Chapter XI: The China–Burma–India Theater, August 1943–January 1945
QUADRANT Directs an All-out Effort
Plans for CBI
A change for the better for the engineers in CBI seemed to be at hand. Meeting in the QUADRANT Conference at Quebec from 14 to 24 August 1943 to discuss world strategy, the Anglo-American high commands gave much thought to operations in the China–Burma–India theater. The Combined Chiefs, assuming that the Chinese trained and rearmed by Stilwell would eventually link up with U.S. forces in southeastern China, agreed to commit enough British and U.S. strength to the theater to keep China in the war as an effective ally and as a base for operations against Japan. To facilitate strengthening China, they directed the capture of the northern part of Burma in order to increase the safety of flights over the Hump and to make possible the restoration of overland communications by mid-February 1944.1 Much thought was given to developing the line of communications from India to China. Somervell went into this matter with the Quartermaster General of the British Army, Sir Thomas Riddell-Webster. The two worked out a comprehensive program for improving logistical support for the Chinese war effort. Their plans called for an increase in deliveries over the Hump to 20,000 tons a month by mid-1944. There would have to be a redoubled effort to open the Ledo and Burma Roads to make possible trucking 30,000 tons of supplies a month to China by January 1945.2
Plans for constructing a pipeline from India to China figured prominently in the talks. To ship sufficient quantities of fuel to China by truck and plane to support a sustained drive against the Japanese would be impossible. “The old Burma Road ate its head off in gasoline,” Merrill had declared at TRIDENT. “A pipeline is the only way to cure this.”3 Construction of a pipeline system in a combat zone might have met with insurmountable obstacles had it not been for improvements, such as the Shell Oil Company’s invasion-weight pipe. This
pipe was thin-walled, portable, and weighed about half as much as standard pipe. There were two sizes—one, four inches in diameter; the other six. Each piece of pipe was twenty feet long. A piece of 4-inch pipe weighed about go pounds; of 6-inch, about 150. The sections were not welded together as were those of standard weight, but were joined by “victaulic couplings.” These were collars with rubber gaskets, made tight by the pressure of the oil or gasoline flowing through the pipes. A mile of invasion-weight pipeline together with pumping stations weighed thirteen tons. Pipe and stations could be easily transported and installed in any kind of terrain accessible to trucks. Improved types of submarine lines, ship-to-shore loading equipment, and bolted steel tanks holding 250, 500, or 1,000 barrels had also been developed. In July 1943 the Office of the Chief of Engineers reported that construction of a 4-inch, invasion-weight pipeline from the town of Dibrugarh on the Brahmaputra River in Assam through the mountains of northern Burma to Fort Hertz and on to Kunming was practicable.4 The QUADRANT Conference approved construction of a line via Fort Hertz which would skirt enemy-held territory and would be used mainly to supply gasoline to Chennault’s air force. The Combined Chiefs further approved the laying of a second 4-inch invasion-weight line; this one would follow the Ledo and Burma Roads to supply gasoline to trucks hauling supplies from India to China. In addition, the Combined Chiefs directed that two 6-inch pipelines be put in, one to extend from Calcutta to Kunming via the Ledo and Burma Roads to provide gasoline for American and Chinese ground operations, and the other to run from Calcutta to Dibrugarh to feed the 4-inch lines. When finished, these 4- and 6-inch lines would form the most extensive pipeline system in the world.5
The QUADRANT Conference also took up the matter of guerrilla warfare. British Brigadier Orde C. Wingate, who had carried on such warfare in Burma, had come to Quebec to support Churchill’s arguments for broadening the scope of commando operations behind enemy lines. Wingate was convinced that in his recent campaigning he had developed a method of harassment that would cripple Japanese defenses. He proposed to augment his specially trained brigades of Chindits—named after the mythical lion-like animals which guarded Burmese temples and made up of natives of India, whites from the British Isles, and Negroes from West Africa—so that they could strike really effective blows. He wanted to improve the means of sending his forces behind enemy lines by air. Given enhanced mobility and dependable air supply, Wingate was certain the Chindits could harry the Japanese sufficiently to force them out of northern Burma. The Allied commanders approved his proposals. General Marshall directed the assembling of an American task force of
some 3,000 volunteers who would serve with the Chindits. General Arnold promised to supply pilots from the AAF to fly the planes Wingate said he needed. He directed Air Force Col. Philip G. Cochran to go to India in the autumn to organize these men into the 5318th Air Unit, which would be a “custom-made” aggregation of bombers, fighters, transports, gliders, and helicopters. It would be up to the engineers to provide the landing fields for the air commandos behind the enemy lines. Wingate would carry on guerrilla warfare in Burma while the Chinese under Stilwell launched their full-scale offensive.6
General Arnold announced a project at the conference which was destined to have a tremendous impact on the engineer mission in CBI. The Army Air Forces had almost perfected the B-29 or “superfortress” bomber, which was to be capable of delivering 10 tons of bombs on a target 1,500 miles away. Arnold informed the Combined Chiefs that the first B-29’s would be ready during the coming winter. If bases could be provided in the Changsha area of China, midway between Kunming and Shanghai, the Air Forces would be ready to launch a massive assault on Japan by October 1944. This plan of overwhelming Japan with fleets of super-bombers appealed to the imagination of the President. The number of fields to be built was left rather indefinite and methods of providing logistic support were not clearly formulated. Planning staffs in Washington and in the theater would have to work out the details in the next few months. Roosevelt believed that if the plan could be carried out as Arnold proposed, there would be a material improvement in Chinese morale and an early end of the war with Japan.7
Theater Reorganization
The decisions at Quebec were undertaken simultaneously with two basic changes in the Allied command structure in the theater designed to promote more effective use of resources. Hoping to eliminate some of the confused relationships of the existing “loose coalition of Allied headquarters,” Roosevelt and Churchill agreed to set up the Southeast Asia Command. Vice Adm. Lord Louis Mountbatten was named commander. With his main forces based in India, he would control Anglo-American operations in Burma. Stilwell’s position in the new setup was not clear. He would be under Mountbatten insofar as operations in Burma were concerned, and it was generally assumed he would be Mountbatten’s deputy, but there was no official confirmation of this assumption. Arnold’s chief of staff, Maj. Gen. George E. Stratemeyer, was to go to CBI as Stilwell’s air adviser. He was appointed commanding general of U.S. Army Air Forces, India-Burma Sector, and as such was the ranking American air officer in the theater. Under him
was Tenth Air Force, commanded, after General Bissell’s return to the United States in mid-August, by Brig. Gen. Howard C. Davidson. Stratemeyer, arriving in the theater in August, set up his headquarters near Calcutta. He soon learned that he would have little control over Chennault. Roosevelt had assured Chiang that Stratemeyer would not interfere with the operations of the Fourteenth Air Force, and Stilwell exempted Chennault from Stratemeyer’s operational control. To most observers, command relationships in CBI remained as involved as before, and the complexities of the engineer organization as great as ever.8
The growing emphasis on air power led to the organization of engineer offices in the Air Forces in CBI for the first time. On 15 August Col. Herman W. Schull, Jr., organized an Engineer Section in Chennault’s Fourteenth Air Force headquarters at Kunming. Schull and his one assistant were henceforth responsible for maintaining liaison with the Services of Supply regarding the building or maintenance of five airfields in Yunnan and ten in eastern China, together with a dozen reserve fields in widely scattered localities. A similar development took place in India. On zo August Stilwell activated the CBI Air Service Command with headquarters near Calcutta, to succeed the X Air Force Service Command. The new organization was charged with supporting the Tenth Air Force in India and the Fourteenth in China. Col. Lyle E. Seeman, who arrived from the United States in the summer of 1943, became the first engineer of the new organization. At the same time he became theater air engineer under Stratemeyer. Like Schull in China, Seeman, with his small staff, maintained liaison with SOS on airfield construction in India.9
Planning for New Operations
Because of the shortage of planning staffs in the theater, Army Service Forces in Washington had to assume the main burden of planning for the line of communications projects the Combined Chiefs had approved. This responsibility Somervell and his staff accepted with enthusiasm. Styer wrote that the “development of the line of communications from India to China bids fair to be the greatest engineering undertaking of the war. ...”10 Early in September, Somervell established the India Committee. It included specialists from the technical services. The committee’s job, Somervell said, was to keep ASF “in a position at all times to back up and even anticipate the demands which are made on us in the way of men and materials.”11
The principal representatives of the Corps of Engineers on the committee were Col. Louis G. Horowitz, for theater liaison, Col. Thomas F. Farrell, for construction, and Col. Harry A. Montgomery, for supply.
With such cooperation as the CBI staffs could give, headquarters in Washington worked at top speed during the autumn to get men and supplies to the theater. Somervell was determined to obtain for the Ledo Road its full allotment of eighteen engineer construction battalions. As of September 1943 only six were in the theater. Subject to the availability of shipping and the troop priority lists established by Stilwell, Somervell intended if possible to have the entire eighteen on the road by the following January.12 The Corps of Engineers expanded the Petroleum Section of the Engineer Unit Training Center at Camp Claiborne, Louisiana; nine petroleum distribution companies were to be trained and readied for shipment to India by early 1944.13 General Godfrey, the Army Air Forces engineer, was deeply interested in a number of projects scheduled for CBI. At his urging, General Arnold directed that the headquarters of an aviation regiment and four aviation battalions be sent to the theater for work on the B-29 fields. Godfrey, having played a key role in securing the adoption of airborne engineer units by the Army in the summer of 1942, was especially interested in Wingate’s plans for the air commandos. He was largely instrumental in getting air borne engineers assigned to the commandos for the coming campaign in Burma.14
In procuring supplies and equipment for road and pipeline construction, Somervell’s hand was greatly strengthened by the fact that Army Service Forces had already assembled many of the materials needed; they had been intended for the now-abandoned line of communications from Rangoon to Kunming. All of the pipe required for the 4-inch line via Fort Hertz was en route to the theater by late August. Nearly a fourth of the 900 miles of 6-inch pipe and accessories which ASF had originally ordered for the line from Bhamo to Kunming was on its way. Of the 55,715 tons of road construction equipment requested by Wheeler during 1942 and 1943, all was either en route or being procured by Army Service Forces by 1 September. Since additional pumping stations and pipe would be needed, the Corps of Engineers undertook procurement during September and October.
