inadequate reinforcements to stem the Serbian advance, it was because her whole Army was nailed down on the Piave and on the Asiago Plateau by the menace of the coming Italian offensive, and afterwards overwhelmed in the irreparable disaster of Vittorio Veneto. The last vigorous resistance of the enemy in Serbia was at Parachin on October 23rd and 24th. On the 24th the Italian offensive was launched. The latter also contributed very largely to the outbreak of the revolt of the Yugoslavs, who until that moment had been the most faithful subjects of His Imperial and Royal Apostolic Majesty.

There were still the other two tasks to be accomplished--Roumania and Constantinople. General Allenby had been rapidly conquering Northern Palestine and Syria,[48] and the moment seemed to have arrived to deliver the _coup-de-grâce_ against Turkey by an attack on Constantinople. Britain attached great importance to the new expedition, which might be regarded as the long-expected retribution for the bloody but heroic check at the Dardanelles. General Sir George Milne was to command it. He brought back his G.H.Q. from Janesh to Salonica, and preparations were at once commenced in Eastern Macedonia, which had just been evacuated by the Bulgars. The expeditionary force, officially described as the “Oriental Section of the Allied Armies,” was formed on October 6th, and comprised the 22nd, 26th and 28th British Divisions (the 26th was at Mustafa Pasha on the Turco-Bulgarian frontier, and the other two between Stavros and Dede-Agatch), the Italian Sicilia Brigade, which had been brought back to Salonica from the Monastir-Prilep area, and was commanded by General Garruccio, the 122nd French Division (General Topard), the I Greek Corps (General Ioannou), to which two more divisions of the National Defence Corps were to be added. The British divisions, greatly reduced in strength after the very heavy fighting at Lake Doiran, had been reinforced by some Indian battalions, which had arrived too late to take part in the offensive.

According to reliable information, the scanty forces detailed for the defence of Constantinople had been strengthened by four Caucasus divisions,[49] already arrived or _en route_, and by some others from Anatolia, while Germany was sending German troops by way of the Black Sea. But the Turkish units were greatly reduced in strength by battle losses, sickness, and above all by desertions, and it was estimated that their total number of rifles was not more than 12,000 to 15,000. Towards the end of October it was known that the German troops were already leaving Thrace for Roumania, perhaps on their way to the Western front. The plan of operations of the new Allied expeditionary force was the following: The river Maritza was to be crossed by a surprise movement, and three bridge-heads were to be built on its banks, whence three columns would advance on Adrianople, Kuleli Burgas and Ipsala respectively. Immediately afterwards the bulk of General Milne’s forces would cut the Turkish Army in two, separating those in the Gallipoli Peninsula from those in Thrace, and occupying the Lule Burgas-Muradli-Rosdosto line, while the Allied fleets would bombard the enemy batteries in the Gulf of Enos. Finally, the Isthmus of Bulaïr would be attacked, with the object of seizing the whole of the European shore of the Dardanelles. Then the artillery fire would be concentrated on the batteries on the Asiatic shore. Once the Dardanelles were conquered the fleets could penetrate into the Sea of Marmara, whence it would be easy to force Constantinople to capitulate.

In the meanwhile, General Allenby was advancing by leaps and bounds; he had conquered the whole of Syria, and captured two Turkish armies, with many guns and immense booty. The expeditionary force in Mesopotamia was also pushing ahead rapidly. The Turkish Army was visibly dwindling away, and the deserters numbered several hundreds of thousands, so that it was obvious that Turkey was not in a position to resist the blow which General Milne was about to strike; he had indeed already seized the bridgehead at Ipsala and was about to cross the Maritza at other points. On October 29th, General Townshend, who had been taken prisoner by the Turks at Kut-el-Amara in 1916, was set free, and sent to the inter-Allied Naval Command at Mudros, bearing a request for an armistice. The Turkish Cabinet, which emanated from the notorious Committee of Union and Progress, had fallen, and was succeeded by another, constituted with the express object of concluding peace. Enver and Talaat, the two evil geniuses of Turkey, had fled with their most compromised satellites and large funds embezzled from the Government Treasury and from private persons. The Turkish proposals were considered, and as soon as the Turkish plenipotentiaries arrived, among whom was Raouff Bey, the Minister of Marine in the new Cabinet and a well-known Ententophil, negotiations were commenced between them and Admiral Calthorpe, Commander of the British Naval Forces in the Ægean, as representing the Allies. After a short discussion, the Armistice was concluded on October 30th, and came into force on the 31st. The order to advance from the Maritza was therefore suspended.

