Following the immediate spread of Scouting in 1907, it soon became apparent to many that the Scouts might really be able to succeed at the experiment of international fraternity. Alexander William Thompson, leader of an English troop, had the idea on a French battlefield in 1918 to found an international Esperanto speaking Scouting organization to support international friendship and exchange of services. In order to cure the linguistic problems, he recommended Esperanto as an international means of communication. The same year saw the foundation of the League of Esperanto-speaking Scouts as an international Scout organization, which thus predates the World Organization of the Scout Movement, though not the Order of World Scouts from 1911. Much is unknown about what Baden-Powell thought of Esperanto, but he liked the idea of an international Scout organization; two years later, in 1920, the World Bureau of Scouting was founded, however without using Esperanto, having English and French as official languages.