It soon became evident that the B-29 program would have to be curtailed. It ran aground on the shoals of logistics. Having the fields at Changsha would mean developing a line of communications from Calcutta to Kunming of a magnitude and at a speed not contemplated by the Combined Chiefs. The supply effort required would be herculean. As modified by Stilwell and Stratemeyer in October and November, the MATTERHORN project called for the construction of five air bases west of Calcutta and four staging fields near the
city of Chengtu in Szechwan Province, northwest of Chungking. This reduced program would move up the advent of the bomber offensive to the spring of 1944, but mass bombings would have to be given up in favor of careful selection of strategic targets, such as Japanese steel mills and aircraft factories.15
The preparations being made in the United States soon had their repercussions in the theater. The engineers had to make still greater efforts to meet the goals set by the QUADRANT Conference. Work on old projects had to be speeded up and new ones begun. Whether much more could be done until more troops arrived was doubtful. Highly desirable would be a better organization of the theater. In any case, by the fall of 1943 there was a noticeable quickening of engineer work in the theater from eastern China to western India.
Airfields in China and India
In eastern China, Byroade continued to supervise construction of the fields near Kweilin and began to improve several more about 200 miles to the east and southeast. In this part of China, the engineers, as before, met with unexpected developments. Outside Kiangsi Province, where the local authorities were not so fully in control, “uncertified contractors” were permitted to start work on some of the fields. Soon organized gangs were carrying out systematic acts of violence and intimidation against contractors and workers alike with little or no interference on the part of the authorities. A number of additional contractors were subsequently “certified,” after they indicated they were willing to share profits with local officials. Despite such hindrances, progress was made in construction. During the autumn Byroade presented Chennault with 5 improved fields near Kweilin and 7 more zoo miles farther east and southeast. By this time SOS engineers in China were responsible for maintaining 27 fields for Chennault.16
The fields in Assam, upon which so much work had been done to make possible flying larger tonnages to Chennault, also showed progress. This improvement was accompanied by high-level struggles in the final, critical phases of the construction effort. The British, pointing to the top priority assigned by the Combined Chiefs to ground operations scheduled for 1943, explained that it would be necessary to withdraw their military engineers from Assam for duty on the line of communications supporting the British forces facing southern Burma. Stilwell and Wheeler were able early in October to convince them that a wholesale withdrawal would be uneconomical. The British agreed to leave their engineers on the most important of the remaining uncompleted fields. Late that year the Air Transport Command had available ten fields along the upper Brahmaputra.17
With more fields in India and China to
give him support, Chennault in October was able to make a more effective showing. Deliveries of supplies over the Hump increased, and two additional fighter squadrons arrived. After the failure of his trial offensive in August and September, Chennault now found the going much easier. He began to take the initiative in China’s eastern skies. In the last quarter of 1943 his flyers carried out highly successful strikes against Japanese shipping on the Yangtze and off the China coast.18
The Ledo Road
Meanwhile, the engineers in Base Section 3 labored to provide the overland communications indispensable for expanded operations in China and Burma. Inasmuch as Arrowsmith’s successor was a Quartermaster officer, supervision of work on the road now rested largely with Col. Robert E. York, road engineer since 21 May. The return of the 45th Engineers from their rest camp near Calcutta early in September and the tapering off of the monsoon gave Colonel York a chance to push road construction once more. With the 330th Engineers breaking the trail and doing the advance grading and the 45th Engineers doing the final grading and graveling, the Ledo Road inched southward through the jungle and defiles of north-western Burma, despite the 23 inches of rain that fell during the remainder of the month.19 By 15 October the lead bulldozer had advanced nearly seven miles and was beyond Mile 60.20 By this time there were on the road 2 general service regiments, 3 aviation battalions, and one engineer maintenance company, about 5,250 engineers in all.21
On 17 October a new chapter began in the history of the road. Col. Lewis A. Pick, Missouri River Division engineer, arrived to take command of Base Section 3.22 He lost no time in inaugurating a new order of things. On the evening of his arrival, he bluntly told his assembled staff, “I’ve heard the same story all the way from the States. It’s always the same—the Ledo Road can’t be built. Too much mud, too much rain, too much malaria. From now on we’re forgetting this defeatist spirit. The Ledo Road is going to be built—mud, rain, and malaria be damned!”23 Pick set up his command tent near the roadhead. He reinstituted the around-the-clock schedule that General Arrowsmith had been forced to abandon five months before with the onset of the rains. Pick was determined to brook no obstacle to the speedy advance of the road. He sought to provide adequate lighting for work at night by stripping the base of all generators, wiring, sockets, and bulbs that could possibly be spared. He told the troops that if necessary they were to put flares in buckets of oil. Work would have to go on without interruption.24
Pick believed that one of his first jobs
was to relieve the forward elements on the road. The day before his arrival, orders had gone out withdrawing Company D of the 330th Engineers from the roadhead. This unit, which had spearheaded the advance since early July, had been reduced to a handful of men by malaria and dysentery. Its removal for rest and recuperation was clearly necessary. On 1 November Pick lauded Company D for displaying a fortitude “comparable to that cited for combatant troops.” Shortly afterward, he began pulling back the rest of the 2nd Battalion for road maintenance and improvement south of Pangsau Pass. By 14 November he had moved up the 1st Battalion of the 330th to take the lead. The roadhead stood at Mile 63. The advance was about to begin in earnest.25
Early in November Stilwell visited road headquarters. He impressed on Pick the urgent importance to the tactical plan of having a jeep trail open to Shingbwiyang by the first of the year.
“I can’t build you a jeep road,” Pick replied, mindful of the difficulty of maintaining a narrow track in the swampy jungle, “but I’ll build you a military highway to handle truck traffic.” With Pick’s assurance that such a road could be built to Shingbwiyang by 1 January 1944, Stilwell took him up on it.26 In mid-November, the 330th and the Chinese 10th engineers at Mile 63 began the 54-mile “race to Shingbwiyang,” by breaking a path through the jungle. To the rear, the 45th Engineers were joined by a number of newly arrived units. The 849th and 1 883rd Aviation Battalions helped with final grading and graveling from Pangsau Pass southward. The 209th Combat Battalion operated a sawmill, did road maintenance at the pass, and a little farther south built a 157-foot-long girder bridge over the Nawngyang River. The 823rd engineers maintained the older sections of the road, while the 479th Maintenance Company repaired equipment. With the help of Company C of the 45th Engineers, which had made an overland trek to open an advanced roadhead at Mile 70 early in October, the 330th had pushed its lead bulldozer twenty-two miles beyond that point by the close of November.27
Under Lt. Col. William J. Green, who became road engineer on 3 December, progress was rapid. Favored by generally clear weather, the 330th Engineers gradually improved their performance until they attained early in December an average of a mile a day. The units to the rear maintained the pace set by the those in the lead. Specifications called for a minimum width of twenty-seven feet, shoulder to shoulder, with a 20-foot roadway, maximum grades of 10 percent, and a minimum curve radius of fifty feet. Accounting for the rapid progress in construction were various factors, including around-the-clock operations, the trickling forward of new equipment, and Pick’s insistence on constant supervision of construction and maintenance by all commanders and on giving junior officers
a detailed insight into the planning behind each phase of the work. The ingenuity of maintenance crews made up somewhat for the scarcity of spare parts but was not equal to the task of preventing entirely the continual deterioration of the heavy equipment, too long in constant use. At any rate, by making the best use of the equipment they had and by throwing fresh grading parties from the recently arrived 1905th Engineer Aviation Battalion to create new roadheads, Green pushed his trace to within eleven miles of Shingbwiyang by 23 December. The engineers now pressed forward through the remaining stretch. Green split the 330th to put in advance roadheads and organized two more grading parties. Shortly before noon on 27 December, the 330th engineers connected their traces 3 miles north of the town. Pick flashed the word to New Delhi that the 117-mile road from Ledo to Shingbwiyang was open. He then rode into town at the head of a convoy of jeeps and trucks. He had beaten his target date of 1 January by five days. Finished grading and graveling remained to be done, but the road from Ledo to Shingbwiyang, which Stilwell wanted, was open.28
Soon after his arrival in the theater, Pick had taken steps to begin work on that part of the pipeline system for which he was responsible. Wheeler had informed him that Stilwell was no longer
interested in a line over the mountains by way of Fort Hertz. Early in October the Chief of Engineers had recommended against using the light, invasion-weight pipe in the high elevations of the China-Burma divide. Consequently, on the 16th Stilwell had gone back to the original plan of putting the pipeline along the road. Because materials could be moved forward more easily there, construction would be simplified. Pick had a considerable stock of 4-inch pipe in his warehouses, but no troops to build the line were scheduled to arrive before January.29 Determined not to waste two months of good construction weather, he decided to use men from the 330th Engineers and from the recently arrived 209th Combat Battalion and 382nd Construction Battalion. On 27 October he put the men to work laying pipe from the refinery at Digboi, toward Ledo, fourteen miles to the south. Early in November Col. Kenneth MacIsaac, who had recently arrived from the United States with a staff of four petroleum engineers, took charge of the project. Almost totally inexperienced in this type of construction, the troops under MacIsaac caught on quickly. The line was soon complete to Ledo and was being extended down the road. The men were laying an average of 1.2 miles of pipe a day. The rate slowed down when they reached the mountains, where they rarely laid more than half a mile a day. By the last week of December, the pipeline crews had almost caught up with the graveling details at Mile 60.
