It was on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month that the guns fell silent a century ago. The war to end all wars had ended. It would take but a few years to learn that it had been the overture, not the finale.
The First World War gave us a League of Nations, a ban on poison gas, restrictions on the ships and tonnage of navies. But World War One did not end the arrogance of the Great Powers that were great only in avarice and conquest.
Nor could it stop the advance of scientists. Their accomplishments would be feted in a quarter century by the radiance of a thousand suns burst at once into the sky of a cold New Mexico desert night.
A false dawn. Not dreams but nightmares. Remembrance Day they call it in many countries, that day 100 years ago when they told us it was the last day of the last war. Remember what came after.
--José G. Pérez
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