The Allied fleets, commanded by Admiral Calthorpe, passed through the Dardanelles on November 10th, and anchored in the Bosphorus off the Sultan’s palace at Dolma Bagshe. It was the first time that a hostile fleet passed through the Straits and trained its guns on the Ottoman capital since the conquest in 1453. The previous day, General Sir Henry Wilson, Commander of the British XII Corps, had reached Constantinople, where he had been sent with a small Staff by General Franchet d’Espérey as his representative in Turkey. He was given command of all the Allied troops destined for the occupation of the city and of European Turkey (including the Asiatic shores of the Straits). These forces comprised the 28th British Division, the 122nd French and later an Italian regiment (the 61st) and a Greek battalion, besides some detachments of gendarmes. The points occupied were the city itself, Scutari, and various places on the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles. Subsequently the occupation was extended to other areas.

A few weeks later Sir George Milne removed to Constantinople with his whole Staff, and on February 8, 1919, General Franchet d’Espérey also arrived with the C.A.A. The further vicissitudes of the Allied occupation of Turkey belong to another chapter of history.

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Let us now return to the 35th Division. After the Armistice with Bulgaria began a veritable Odyssey for the Italian troops, a constant marching and counter-marching along roads deep in mud, without shelter for the night, across wild mountains, under torrents of rain, and later amid snowstorms; the soldiers, however, were cheered by the thought that they had won the war and that their homecoming was near. From Sop the division at once began to march in a north-easterly direction, as it appeared then that it was destined, as General Mombelli strongly desired, to take part in the operations in Serbia. On October 9th the headquarters were at Prilep, and a large part of the troops were encamped in the neighbourhood of that town. Squads of Bulgarian prisoners, guarded by Allied infantry and reinforced by Italian engineer companies, set to work to improve the impossible roads and to repair the Monastir-Prilep décauville. A few days later the whole force crossed the Babuna Pass, except the Sicilia Brigade, which, as we have seen, was to take part in the Constantinople expedition, and was sent to Monastir, and the newly-created Spezia Brigade, made up out of elements of the others, which remained at Prilep.

General Mombelli’s wish that his troops should be sent to Serbia to co-operate with the Serbian Army was shared by the Prince Regent Alexander, who expressed himself very decidedly in that sense. Had the 35th Division been given that destination, and had been able to fight on Serbian soil by the side of Voivod Michich’s soldiers, the relations between the two peoples, which at that time were very good, would have become ever friendlier. The Italian soldiers, had they been left to garrison Serbia, Slavonia and the Banat, would certainly have made themselves popular with the inhabitants, as occurred in Bulgaria, still technically an enemy country, and our relations with the Serbian State would have been very different from what they actually became. This was then desired on both sides.

But tendencies and forces hostile to an Italo-Serb understanding unfortunately prevailed. The destination of the 35th Division was altered by order of the C.A.A., and the bulk of its troops were sent towards Bulgaria. Hence new and exhausting marches, with supplies never arriving up to time on account of the badness of the roads and the deficiencies of certain services of the C.A.A. on which they still had to depend. After various intermediate halts, the Command reached Kustendil on November 13th, with the troops echeloned between Guyeshevo and Sofia, and soon after removed to Sofia itself. The division now spread over a large part of Bulgaria--Kustendil, Sofia, Vidin, Lom Palanka, etc. For some time there was a battalion at Burgas, and one at Philippopolis, belonging to the Sicilia Brigade, most of which had now left Salonica. When the British garrisons left the Dobrugia they were relieved by Italian troops.

Although the French forces in Bulgaria were now very few, the Inter-Allied Command in that country was entrusted to the French General Chrétien. His position was certainly anomalous, as hitherto the principle had been always applied that the Command in any given area should be entrusted to a general of the nation which had most troops in it. But the tact, character and excellent military qualities of General Chrétien rendered this illogical situation tolerable.