Thereafter, MacIsaac slowed the pace of the advance to that of the gravel-head in order not to hamper the forward elements on the road.30
Stilwell’s campaign in northern Burma had gotten off to a premature start on 16 October. The tactical plan called for the Chinese to advance from Shingbwiyang to the Tarung River, which flowed in a southerly direction about twenty miles to the east. From the Tarung, Stilwell’s forces were to drive southward on 1 December toward the town of Myitkyina, some 140 miles away. Myitkyina was the main operational base for the Japanese forces holding northern Burma. Astride the route planned for the Ledo Road, it was a key rail terminus. Near the outskirts of the town was a vitally important airfield. Operations against the Japanese did not develop as planned. On 30 October the Chinese ran into unexpectedly strong enemy formations on the west bank of the Tarung. What was to have been a quiet “forward displacement” became a seesaw struggle.31 The possibility of a counterattack against Shingbwiyang and the roadhead had loomed large in the minds of the engineers near the front. Writing to Pick on 14 December, Lt. Col. William E. Hicks, executive officer of the 330th Engineers, complained that his forward battalion, approaching Shingbwiyang, had only piecemeal information on the location and status of the front. Liaison of the engineers with the ground forces was practically nonexistent, Hicks declared, and the air-raid warning system was totally inadequate insofar as his forward elements were concerned. On 30 December Hicks reiterated his fears, but by the time his letter reached Ledo the Chinese had scored a signal victory at Yupbang Ga. This triumph clinched their hold on the line of the Tarung.32
The Burma Road
Prospects in late 1943 for opening a line of communications in Assam and Burma appeared brighter, but such was not the case in western China. Colonel Dawson could report but slight progress on road work there. By the end of October, funds allotted for the repair of the Burma Road east of the Mekong were exhausted. West of the river the Chinese did some work on bridges, but since they were still haunted by the spectre of a Japanese crossing of the Salween, it was impossible to get them to resurface the demolished portions of the road within thirty-five miles of the river. In December Stilwell proposed a further allotment of 480,000,000 Chinese dollars for widening, surfacing, and reducing grades, but the likelihood of getting the money appeared slight. Little work was accomplished. The Burma Road, Dawson disclosed late that month, was “still essentially a one-track road. ...” Nor could he report any real progress on the Mitu Road. Having appropriated 168,000,000 dollars in September for construction of the first
300 kilometers, the Chinese Government organized a makeshift Mitu Road Authority. Despite Dawson’s repeated protests, the Chinese ignored the graded and generally satisfactory roadbed of the Yunnan-Burma Railroad; they planned instead to turn a nearby supply trail into a one-lane, dry-weather road. This trail occasionally followed stream beds, which meant that monsoon rains would wash a road out altogether. In February the director of the road authority quit. His successor refused to take over because the agency’s funds were exhausted. By this time American hopes for the Mitu Road had been dashed to pieces by Chinese indifference and mismanagement.33
Supplies
Engineer supply for the theater was an immense problem by the latter months of 1943. In October General Somervell, on a worldwide inspection trip, visited Base Section 3. His observations and his talks with General Wheeler and Colonel Strong convinced him that Army Service Forces would have to intensify its efforts even more if Stilwell’s vital supply line across Burma was to be completed before the monsoon began in 1944- The engineers’ most common complaint about their equipment was that the D-4 tractors and ½-yard shovels were too small for the work the general service regiments had to do. On 21 October Somervell radioed Styer, directing him to procure and ship to the theater by January 1944 a large number of heavy construction items. Included were 100 D-7 tractors, 40 shovels, 70 scrapers, 75 graders, and 10 rock crushers. Somervell assured Wheeler that on his return to Washington he would institute changes in tables of equipment for general service regiments to provide machinery of greater earth-moving capacity. Noting that local sources of engineer material were almost exhausted, particularly in the categories of electrical and water distribution systems and builder’s hardware, Somervell directed his subordinates to begin shipment by January 1944 of a 6-month supply of such materials.34
In reviewing the troop situation with Somervell, Wheeler emphasized the fact that units from the United States were not reaching Base Section 3 on time. The causes were varied—insufficient shipping, the relatively low position of the engineers on the theater priority list, and the frequent unreadiness of units in the United States for overseas movement when they were scheduled to go. The troop basis for pipeline companies, which Somervell proposed to expand from ten to seventeen, was a case in point. Three companies were needed at once, but for the reasons given above none would be in the theater before January 1944.35 Commenting on the overall engineer troop situation in a radiogram to Styer on 22 October, Somervell stated that it was impossible “to overemphasize the importance of getting these units here at
the earliest ... date.” “Adequate shipping should be secured,” he directed. In addition Styer should insure “that these units are ready to meet new priorities ... and all delays due to defects in equipment, training, or other causes should be avoided at staging areas.” Also needed in order to “strengthen the general situation” were maintenance, heavy shop, depot, and parts supply companies.36 Stilwell’s staff agreed to improve the engineers’ position on the theater priority lists. The rest was up to Army Service Forces.37
Problems of Organization
The latter part of 1943 saw far-reaching changes in the assignments of key officers in the theater. Wheeler was transferred from the Services of Supply, CBI, to the Southeast Asia Command to become Mountbatten’s chief administrative and supply officer. Mountbatten’s engineer-in-chief was British Maj. Gen. Desmond Harrison; his deputy engineer-in-chief was Col. Walter K. Wilson, Jr., recently arrived from the United States along with Maj. Gen. Albert C. Wedemeyer, who had been selected as Mountbatten’s deputy chief of staff. As Wheeler’s successor in SOS, Stilwell accepted Somervell’s choice of Brig. Gen. William E. R. Covell, an Engineer officer, at that time head of the Fuels and Lubricants Division in the Office of The Quartermaster General. Colonel Farrell of ASF’s India Committee went to CBI as Engineer, SOS, to replace Colonel
Strong, who was to return to the United States. General Godfrey was scheduled to become Stratemeyer’s engineer, with Colonel Seeman as his deputy. More officers were now available. Between mid-November and mid-December about fifty arrived from the United States to staff the engineer structure in the theater.
At this time Chennault and Stratemeyer were making vigorous attempts to take airfield construction away from the Services of Supply. Seeking control of airfield construction in China, Chennault criticized, as contrary to established policy, the arrangement of having fields built under the direction of SOS. “If the present system were working well, it might be best to let it ride,” he declared on 9 October 1943, but, he stated, SOS engineers were in many instances unprepared to do the work which the Air Forces wanted. Moreover, he felt the presence of SOS in the chain of command merely served to extend the interval between the request for and the start of construction.38 Stratemeyer, hoping to get control over construction of the B-29 fields, had placed his aviation engineers on preliminary planning early in November. Wheeler pointed out that the proposals of the airmen, if carried out, would result in the formation of two competing engineer services. The Services of Supply was already critically short of engineers, and things would only be worse if the few that were available had to be shared.39 Upon taking up his duties as commander of SOS, General
Covell supported Wheeler’s views. He explained to Stilwell on 17 November that aviation engineering was “not unlike other construction.” Building up a separate engineer organization for the Air Forces would only delay getting MATTERHORN Off the ground. In his opinion, it would be “more expeditious to expand a going organization.”40 After weighing the arguments, Stilwell on 19 November transferred responsibility for building airfields in China and Burma to the Air Forces. He approved enlarging the Fourteenth Air Force Engineer Section and sending an Air Forces engineer headquarters company to China for service with Chennault. But he kept SOS in charge of airfield construction in India.41
One of General Covell’s first jobs was to deal with a request from Stilwell for a report on SOS and for proposals as to how that command might be reorganized in line with recent War Department plans for reorganizing communications zones in theaters of operations. These plans called for centralizing control of major technical activities in headquarters, SOS, rather than delegating control to the commanders of base and advance sections. In a report made on 2 December recommending strict adherence to the War Department’s plans, Covell suggested that command over construction projects “of a nature that involves highly technical control and operation” be placed directly under his headquarters. Insofar as engineer work was concerned, commanders of base and advance sections would henceforth be responsible only for administrative and housekeeping functions.42 Although Stilwell modified parts of Covell’s proposals, he approved fullest possible application of the principle of centralized command over engineer construction.43
On 22 December Covell established the Construction Service as one of his subordinate commands and made Colonel Farrell its head. At the same time, Farrell remained as Engineer, SOS.44 On 15 January Farrell took charge of all engineer work for which SOS was responsible except that in Pick’s Base Section 3 and in the advance sections in China. To staff his new headquarters, he merely made use of his SOS Engineer Section. Retaining its organizational structure substantially as it was, he took advantage of the recent influx of engineer officers from the United States to expand the various sections.45
By the end of January, Farrell, responsible for engineer work in a vast area, had set up a field organization modeled on what the Corps of Engineers had in the United States; that is, one made up of divisions and districts. There were two divisions and six districts. Division 1, under Col. Philip F. Kromer, included most of central and eastern India, except Assam. In this division, District i o, headed by Lt. Col. Kenneth E. Madsen, was in charge of the
work on the B-29 fields west of Calcutta, just getting under way. District 12, placed under Col. William C. Kinsolving, a petroleum engineer, formerly general manager of the Sun Pipeline Company and recently arrived from the United States, had the task of laying the two 6-inch pipelines from Calcutta to Assam. District 11 had charge of all remaining projects, located principally around Calcutta. Outside the divisional area and reporting directly to Colonel Farrell was District 9, which was responsible for construction in the New Delhi area. Pick was in charge of Division 2, which included most of Assam and part of Burma. He had two districts. District 20 was to do all construction and maintenance at the Hump airfields in Assam. District 22 was in charge of building the pipelines along the Ledo Road. Pick remained in command of Base Section 3, which included the Ledo Road. He retained firm control of all construction for which he had been responsible; work on the Ledo Road was not under Farrell’s jurisdiction.46
In view of the transfer of airfield construction in China from the Services of Supply to the Air Forces, Covell and Stratemeyer in December prepared a plan for reassigning engineer personnel on duty there. All engineer officers assigned to airfield work in Advance Sections 3 and 4 were transferred to the CBI Air Service Command. At the close of the month, the latter organized the 5308th Air Service Area Command, with headquarters at Kunming. The new organization was to direct all airfield construction in China. Colonel Byroade was transferred from Advance Section 4 and assigned temporarily to the area command as project engineer. In early 1944 the area command organized three districts. The first had charge of work on the eight fields near Kunming, the second was to build the 13-29 fields, and the third was to build more fields for Chennault in eastern China.47
The B-29 Fields
Late in 1943 work on the 13-29 fields began. The amount of construction required was considerable, for the size and weight of the B-29 were unprecedented. The craft’s wing span was 141 feet as compared to the 104 feet of the 13-17, or Flying Fortress, the next largest bomber; its loaded gross weight of approximately 70 tons was twice that of the Flying Fortress. Its wheel load was 34 tons as against the 19 tons of the B–17. According to estimates made in the United States, the B-29 required a runway 8,500 feet long and zoo feet wide, an area almost twice that of the 6,000 by 150 foot runway used by the B-17.
