For he today that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile, This day shall gentle his condition.

— Shakespeare’s Henry V

The hearts of all Americans today go out to the Italians who are grieving for their 18 countrymen slain yesterday in a cowardly attack by terrorists in Iraq. We couldn’t help think of the famous lines from Henry V’s Feast of Crispian. They are our brothers. And for Americans and no doubt the free Iraqis, the words that Prime Minister Berlusconi spoke yesterday will be remembered for years.”No intimidation will budge us from our willingness to help that country rise up again and rebuild itself with self-government, security, and freedom,” he told the Senate at Rome after the attack at Nasiriyah. “If there ever was a day when controversy should be silenced and when all Italian citizens should show solidarity with those who have taken on the lofty task of defending the values of our democracy, then this is the day.”

No doubt these words were heard and mocked in the Continental capitals of appeasement, Paris and Berlin. No doubt the deaths in yesterday’s attack will inflame anti-war sentiment in Italy. Looking at the newspaper photographs of Mr. Berlusconi’s face, one could almost feel the grief he expressed for a nation that has not been bloodied much in the past two generations. But Mr. Berlusconi made a point of noting the pain that Italy is helping to end. “We also feel pride for the courage and humanity with which our troops…have worked and still work to make the situation tolerable for children, women, the elderly, and the weak who live in that martyred region,” he said.

The Europeans who stood down from this fight, we have no doubt, will someday feel cheap next to the Italians. This is what an expedition of 2,300 men can achieve. Mr. Berlusconi can stand taller when he comes face to face with the other leaders in the European Union. And when he or his countrymen come to America, they will be embraced like the British and the Poles, like all coalition nations that were with us in this fight, like the Iraqis themselves. They have become our brothers.