to be tran-shipped on to a metre-gauge train. This wandered up the Brahmaputra Valley to a ferry at Pandu which is from Calcutta. Once ferried across the river the train continued to Dimapur over from Calcutta. This was the main supply depot for the Fourteenth Army. If the supplies were destined for the Northern Combat Area or trans-shipment on to China, they had to be sent an additional to Ledo which is over from Calcutta. The line had been built to serve the tea plantations of Assam and had a peacetime capacity of 600 tonnes a day. By the time the Fourteenth Army was formed in late 1943 this had risen to 2,800 tonnes. Up to Dimapur there were two other options, roads and river which could be used to supplement the rail tonnage. But there was no road to Ledo. In early 1944, the American Army provided six battalions of dedicated railway troops, about 4,700 men. By October 1944 they had raised the capacity to 4,400 tonnes and by January 1946 to 7,300 tonnes a day. This was possible by the increase in staff from two British, or Indian, officers to twenty seven experienced American railroad men on the same length of line and the introduction of more powerful American and Canadian locomotives. 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. 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 . For the Central (Assam) Front the river port at Gauhati could be used, but from there supplies had to travel over the already congested metre-gauge railway to Dimapur. The Southern Front could be reached by a combination of broad-gauge railway, river-steamers and then a metre-gauge railway which ended at Dohazari railhead. To move supplies from the railheads to the Army fronts three all weather roads were constructed in record time during the autumn (fall) of 1943: The Ledo road in the north which went on to connect to the Burma road and supply China. The campaign winning Central Front road from Dimapur to Imphal. The southern road from Dohazari south of Chittagong for the advance to Arakan. Much of the labour for the two British roads and for constructing