In India, the engineers set out to provide the runways for the 13-29’s by enlarging and improving five existing fields in the flatlands west of Calcutta. Little could be done unless help was forthcoming from the government of India. Much of the impetus for getting work started came from the engineers on Mountbatten’s staff. The SOS engineers appealed to General Harrison and
Colonel Wilson for help. They in turn appealed to Mountbatten, whose influence on the government of India was considerable, and help was promised. In mid-December, Stratemeyer’s engineers turned over to Covell the preliminary construction plans already prepared. Company A of the 653rd Topographic Battalion began to survey the fields in order to determine how the extensions could best be made. So that the runways could be made operational at an early date despite the shortages of men and materials, the SOS engineers persuaded the airmen to accept, for the time being, runways 7,500 feet long and 150 feet wide. Since the aviation engineers who were to build the fields would not reach India until February, the engineer-in-chief of the British Eastern Command agreed to furnish local contractors to begin work at the sites. In December, District 10 borrowed 170 equipment operators from various engineer units, together with 300 trucks. By the end of the month the district had provided each field with a project engineer to serve as a liaison officer with the Royal Engineers supervisor. In January Pick released the 382nd Construction Battalion temporarily to rush work on the field at Kharagpur.48 These various makeshift arrangements would have to do until the aviation engineers arrived.
By late 1943 work on the 13-29 fields in China was also under way. Byroade and his staff had begun planning during the last week of November. To find sites for the fields, Byroade personally reconnoitered the plains around Chengtu, 150 miles northwest of Chungking. He believed the area to be the best in Free China. The terrain was similar to that of the American midwest, and in the Chengtu Valley a number of fields already existed, the runways of which could be easily lengthened for the big bombers. After studying his report of 8 December,49 Chinese and American commanders worked out an agreement to get construction started. The Superfortresses would be based at four sites—Kwanghan, Pengshan, Kiunglai, and Hsinching. (Map 21) There were to be seven fighter fields. The Chinese Military Engineering Commission would control construction; American engineers would do mainly staff work. The responsibility of Lt. Col. Waldo I. Kenerson, head of District 2, would be limited to drafting specifications, preparing layouts, making inspections, and assisting with the organizing, administering, and paying the hundreds of thousands of peasants who would be conscripted for work on the airfields.50 Since the runways would have to be built largely by hand and probably could not be brought up to required standards, the full length of 8,500 feet was authorized
Map 21: Principal airfields built or improved for the U.S. Army Air Forces, 1942-1945
to lessen the chance of serious mishaps in takeoffs and landings.
Particularly irritating to the engineers was the radical departure from existing financial arrangements whereby the Chinese had paid for building operational facilities, and the Americans had supplied quarters, recreational facilities, and other nonoperational features. President Roosevelt had promised Chiang reimbursement for all labor and materials expended on MATTERHORN in China. How far Roosevelt had committed himself became evident in mid-December when the Chinese came up with a preliminary cost estimate of two to three billion Chinese dollars. “Appalling,” wrote Stilwell on 18 December, suspecting that “squeeze” accounted for a large share of this astronomical figure, which at the official rate of exchange amounted to $100-150 million in American money.51
By early 1944 the engineers were making progress in providing the logistic
Pipeline carried across a stream on an A-frame
basis for the impending Allied offensives. Of a total U.S. Army strength in Stilwell’s command of 100,000, tt,000 were engineers. Five thousand more were on the high seas, due to arrive within the next few months. The engineers were building or maintaining some forty-five airfields in India and twenty-five in China. Nearly 90 percent of the troops were working on the Ledo Road and the pipelines in Base Section 3. There were now about 80,000 tons of supplies and equipment in the hands of engineer troops in the theater, almost all of the tonnage being in Base Section 3. The condition of most of the equipment was poor. Nearly half of the machinery in Pick’s command was deadlined because of the lack of spare parts. Local sources of supply, almost depleted because of India’s low level of industrialization and the difficulty of maintaining imports
from the West, furnished no remedy to alleviate this situation. The engineers were becoming increasingly dependent on the United States for men and materials, and Army Service Forces was working against time to make good Somervell’s commitments to the theater.
The All-out Effort Continues
There was no slackening in the pace in the first months of 1944. With the Japanese brought to battle in northern Burma, work on the Ledo Road was of great importance. The engineers in western China continued urging upon the Chinese the necessity for early reconstruction of the Burma Road to support the Y-Force’s coming advance. At the same time engineer commanders were taking advantage of their growing resources in men and materiel to push the pipelines northward from Calcutta to Assam, and from there southeastward into Burma. To help prepare the great surprise which the B-29’s had in store for the Japanese, the engineers had ahead of them the enormous job of completing the bases in India and China for the Superfortresses. In addition, the demands of the struggle in northern Burma were to involve the engineers in combat for the first time.
Combat Support
After the Chinese won their victory over the Japanese at Yupbang Ga in the last week of December, Stilwell made plans to push the enemy farther southward. One of the prominent terrain features in northern Burma was the Tanai River, which flowed northwest
ward for about 50 miles through the Hukawng Valley to within ten miles of Shingbwiyang, where it made an abrupt turn to the south. The Tarung River, its source in the northern hills, flowed southward into the Tanai in the Hukawng Valley at a point about 18 miles southeast of Shingbwiyang. An oxcart trail led from Shingbwiyang eastward across the Tarung and then south across the Tanai to the village of Mogaung, 30 miles southwest of Myitkyina. This trail was the main supply route for the Japanese. Stilwell wanted to move a Chinese force across it some 30 miles southeast of Shingbwiyang in order to envelop the Japanese believed to be along the north bank of the Tanai east of the Tarung. While the main body of the division would assault the enemy frontally along the Tarung, a Chinese regimental combat team would slip across the Tanai south of Shingbwiyang and proceed along the river’s left bank. At the same time, a Chinese infantry regiment, assembled 25 miles southwest of Shingbwiyang, would move eastward into the upper Hukawng far behind the Japanese. If this plan of campaign could be carried out successfully, the Japanese would be trapped and destroyed in the Hukawng Valley. After that, the march on Myitkyina would be virtually unopposed.52
While the Chinese were preparing for the offensive, Stilwell detached two companies of the 330th Engineers to clear trails through the ten miles of jungle between Shingbwiyang and the Tarung so that the infantrymen could move forward more easily. This area was so near the enemy troops that patrols from both the 330th and the Chinese units had to be kept on both flanks. On 6 January a route to the Tarung was open to jeeps. The engineers then graded and widened a 12-mile-long, dry-weather road leading eastward from Shingbwiyang, to be used as a supply line for the Chinese.53
The attack was soon under way. On 13 January the Chinese crossed the Tarung and came to grips with the main body of the enemy. The regimental combat team which crossed the Tanai southeast of Shingbwiyang, hoping to envelop the enemy left flank, encountered unexpectedly strong resistance on the south bank. Although it managed to push the enemy eastward beyond the confluence of the Tanai and Tarung, it had to pause to root out pockets of resistance and consequently could not put any serious pressure on the main enemy force north of the Tanai. The envelopment of the Japanese flank failed. Elsewhere, the Chinese made reasonable progress. During the first’ week of February, they reached the village of Taihpa Ga located at the point where the oxcart trail crossed the Tanai, four miles east of the Tarung.54 The stubborn Japanese resistance halted progress on the Ledo Road. Pick had to keep almost all of his men north of Shingbwiyang, where they were engaged in grading and widening the stretch of road already put in.