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With the break-up of Austria-Hungary thousands of Italian prisoners were set free or freed themselves. While the bulk of them made for Italy, many tens of thousands who were in Hungary, Roumania, Galicia and Russia proceeded towards Salonica, as they knew that there were Italian troops in Macedonia. They had been cast adrift without food, with insufficient clothing, often in rags and unshod, when they set forth on their wretched pilgrimage towards their victorious comrades across the icy-cold, wind-swept tracks of the Balkans. The country was almost denuded of resources and, owing to the execrable state of the communications, it was impossible to send up supplies from Salonica, where they abounded. General Mombelli made superhuman efforts to bring relief to these unfortunate wanderers; he sent detachments of troops to Serbia, and with immense difficulty organized a service of supply and transport. Gradually the liberated prisoners were conducted to Salonica, Burgas, or Constantza, and thence embarked for Italy. But large numbers perished from cold and hardships at the very moment when all were rejoicing over the glorious victory.

On November 4th the Villa Giusti Armistice between General Diaz, representing the Allies, and the Austro-Hungarian Command, was signed. But it was not clear whether and to what extent it was applicable to Hungary. On November 3rd two Magyar Field Officers presented themselves at the outposts of the Armée d’Orient in the Banat, stating that Hungary wished to conclude an armistice on her own account. In Hungary there was indeed no longer any recognized central authority, and the country was rushing headlong towards anarchy. Count Karolyi, the head of the Government, but almost without any authority, wished to enter into negotiations with General Franchet d’Espérey, who, however, had no instructions for dealing with such a situation. On the 7th a meeting between them took place; Count Karolyi declared that he had no army which he could rely on to hold the troops of Marshals von Mackensen and von Koevess in check, and asked for certain political concessions, which General Franchet d’Espérey was unable to grant. The latter added that he would proceed with the offensive as long as Hungary did not ratify the Villa Giusti Armistice, and, in conformity with instructions received from Paris, he threatened to send British and French divisions to Budapest. Karolyi then agreed immediately to his request, and on the 13th an armistice was signed between General Henrys (General Franchet d’Espérey had returned to Macedonia) and Voivod Michich for the Allies and M. Bela Linder for Hungary. According to the terms of this agreement, the Hungarian troops were to withdraw behind a line passing by Fünfkirchen, Baja, Mariatheresienstadt, the course of the Maros and the upper valley of the Great Szamos. Otherwise the terms of the Villa Giusti Armistice were reproduced as far as they were applicable to Hungary, save that the latter was authorized to keep six divisions on a war footing for the maintenance of order, which was threatened by criminal Bolshevism. The further vicissitudes of Hungary were to cause the Allies more trouble yet.

There still remained the army of Marshal von Mackensen in Roumania to be dealt with. On October 19th, French troops reached the Danube. A few days previously General Berthelot had arrived at Salonica, with instructions to create a new “Army of the Danube” out of units of the Armée d’Orient to conduct operations in Roumania. This new organization, which appeared cumbersome and practically useless, comprised two French divisions, parts of two others, a cavalry regiment, a British division and the Garrison Brigade. All these forces were echeloned along the Danube within the month of October, three bridge-heads were built near Rustchuk, at Giurgiu, and between Shistov and Nicopolis, and on November 10th the troops began to cross the river. Roumania, after a heroic resistance, had been obliged, in consequence of the treachery of the Russian Bolsheviks acting on behalf of Germany, to sign the disastrous Peace of Bucarest, but now that the liberators were at the gates she was able to shake off the hated yoke; the Government ordered a fresh mobilization, and declared war against the Central Empires. This gave her afterwards the right to take part in the Peace Conference, in Paris, among the Allies. The day that the French troops crossed the Danube the Roumanian Army reappeared on the scene.

Marshal von Mackensen’s troops offered but slight resistance. They soon gave up all hope of holding the Danube line, and thought only of retiring through Hungary into Austria and Germany. But it was an army in dissolution, almost without discipline, and its passage through Hungary might have led to serious trouble. On the other hand, if it were forced to surrender, there were no means of feeding it in the Balkans, nor ships to convey it home by sea. In the meanwhile the Serbian troops, in order to cut the communications between Roumania and Germany, occupied Vershetz and Neusatz, and pushed on towards Temesvar. The Armistice with Germany having been concluded on November 11th, von Mackensen’s army would have had only eight days in which to make use of the Hungarian railways, which, moreover, were in such bad condition as to be of little help; but it was granted an extension of the time limit, as it was generally felt that, on the whole, the wisest course was to allow it to go home. Difficulties, however, arose with the Hungarian Government. Von Mackensen had been interned in the Castle of Pott, near Budapest, but it was feared that his Hungarian guards might leave him free to range through Hungary and perhaps promote disorders and insurrections. Consequently, to avoid trouble, a couple of squadrons of Morocco Spahis were sent to Pott, and on January 5, 1919 they escorted the Field Marshal to the Castle of Futtek near Neusatz, in an area occupied by troops of the Armée d’Orient, and later to Salonica. In that city which he had expected to enter one day in triumph, acclaimed by the inhabitants--who would not have failed to become pro-German for the occasion--he remained interned for some months.

