Romanian majority. To encourage recruitment, the Romanians were allowed to wear their national colors as well as receiving spiritual guidance by ethnic-Romanian military priests. In 1914–15 large parts of the Bukovina were occupied by the Russian 8th Army under General Aleksei Brusilov after the Austro-Hungarian defeat in the Battle of Galicia and could only be regained by the united forces of the Central Powers after the German-led Gorlice–Tarnów Offensive and the Russian Great Retreat. The Romanian troops fought bravely, 62 being awarded the Medal for Bravery. In one instance, the 41st Regiment fought for 54 hours continuously. By 4 June 1916, The Bukovinian Romanian casualties were 184 killed, 1175 wounded and 82 captured. In the autumn of 1918, the multi-ethnic state of Austria-Hungary collapsed and the Ministry of War officially ordered demobilization, though no central authority was able to ensure the decommissioning of arms. On 18 October 1918, the Ukrainian National Council established in Lemberg, Galicia, planned to declare a Ukrainian Republic that would also incorporate the Bukovina and Carpathian Ruthenia. On 25 October 1918, a Ukrainian regional committee, led by Emilian Popowicz, was established in Czernowitz to represent the Ukrainian National Council in Bukovina. On 14/27 October 1918, at the initiative of Sextil Pușcariu, Iancu Flondor, and Isidor Bodea, the Constituent Assembly of Bukovina established, in Czernowitz, the Romanian National Council (consisting of representatives from the Austrian parliament and from the Bukovina diet, and local political activists), which adopted a declaration to support the union of Bukovina with Romania, and demanded the last Austrian Landespräsident governor Josef Graf Etzdorf to cede his power. In the meantime, the local paramilitary forces of the Ukrainian National Council took control over Czernowitz and other parts of Bukovina, effectively supplanting Austrian control by the 6th of November. Although local Ukrainians attempted to incorporate Bukovina into the so-called West Ukrainian People's Republic, they were not able to set up an administration. In the light of Ukrainians' actions, the Romanian National Council leader Iancu Flondor, request the Romanian government to intervene in Bukovina. Five days later, the Romanian 8th Division, led by General Iacob Zadik, entered Czernowitz, against Ukrainian protests, while the Ukrainian paramilitary forces withdrew without resistance to Galicia. Further attempts by local Ukrainians to incorporate parts of northern Bukovina into the West Ukrainian People's Republic were swiftly suppressed by the troops, with the leadership of the Ukrainian National Council fleeing across the Dniester