Stilwell had decided that as soon as Taihpa Ga had been captured, he would
send Col. Rothwell H. Brown’s Chinese tank group down the oxcart trail toward Mogaung. He directed Pick to send in engineers to improve and hold open this “combat trail,” as it was henceforth usually called. This would mean a serious diversion of Pick’s engineers from the Ledo Road. The combat trail, lying dangerously below the flood levels of the Hukawng Valley, had already been rejected as a possible route for the road. A great deal of work would be needed to make it passable for military vehicles. Pick, bowing to tactical necessity, put a strong engineer force on the job of improving the trail and bridging the rivers. Men of the 1st Battalion, 330th Engineers, worked long and hard to make the trail passable for military vehicles. They were joined by the 76th Light Ponton Company and Company A of the 1883rd Aviation Battalion. Early in February a detail from the 330th built a dry-weather transport strip at Taihpa Ga, despite the frequent shelling from Japanese artillery south of the Tanai. In the first half of the month the 76th pontoniers put a 470-foot pneumatic ponton bridge across the Tarung. The overall situation was encouraging.55
During March Pick, now a brigadier general, had to lend a number of his engineers to the infantry to provide support for the forward movement. At the beginning of the month, at Taihpa Ga, the 71st and the 77th Light Ponton Companies built a 470-foot ponton bridge across the Tanai over which Brown’s Chinese tankers and infantrymen passed and then moved down the combat trail.56 Ten bulldozer operators from the 330th General Service Regiment volunteered to support Brown’s forces with their machines. On 3 March they went into action with the tankers at a point thirteen miles southeast of Taihpa Ga. The engineers’ mission was to hew a trail through the jungle to the southeast and help get the tanks across numerous streams so that they could make a surprise assault on the Japanese at the hamlet of Walawbum, twenty-two miles southeast of Taihpa Ga. Three of the engineers were wounded the first night. Three were subsequently awarded the Silver Star, and the entire group was commended, as Stilwell put it, “for resolute conduct under very difficult terrain conditions and while frequently in contact with enemy opposition.”57
As infantry and tanks closed in on Walawbum from the northwest, a new threat to the Japanese appeared from the east. The American infantrymen originally scheduled at QUADRANT to serve under Wingate were, upon arrival in the theater, diverted to Stilwell to be used as a hit-and-run force. Merrill, now a brigadier general, was in command. Correspondents dubbed the force “Merrill’s Marauders.” On their first mission, the Marauders suddenly appeared at Walawbum on 3 March and threatened the Japanese there with entrapment. The enemy commander on the same day ordered a general retreat to the south. By 9 March the Japanese were gone.58
Early in March Wingate was ready to
begin his airborne offensive. He had assembled Colonel Cochran’s Air Commando unit, 4 brigades of Chindits, and the 900th Engineer Airborne Aviation Company at 2 airfields, 300 miles northeast of Calcutta. The engineers were to prepare strips in the Burmese jungle for the Chindits to land on. Engineers in other theaters had already carried out airborne missions; this one would be the first mission in which they would travel to their destinations in gliders. Airmen, reconnoitering at low altitudes over the Burmese forests, had come upon two fairly level clearings near the western bank of the Irrawaddy, eighty miles south of Myitkyina. Engineers flown in with the first infantry detachments were to prepare the clearings for the large number of planes to come in later. Aerial photographs made shortly before the scheduled takeoff showed that trees had been dragged onto one of the clearings to block a landing. All the gliders would therefore have to be flown to the other clearing despite the congestion likely to ensue.
On the evening of 5 March men, planes, and gliders were ready to take off for their destination, 250 miles deep in enemy-held territory. Accompanying the infantry were Capt. Patrick J. Casey, commander of the 900th engineers, with 13 of his men. They had four bulldozers, two scrapers, a grader, a jeep, and hand tools. The men loaded the bulldozers, with blades attached, on the gliders. The air fleet took off, the planes towing the gliders in tandem. Crossing the 7,000-foot-high mountains of the Indo-Burmese border, the fleet soon approached the clearing. The heavily loaded gliders came down at high speed. Some of the first ones ran into unforeseen difficulties. The field was crisscrossed with ruts, which, overgrown with grass, had been invisible to the reconnoitering parties. The ruts tore off the landing gear of some of the craft and caused a number of crashes. With so many craft coming down at once, several pile-ups resulted. Some of the gliders rammed into the trees surrounding the clearing. The glider in which Captain Casey and an engineer enlisted man were riding came in too high. Attempting to circle the clearing for a landing, the pilot lost control of the craft; it plunged into a tree, and the occupants were killed. All told, about 5 percent of the landing force was lost. A bulldozer and a scraper were wrecked.
The first infantrymen to land dispersed to guard against possible enemy infiltration. The engineers began to prepare the landing strip. Their main job was to level the clearing as rapidly as possible with their machinery. Some of the infantry, using hand tools, filled in ruts and cut grass. The soil, with a high clay content, would be satisfactory for dry-weather operations. The next night, about seventy C-47’s safely brought in troops and supplies on a runway already provided with lights, radios, and radar. That same night another detachment of the 900th was flown to a glade fifty miles farther south. This landing was made without mishap. Using their bulldozers, the engineers smoothed the surface of the clearing sufficiently to enable transports to land without serious damage. Chindits, flown to these two fields, set out to dynamite the Burma Railway.59
Harassed from the front and rear, the Japanese in the Hukawng Valley withdrew southward, hoping to make a stand on a ridge at the southern end of the valley. On 19 March the Chinese upset these plans by seizing the ridge. They then pushed on, while the Marauders repeatedly hit at the enemy’s rear and flanks. In late March, with his forces only seventy-five miles from Myitkyina, Stilwell planned a bold stroke to seize the city and its important airstrip before the monsoon closed in. The Chinese were to continue the advance in such strength as to lead the Japanese commanders to believe that Mogaung, not Myitkyina, was their goal. While the Japanese moved troops from Myitkyina to defend Mogaung, two Chinese regiments and the Marauders would slip over the Kumon Range and descend on Myitkyina from the northwest.60
Meantime, the Japanese began an offensive of their own against the British Fourteenth Army near Imphal on the Indian-Burmese border. The British had been expecting an attack for months and had their plans ready for meeting it. At the first enemy attacks, they intended to retire from the mountainous frontier and draw the Japanese into the Manipur Plain. When the Japanese reached Imphal, British ground troops with the help of airborne reinforcements would turn on them. But the enemy struck with much greater speed and strength than expected, and the British position soon appeared to be precarious.61
The extent of the Japanese offensive suggested to Mountbatten the need for stronger measures against the enemy’s lines of communications. Additional airborne troops would have to be flown into Burma. To place his last two Chindit brigades across enemy lines of communications and to supply his more or less isolated units already in Burma, Wingate called upon the airborne engineers to prepare a landing strip in a clearing about eighty miles southwest of Mogaung. At dusk of 21 March a third detachment of the airborne engineers was flown to Burma. Construction of this landing field was a race against time. Wingate’s staff believed the Japanese, who would undoubtedly learn of the landing, would attack within twenty four hours. The engineers would have to prepare the strip so that the Chindits could land before the enemy arrived. The race was won by two hours; this was the length of time it took the first Chindits to make contact with the approaching Japanese. Personally directing this new assault, Wingate was killed in a plane crash on 24 March. He left to his successor, Maj. Gen. W. D. A. Lentaigne, the problem of coping with the desperate situation of those Chindits holding the railroad block at Mawlu against frantic Japanese attempts to break their grip.62
On the plains of Manipur, things continued to go badly for the British. By 30 March the Japanese vanguard had reached the highway leading north from Imphal to Dimapur, about 170 miles southwest of Ledo. The British Fourteenth Army,
70,000 strong, found itself cut off from contact with friendly forces. In an emergency meeting on 3 April at Jorhat with Mountbatten and his principal subordinates, Stilwell was relieved to discover that the British were confident of ultimate success because of the logistical overextension of the Japanese forces. In fact, for the first time, Stilwell’s British colleagues seemed really enthusiastic about his offensive against Myitkyina.63
Because of the desperate plight of the Chindits at Mawlu, Lentaigne sent the commandos and the engineers on a rescue mission. On 4 April the commandos landed five gliderloads of engineers with equipment in a clearing near the roadblock. The men prepared a landing strip at the foot of the high hill upon which the Chindit stronghold was located. Additional troops and supplies flown in enabled the Chindits to keep the Burma Railway blocked until the monsoon rains began one month later.64
Progress on the Ledo Road
During the first months of 1944 work on the Ledo Road lagged. Because of the unfavorable tactical situation east of the Tarung, nothing was done on the roadhead east of Shingbwiyang until 26 January. Between then and early February, the engineers cleared twelve miles beyond the city. Work stopped. The proximity of the Japanese and the diversion of troops to the combat trail made it advisable to halt. For the time being, the 45th and 330th General Service Regiments and four aviation battalions graded and graveled the road north of Shingbwiyang. The beginning of March saw the resumption of sustained work on the roadhead. The 1st Battalion of the 45th Engineers took the lead. Hardly had it finished its clearing and grading to the Tarung during the last week of March, when Stilwell directed it to move south of the Tanai to help maintain the combat trail. Moving up to the forefront on the Ledo Road, the 1883rd Aviation Battalion began pushing through the forests and marshes beyond the Tarung. The unit did both grading and graveling. In April, to speed the work, General Pick sent the 1905th Aviation Battalion and Company A of the 330th Engineers ahead of the 1883rd to put in a finished and separate four-mile stretch of road. At the same time, details of engineers built a number of landing strips along the road so that supplies could be flown in and defense of the road facilitated.65
It had been recognized from the first that one of the biggest jobs on the Ledo Road would be bridging the turbulent rivers of northern Burma. Materials had been requisitioned early and had begun to reach the theater in the first months of 1943. The engineers in the theater had decided that the H-20 bridge would be best. This bridge consisted of decking, supported by two trusses made up of rectangular, latticed steel sections, each 12½ feet long, 6 feet high, and 2 feet wide, weighing nearly a ton
apiece, and bolted together. The maximum span, made up of ten sections on a side, was 125 feet; it could carry loads up to 15 tons. With shorter spans and more than two parallel trusses, the capacity of the bridge could be increased to 54 tons. Early in March, General Pick placed the main responsibility for bridging on the 209th Combat Battalion. One company of the battalion, helped by the 76th Light Ponton Company, built an H-20 bridge, 960 feet long, over the Tarung in 27 days, completing it early in April. The other companies of the 209th bridged the lesser streams beyond the Tarung. In mid-March, Company A of the 209th started to build an H-20 over the Tawang. This bridge, together with its wooden trestles over the swampy approaches, was 1,200 feet long. The major accomplishment of Company F of the 330th Engineers during the dry season was the erection of a third H-20, 607 feet long, over the Tanai. This job was completed early in May.66
As a result of the QUADRANT Conference, bridging for the Ledo Road had become a major subject for planning in the Office of the Chief of Engineers and in Army Service Forces in the fall of 1943. During the following winter OCE sponsored various study projects in order to find the most suitable types of bridges for the major river crossings. Since the structures for the road would be built far behind the front lines, various types of military bridges and even commercial bridges could be considered. At this time a new type of structure, the Bailey bridge, was replacing the H-20.