The Armée d’Orient was now scattered over an immense territory. The Commander-in-Chief, still General Franchet d’Espérey, remained at Constantinople with his Staff. The city and the adjoining area was garrisoned by General Wilson’s inter-Allied Force. At Salonica there remained fragments of the various Allied armies, commanded by General Génin, with detachments in other parts of Macedonia, especially in the old fighting zone, to collect the vast quantities of war material and to guard the prisoners. The latter were regarded as public nuisances, difficult to feed, and of little use for labour as there was very little work for them to do, so that the various Commands who had fought so hard to capture them were only too delighted when some of them escaped. The old Italian headquarters at Tepavci was occupied by the Bulgarian generals and field officers captured by our troops.

The bulk of the Italian Expeditionary Force was now in Bulgaria. The Dobrugia was occupied by Franco-British, and afterwards by Italian, detachments. In Roumania, besides some Roumanian divisions, there was part of General Berthelot’s army; the rest of it was for a short time in South Russia, together with some Greek and White Russian units, commanded by General d’Anselme.

The remnants of the A.F.O. and the Serbian Army were scattered about the new provinces occupied by Serbia, which were destined to form the new S.H.S. State, principally in the Banat and in Croatia-Slavonia. Small French detachments were in Montenegro, Cattaro, Ragusa, etc. In many of these places there were also Italian troops, and at Fiume there was a mixed Italian-French-British garrison. At Scutari the pre-war inter-Allied occupation was reconstituted, and a garrison consisting of a French, an Italian and a British battalion, commanded by General Foulon, was sent there.

All these troops took orders from General Franchet d’Espérey in Constantinople. The Italian troops in Bulgaria, in European Turkey and in Macedonia, belonging to the 35th Division, formed part of the Armée d’Orient. But the Italian detachments at Scutari and along the mid-Adriatic coast took orders from the Albanian Command, while those at Fiume were under the Italian III Army. Neither the former nor the latter had anything to do with the C.A.A. at Constantinople, whereas the French detachments in the same places were under it. The British Army, still commanded by General Milne, was under the C.A.A., but to a very limited extent, while the British troops in Asia Minor, in the Caucasus, etc., were also under General Milne, who, as far as they were concerned, had nothing whatever to do with the C.A.A. The Serbian Army was now acting entirely on its own.

All this Chinese puzzle of Commands seemed to have been invented for the express purpose of promoting inter-Allied disagreements--and it certainly succeeded in doing so. But the subsequent political and military vicissitudes of the Allied troops in the East do not belong to the history of the Balkan Campaign, but to that of the Peace Conference.

The Italian troops remained in Bulgaria until July 1919, when the 35th Division was broken up and its various elements repatriated, except the Regimental Command and one battalion of the 61st Regiment, which remained in Constantinople. During this period General Mombelli and his officers and men had occasion to show how high was the level of Italian civilization. No operation is more thankless nor more likely to become odious than the occupation of a vanquished country. But the Italian Expeditionary Force, which had borne itself so well during the war, also proved, in the eyes of the Bulgarians, whom it had so valiantly contributed to defeat, generous and dignified during the Armistice period. No unpleasant incident marred the relations between the troops and the inhabitants, but at the same time our men showed a proper reserve in their dealings with a nation with whom we were still technically at war. Further, the Italian soldiers did many acts of kindness and courtesy towards the natives that left indelible traces for the future good relations between the two peoples. We were fortunately spared the odium of garrisoning the country at the time when the _dura lex sed lex_ of the Treaty of Neuilly had to be applied. On their departure the Italian troops were bidden farewell with numerous demonstrations of sympathy, which those who had some interest in presenting Italy in an unfavourable light tried to misrepresent as signs of deep and dark intrigues on her part, but which were in reality nothing more than manifestations of gratitude.

Here we shall end our brief chronicle of the Balkan Campaign. Let us hope that the remembrance of the common effort for the common cause, and of the great victory by which it was crowned, prove an earnest for the future brotherhood of the peoples who fought together, in the hard struggles for the peace of the world.