North-east Indian railways during World War II

At the start of the War the railways and water communications of north-east Indian Railways was not a major concern for the British Empire forces stationed in Burma as they could be supplied by sea through port in Rangoon (as could Chinese forces in south western China thought supplies passing up the Burma Road).

However, when the Japanese attacked and forced the British back to the Indian Burmese border, the supply of material over the extended lines of communication from Calcutta to the front lines and over the Hump into China, became a critical issue for the Western Allies and the Chinese National Revolutionary Army (NRA) under the command of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek.

In doing so, not only did the Japanese threaten India, but they denied use of the Burma Road to the Western Allies, who had been sending supplies to Chiang Kai-shek's National Revolutionary Army (NRA) by that route.

Without the trebling of capacity, the supply of Chinese troops in China would not have been possible once the Japanese attacked India and the Fourteenth Army counterattacked.

[3] It was possible to reach the Northern Front by river from Calcutta through the Sunderbans and then up the main stream of the Brahmaputra to Dibrugarh a distance of 1,136 miles (1,828 km).

[5] I remember once saying "Well, that railway's been washed away by floods, put out by bombing, swept away by landslides, closed by train wrecks; there's not much more that can happen to it."