Named after its British inventor, Sir Donald Coleman Bailey, it was based on an entirely different principle from that of the H-20. Its basic unit was a flat panel 10 feet long and 5 feet high, weighing about 600 pounds. The panels were connected by pins to form trusses, which were joined beneath by transoms to support the decking. Multiple trusses and multiple stories of panels made it possible to erect spans of 30 to 220 feet that could carry loads from 10 to 100 tons. The panels could also be used to build piers. One great advantage of the Bailey was its adaptability to various loads. Another type of bridge which might be used was the I-beam bridge, produced commercially, the decking of which rested on steel beams from 30 to 60 feet long.67 Confronted by a shortage of engineering data within and without the theater, the Chief’s Office sent a team of bridging specialists to CBI in January 1944 for firsthand consultations with engineers in the theater. As a result of investigations and discussions held at Ledo and New Delhi during February and March, the theater engineers chose the H-20 bridge as still the best for the Ledo Road. This decision created something of a stir in Washington, since the H-20’s during the past year had been replaced by Baileys in the Engineers’ catalog of standard equipment. Attempts by the Office of the Chief of Engineers to get Pick and Farrell to accept substitutes were to no avail. Bailey bridge panels would require more cargo space for a given bridge capacity than would the H-20, and I-beams were
too long for shipment on the diminutive cars of India’s railways. Faced with these irrefutable logistical arguments, OCE accepted the theater’s decision and reinstituted procurement of H-20 bridging in late April 1944.68
The longer the finished portion of the Ledo Road became, the greater was the effort needed to keep it open to traffic. Pick systematically turned over to various engineer battalions the responsibility of maintaining each new section of the road as soon as the forward troops finished compacting the final layer of gravel or crushed rock. On 29 April, he set up a road maintenance division under Lt. Col. Donald L. Jarrett, to direct the work of engineer troops who were to keep completed sections in repair.69 By mid-May, Jarrett had three aviation battalions working full time on maintaining the road between Ledo and Shingbwiyang. They built and repaired bridges, resurfaced poor sections, eliminated some of the worst curves, reduced grades, and installed better drainage. Since Jarrett’s organization was directly under Pick, Colonel Green as road engineer was able to concentrate his attention almost entirely on road construction.70
Progress on the Pipelines
During the first months of 1944 Colonel MacIsaac began to make more rapid progress on the pipelines. Late in January specially trained troops arrived from the United States and took over construction of the 4-inch line along the road. The 699th and 706th Petroleum Distribution Companies, joined by the 775th in February, strove to complete the line from Ledo to Shingbwiyang as soon as possible without getting in the way of the graveling crews. Having arrived without their equipment, the troops had to borrow hand tools, welding machines, bulldozers, and trucks from units at Ledo and on the road. They soon discovered what troops on the road had long known—that constant hauling and rough roads gave trucks a merciless beating and burdened drivers and mechanics with ceaseless maintenance chores. As if to climax their trials, the 699th engineers had hardly gotten pumping operations under way early in March when a 1 ,000-barrel tank of gasoline at Logai, fifty miles down the road from Ledo, burst into flames and had to be junked. Nevertheless, by mid-March the line was through to Shingbwiyang. Thereafter, MacIsaac moved the 706th and 775th forward as rapidly as the tactical situation permitted.71
Colonel Kinsolving, head of District 12, had hoped to begin construction in January on the first standard-weight 6-inch line, which would extend from Calcutta to the Assam Oil Company’s storage tanks at Tinsukia, 30 miles west of Ledo. The diversion of troops to build a 6-inch line to the MATTERHORN fields, and the delay in the arrival of salvaged standard-weight pipe from British depots in the Middle East forced Kinsolving to mark time until mid-February. Then,
with three petroleum distribution companies, the 709th, 776th and 777th, he began to build the line from the tanker terminal at Budge-Budge, south of Calcutta, up along the Bengal-Assam Railway toward Tinsukia—a distance of 750 miles. At Tinsukia the line would connect with the 4-inch invasion-weight line running along the Ledo Road. It must have seemed to Kinsolving that many factors were in conspiracy against his plans to complete the project by August. When the pipe began to come in, it was frequently in damaged condition and without couplings and screws. Farrell and Kinsolving decided in late February to build the line with invasion-weight pipe, newly arrived from the United States and intended only for the northern reaches of the line. This decision produced complications, for in the densely populated lower Brahmaputra Valley it was necessary to bury this thin pipe, which was highly subject to corrosion and leakage. Stilwell’s drive in Burma and the Japanese invasion of Manipur Province placed such a strain on the Bengal-Assam Railway that the tonnage allotted to District 12 had to be cut by nearly 75 percent in March. There were bright spots, however. The railway officials and crews proved highly cooperative in hauling and unloading pipe along the right-of-way, and the British garrison engineers at various posts along the route did effective work in securing land and rounding up local workmen.72
Progress on the B-29 Fields
Meanwhile, the engineers were rushing work on the MATTERHORN fields. In West Bengal, Colonel Madsen, head of District 10, had the 879th Airborne Aviation Battalion, the 382nd Construction Battalion, and the 853rd, 1875th, and 1877th Aviation Battalions. These units began work on the five B-29 fields in March with borrowed equipment, pending the arrival of their machinery. In mid-April, with the arrival of the 1888th Aviation Battalion, Madsen had 5,000 engineers on the job. By the end of the month Kinsolving announced substantial completion of a 6-inch pipeline from the tanker terminal at Budge-Budge to the fuel distribution systems at the airfields. With the arrival of the aviation battalions’ machinery in April more rapid progress was possible on the runways. A major task was to make the best use of the local workmen, who were not too efficient at best. It was soon obvious that native customs would have to be observed, if the construction was to go on smoothly. At Chakulia, the 1877th engineers, unaware that the Bengalese regarded the quarrying of rock as man’s work and the screening of it as woman’s, bulldozed stockpiles for both sexes to screen. Everyone walked off the job. Religious considerations obliged the engineers in District 10 to stock seven types of rations. Work moved ahead, but slowly.73
In China, progress on the B-29 fields was encouraging. Each field was to consist of a runway, taxiways, hardstands, a fuel distribution system, revetments, and housing for service crews. Since it was impracticable to transport either cement and concrete mixers or asphalt from India, runways would have to be built of rock, gravel, and sand. Limited in theory to staff and liaison functions, Colonel Kenerson, as District 2 engineer at Chengtu, had to assume numerous responsibilities which the Military Engineering Commission was charged with but could not perform adequately. Kenerson had to supervise much of the administrative work required in hiring and utilizing the 365,000 peasants conscripted by the Governor of Szechwan. Despite centuries of experience in building hard-surfaced roads by hand, the Chinese were largely unprepared to construct the 8,500-foot runways capable of sustaining the 70-ton bomber. Kenerson found he had to teach them the elements of soil mechanics; then he had to supervise them constantly to see that they applied what he had taught them. As a rule, the peasants toiled dutifully, but there were some serious riots caused by disgruntled workers whose only desire was to go home.74
In late February there was a noticeable slowdown, partly as a result of the failure of the Chinese to find enough trucks for hauling material and partly because of
the breakdown in the government’s system for distributing funds. Brig. Gen. Thomas F. Farrell, supporting Kenerson’s efforts insofar as possible, sent several small rock-crushers by air and supplied a detachment of engineers to install gasoline distribution systems at the bomber fields. By the time construction had started in January, Chinese estimates of the cost of the fields had risen to a fantastic five billion dollars. “Squeeze” in the Chengtu area would inflate even that figure. By late spring cost estimates were to reach seven billion dollars. At the official rate of exchange, the United States would have to pay $350,000,000 for the fields at Chengtu.75
Airfields for Chennault
Work was continuing on the fields in eastern China for the Fourteenth Air Force. Since the fall of 1943 Chennault had been trying to enlarge his engineer staff of four men to make possible more effective supervision of the work. Shortly after the 5308th Air Service Area Command activated its Engineer Division under Byroade at Kunming on 1 February 1944, Chennault conceived the idea of merging Byroade’s office with the Engineer Section of the Fourteenth Air Force. On 16 March Byroade assumed the dual role of Engineer, Fourteenth Air Force, and Engineer, 5308th Air Service Area Command. He merged his two offices within the month. On 18 March, Stilwell gave Chennault control of all construction for air force elements in China, a control Chennault delegated
to Byroade.76 The air force engineers had their work cut out for them.
District 3 in eastern China inherited all the harassments and irritations Advance Section 4 of SOS had experienced with Chinese officials and contractors. The lieutenant-governor in South Kiangsi, who had tied up construction at Kanchow and Sincheng during the winter because of a dispute over the certification of contractors, finally had the situation sufficiently under control to permit construction to start early in March. “He has merged all the contractors in the area into a company of his own,” one engineer wrote to Byroade, “and has jacked prices for earthwork, paving, etc., up 200% at Sincheng and 100% at Kanchow.”77 Merchants supplying materials for American projects, informed that local officials expected generous kickbacks on each sale, adjusted prices accordingly. In many instances work was held up, specifications were flouted, and schedules disrupted by the paramount importance of “face.” The engineers learned that the Chinese could easily lose face if they took orders from foreigners, admitted their ignorance, or dealt with officials of lesser rank. In China, ways and means had to be found to remove even the most minor incompetent officials without affronting their dignity. But progress was made on the airfields. By t April 1944 Engineer District 3 was maintaining eight major fields in eastern China, and construction was well under way on eight more.78
Even at this late date work on the Hump airfields was continuing in Assam to enable them to handle bigger loads for Chennault. As head of District 20, Lt. Col. Karl M. Pattee had a staff of twenty officers and the 848th Aviation Battalion at his disposal. Most construction and maintenance continued to be a responsibility of the Royal Engineers. But Pattee was able through his control of his aviation battalion to exercise a more than nominal control over the course of airfield work in Assam. As before, airfield construction conformed to British specifications at all of the eight airfields regularly used by the Air Transport Command in Assam. By the spring of 1944 the airlift was beginning to realize its potentialities.79
While the Fourteenth Air Force was unable during the first quarter of 1944 to carry out all of Chennault’s claims, the successes that it did achieve were such that the Japanese high command was compelled to act in the spring. Shipping on the Yangtze River had become so unsafe that the enemy determined to reopen the Peiping-Hankow railway as an alternate supply line. Because of Chennault’s crippling attacks on the sea-lanes linking Japan to her southern conquests, the high command ordered its mainland armies to overrun Chennault’s eastern airfields and open railroad communications from the Yangtze Valley to Canton and French
Indochina. The first phase of this operation, starting in April, was to be the conquest of a large pocket north of Hankow. In May the Japanese began to move south from their base at Hankow to drive the Fourteenth Air Force off its advanced bases around Kweilin.80
The Theater Engineer
Colonel Newcomer, Stilwell’s engineer, was little concerned with all this activity in China. Although his responsibilities were theater-wide, Newcomer never looked upon his office as playing “a critical role.” His staff at peak strength included one officer, Lt. Col. Robert F. Seedlock, and three enlisted men. Stilwell rarely consulted Newcomer. His principal job remained that of coordinating with the Chinese on airfield construction for Chennault and MATTERHORN and supplying Chinese troops to be sent to Burma. His office continued to take responsibility for supervising housekeeping duties for the American forces in Chungking. To do such administrative work as was needed for the engineer units in India, Newcomer had set up a small rear echelon office in New Delhi.
Early in May, General O’Connor, formerly head of the Northwest Service Command, arrived in India to replace Newcomer, who was transferred to Panama. Newcomer later stated that he was never so happy as when he received his orders for his new assignment. General O’Connor set up his theater engineer office in New Delhi and maintained a forward echelon in Chungking under Colonel Seedlock. The office of theater engineer assumed no more importance under O’Connor than it had under Newcomer.81
Overall Progress in Burma During the Early Monsoon
Work on the Ledo Road continued well into May. The 45th Engineers, taking over the lead on the road on the 15th of that month at Mile 168, began clearing and grading. But it was soon evident that the 1944 monsoon would be the equal of its predecessor. “The rain never stopped,” recorded the regimental historian.82 Progress through the mud slowed to a crawl. Toward the end of the month, General Pick came to definite conclusions about the immediate future. Mindful of the loss of engineer troops to the fighting front and the increasing maintenance efforts required by the rains, Pick decided that for the time being his engineers could do little more insofar as road construction was concerned. Having advanced about 70 miles during the past four months, the road was open to trucks as far as the Tanai, 145 miles from Ledo. The roadhead had reached a point 30 miles beyond the river. “I do not wish to give you the impression,” Pick wrote to General Covell on 25 May, “that we are folding up.” He went on to say:–
But I thought you would like to know
what the conditions are. ... Our equipment to a very great extent is just about shot. Our troop strength has been reduced to such an extent that we can not be expected to go any further [than] Warazup during this season... But unless I can get troops and equipment, I don’t think we can advance any farther and maintain the soft, spongy, newly completed road. …83
It was hardly likely that the Ledo Road would be extended much further during the monsoon.
The campaign in northern Burma was so far behind schedule that it was questionable whether the road could have been pushed through to Myitkyina before the monsoon rains in any case. To make matters worse, the Chinese had persistently hung back from launching the Y-Force across the Salween. These unfavorable developments, together with the British reverses on the Manipur Plain, had gradually forced Stilwell to give up hope of extending the road into Myitkyina during May. But since late March he had been making plans for taking Myitkyina by an air attack before the monsoon set in. Capture of the town would be desirable for many reasons. It would have beneficial effects for the airlift to China. Seizure of the airfield would drastically curtail the enemy’s power to interfere with the airlift and would at the same time permit the Air Transport Command to use a lower and more southerly route across the mountains to Kunming. Besides, the extension of the two 4-inch pipelines to Myitkyina, which could probably be achieved before the Ledo Road was completed that far, would enable transports to refuel there and thus conserve valuable cargo space for supplies for China.84
On 17 May the Marauders and the Chinese swooped down on the surprised Japanese garrison at Myitkyina. The attackers easily overran the bomb-cratered airstrip, but the defenses of Myitkyina itself were stronger than expected. Instead of winning a quick victory, the attackers were pushed back from the outskirts of the town. The great need now was for more men and supplies, which could come only by air. The airfield would have to be repaired in a hurry. On the evening of the first day of the battle, a group of men from the 879th Airborne Aviation Battalion arrived in gliders and began filling craters in the 4,800-foot runway. Two days later a detachment of the 504th Light Ponton Company, flown in from Ledo, prepared to ferry troops across the Irrawaddy and reconnoiter southwest of Myitkyina. When the tide of battle turned in favor of the enemy, Stilwell decided to put engineer troops in the line with the Marauders holding on at the northern edge of the town. On 24 May the 209th Combat Battalion, commanded by Lt. Col. Leslie E. Sandvall, was pulled off the Ledo Road and hastily flown to the front; four days later, the 236th Combat Battalion, under Lt. Col. Harold E. Greenlee, was sent in from Ledo. The struggle for Myitkyina promised to be a long one. Meanwhile, the monsoon made it necessary to put an end to guerrilla warfare. When the
rains set in, Mountbatten began withdrawing the Chindits. Early in May engineer detachments were flown to two villages some thirty miles south of Myitkyina to prepare the fields from which the air commandos were to fly the Chindits back to eastern India.85
During June and July the fighting at Myitkyina showed no signs of abating. The engineers continued with their missions in support of the siege. By early June all the 879th Airborne Aviation Battalion was at work on the airfield. The detachment of the 504th Ponton Company, having established a boat landing on the Irrawaddy three miles below Myitkyina, was busy ferrying Chinese troops across the river and carrying Gurkha riflemen far downstream for reconnaissance missions. In the lines being drawn ever tighter around the town were the two combat battalions. After combining the engineers into a provisional regiment early in June, Brig. Gen. Haydon L. Boatner, Stilwell’s field chief of staff, brigaded them with the Marauders on the northern approaches to Myitkyina. Their baptism of fire proved costly and painful because of their unfamiliarity with the ways of the enemy and the peculiar demands of the battlefield. Like the incoming replacements for the Marauders, they were at first lax in security measures and too prone to panic when surprised. Within a short time, however, experience and behind-the-lines training enabled the engineers to fight like veterans. Casualties were heavy—the 209th engineers reported 71 enlisted men killed and 179 wounded; the 236th engineers, 4 officers and 52 enlisted men killed and 142 wounded. All of the 209th and elements of the 236th Battalion received high praise for their action at Myitkyina.86
One hopeful development in the Burma campaign was that the Chinese forces in Yunnan were at last on the move. On May the Y-Force attacked along the Salween, sending spearheads of three divisions across the river above and below the demolished bridge of the Burma Road. The Chinese engineers of the Y-Force now had an opportunity to show how much they had profited from instruction in river crossings given at the Kunming Training Center by American engineers serving with the Y-Force. From nightfall of 11 May until the next morning Chinese engineers ferried the infantry across the turbulent Salween in pneumatic assault boats and makeshift rafts, with the loss of but one Chinese infantryman. Once across the Salween, the Chinese infantry engaged the Japanese in a battle that raged back and forth for many weeks in the rugged mountains along the west bank. Eventually, the numerical preponderance of the Chinese began to tell. During late May they made a two-pronged attack. One force advanced yard by yard down the Burma Road toward Lungling, thirty-five miles west of the Salween, and another moved toward
Tengchung, thirty-five miles to the north. On 8 June the Chinese laid siege to Lungling and on 2 July attacked Tengchung. Repeated attempts to take the cities were repulsed.87
By late spring the work of the engineers on MATTERHORN had begun to pay dividends. The rock and gravel fields in western China were ready on 15 May. During the following weeks, the engineers accelerated work on the paved fields in India. Kharagpur, a field “barely operational” in mid-March, was the one nearest completion by June. The 7,500-foot long runway and fifty hardstands were complete. Hangars, salvaged from the Mediterranean theater, operational buildings, and housing were almost finished.88 On the 5th of the month the 382nd Construction Battalion standing beside Kharagpur’s concrete runway, saw the first B-29’s leave for Bangkok to bomb railway shops there. On 14 June the Superfortresses took off for the first time for Chengtu, from where they flew to the Japanese home island of Kyushu to bomb the steel mills of Yawata.89
The monsoon had brought an end to the forward progress of the Ledo Road. But efforts were under way to bring up men and machinery so that work could start with redoubled vigor in the fall. Assuring Pick that he would make certain “no one spares the horses in supplying your needs,” General Covell got from the Los Angeles Port of Embarkation a promise that it would load thirty-seven tons of spare parts on ships sailing in June and July. He had parts flown in from Calcutta for Pick’s 73 tractors and other machines deadlined at the beginning of June.90 Farrell’s representatives at Calcutta made special efforts to expedite the shipment of new machinery, an undertaking favored by the rising efficiency of the Bengal-Assam Railway. During the first three weeks of June, the Engineer Supply Officer of Base General Depot No. 2 at Calcutta sent 39 tractors, 27 graders, nine shovels, nine scrapers, and many other pieces of much-needed equipment to Ledo.91 Pick wrote Farrell on 24 June that he was as “pleased as a two-year-old at his first Christmas tree. I believe with the equipment which you are getting up to us we are going to be better off than I ever dreamed we could be. Most of us here have worn out our patience, and I might say our lifetime good looks, trying to make this old equipment go.”92
Equipment was more plentiful, but attempts to get more troops attained little success. On 1 June 1944 there were still only 7,200 on the road. The most critical need was for more shop and parts supply companies. Since early 1943 the struggle to obtain more such units had been going on. The basic difficulty had always been CBI’s low priority. In the United States there was, moreover, a serious shortage of trained mechanics and parts supply specialists. The War Department found
it impossible to organize and train new units to keep up with demands of even those theaters overseas with the highest priorities. The most Washington could promise Covell was that it might allot one parts supply and one heavy shop company to the theater late in the summer of 1944.93 Such reinforcements as Pick was able to get for his projects during the summer months consisted of but three pipeline companies, one construction battalion, and a depot company organized at Ledo in May 1944 from two platoons of the former 456th Depot Company and casual personnel.94
Despite the downpours of the monsoon, the troops laid additional miles of pipeline. On 8 June the 706th and 775th engineers connected their lines along the Ledo Road. With this connection, 180 miles of 4-inch pipe were in place from Digboi. Since Myitkyina was under siege, Stilwell deemed it inadvisable to extend the line further. As construction on the line came to a halt, work began on the second 4-inch line along the road. MacIsaac had received three additional petroleum distribution companies, the 778th, 779th, and 780th. He put the 778th to work hauling pipe from the engineer depot at Likhapani down the Ledo Road for the future construction drive. He assigned the 779th the job of putting in an underground line from Digboi to the tank farm under construction at the railway terminal in Tinsukia, twenty-two miles to the west. To the 780th he gave the job of laying the second 4-inch line from Digboi into Burma. The pace was retarded by such problems as reluctant laborers, flooded areas, washed-out bridges, and delayed pipe shipments from Calcutta. Meantime, in District 12, Colonel Kinsolving’s men were pushing ahead with determination. On July they coupled the last pipe in the first 6-inch line from Calcutta to Tinsukia. The longest invasion-weight pipeline in history was ready to carry 250,000 barrels of gasoline a month from Calcutta to Assam.95
Maps
Both the campaign in Burma and the work on the Ledo Road had been handicapped by the lack of adequate maps. The Americans had to depend mainly on maps of British or Chinese origin, many of which were out of date and inaccurate. Wavell’s General Staff Geological Survey, responsible for mapping India and Burma, did not have the resources to carry out adequately its responsibilities of revising maps and distributing them. The Chinese were too disorganized to carry on a mapping effort. In the autumn of 1942 General Reybold had sent three officers and three enlisted men to New Delhi as a liaison group. Headed by Maj. Frank N. Gunderson, they were to get from the British such maps as the Americans needed. Early in 1943 Gunderson’s group was directed to include liaison with the Chinese in Chungking in order to obtain data that might enable the Army Map
Service in Washington to help supply Stilwell’s command with satisfactory maps. Because of Chinese suspicions that the data might fall into the hands of “third powers,” particularly Britain, Gunderson’s men could at first get little information in Chungking. The situation in India improved somewhat during the summer of 1943, with the arrival of the 653rd Topographic Battalion to handle general publication and map-reproduction work for the American forces and of the 958th Aviation Topographic Company to provide aeronautical charts for the Tenth Air Force. In 1944 Gunderson reported greater success. In the summer of that year, the Chinese agreed to let the Air Forces carry out a program of aerial photography to make possible the production of up-to-date maps of China and adjacent countries. The Chinese handed over to Gunderson material on geodetic and astronomic stations, river surveys, and towns—it being understood that “third powers” would not get the data. The 653rd engineers undertook to coordinate the information with that obtainable from aerial photographs supplied by the Fourteenth Air Force and the XX Bomber Command. Late in the summer the Combined Chiefs gave the U.S. Army responsibility for supplying maps to Anglo-American forces in Asia. General O’Connor set up a map depot at Chabua to supply American forces with maps produced by the 653rd and 958th engineers or sent by Army Map Service. Gunderson’s office in New Delhi was to take care of British requisitions on American stocks, dealing directly with the depot at Chabua or with Army Map Service. Unfortunately, the aerial photography program in China was of little help to the engineers in their efforts to increase the flow of up-to-date maps to the field. Much of the photography failed to meet specifications. Too much cloud coverage and, during good weather, priorities of combat sorties cut down on the number of photographic missions. A further handicap was the strict rationing of gasoline. Consequently, little could be done to supply more adequate maps of China and Burma.96
Overall Progress During the Late Monsoon
The Chinese drive into Burma gave Allied commanders considerable cause for optimism. The performance of the Chinese engineers also contributed to the brighter outlook. On 18 June local Chinese commanders permitted the reconstruction of the partially demolished 25-kilometer stretch of the Burma road just east of the Salween. This job was turned over to Colonel Dawson and his engineers as their first major project in support of the drive west of the Salween. After four days of around-the-clock operations under occasional enemy shell fire, Dawson’s men opened the stretch to one-way traffic on 24 June. Their next
job was to rebuild the bridge across the Salween, since rafts and pneumatic boats had great difficulty in coping with the swift and treacherous river. The previous span had been a suspension bridge with stone towers and a steel trussed deck. The Chinese had left the south tower with its two anchorages intact but had completely destroyed the north tower. Dawson’s engineers set out to design an improvised steel suspension bridge similar to the suspension bridges the Chinese had been building out of vines for centuries. Unable to find any materials salvaged from the original structure and informed by SOS that no supplies could be sent from India, Dawson’s men searched Yunnan for likely substitutes. They found some 1/4-inch wire rope, a few iron plates and rope clips, and fairly ample supplies of wood. With these materials, Dawson’s Chinese engineers first set out to build a suspension footbridge. They erected a wooden tower an the north bank to replace the destroyed stone tower. They then stretched two cables across the river, anchored them to the towers, and along the cables hung V-shaped stirrups, about five feet apart. They then placed 2-inch boards along the bottom of the stirrups. The footbridge was soon improved with the installation of four cables from anchorage to anchorage and 3-inch planks along the bottom of the stirrups. The bridge could safely take loaded jeeps. The entire job required little more than a month.97
As the Chinese continued to drive the Japanese back west of the Salween, American engineers supported practically every phase of the advance. Through the efforts of the Y-Force engineers, explosives and hand tools went forward to the Chinese at the front, and each Chinese field army had a few American engineers as advisers to help locate mines and find the best sites for airstrips. An outstanding example of U.S. engineer cooperation with the Y-Force came with the formation of the Burma Road Engineer Detachment in June under Dawson, now a lieutenant colonel. The detachment, consisting initially of 27 officers and 46 men picked by Dawson from the engineers of the Y-Force operations staff, was, in effect, a construction group headquarters, modified to meet the peculiar needs of the locality. Attached for operations were various types of units, including engineer, ordnance, signal, medical, and antiaircraft artillery.98
Beyond the Salween, the engineers had a great deal of work to do. Rising to a height of 3,000 feet above the west bank of the river was Sung Shan Mountain. Japanese artillery emplaced on it commanded thirty-six miles of the Burma Road’s winding approach west of the river. In their drive on Lungling the Chinese had bypassed this strongpoint. During late June and early July, Chinese cannoneers exchanged shots regularly with the enemy. During late July and
A workman strings a ferry cable across the Salween while men in the foreground build the ferry
early August the Chinese made repeated assaults up the mountain but could not dislodge the 1,200 Japanese.99
Favorable developments along the Salween in July, especially the siege of the city of Tengchung, had repercussions in headquarters at Ledo. The fall of Tengchung, 100 miles east of Myitkyina, would clear an old caravan trail which linked Myitkyina with the Burma Road at Lungling. A number of engineers in the theater believed the Ledo Road should be built along this trail. In the summer of 1944 a heated controversy developed over the relative merits of this route as against the one Pick wanted, which ran 80 miles farther south through the town of Bhamo. The origins of the dispute went back to March 1944, when Stilwell thought he would have to limit his advance in northern Burma to a line including the Tengchung trail but not the Bhamo area. In late March, CBI commanders had begun to press Chiang to make a
The footbridge and ferry across the Salween, during Chinese advance
positive contribution to lifting the blockade of China by constructing a military highway from Lungling through Tengchung toward Myitkyina as soon as the Y-Force drove the Japanese from that part of Burma. In April Colonel Dawson made an analysis of the project and reported that building the road would be feasible from an engineering standpoint. In July General O’Connor approved construction of a road along the trail on the grounds that the region would be cleared of the enemy sooner and a road there would be zoo miles shorter than one by way of Bhamo.100 The Chinese agreed in June to adopt the American proposals and to survey the route preparatory to calling out laborers and initiating construction.101 Stilwell felt construction along the new route was urgent. “Essential that route and work be started from the China side without delay,” he radioed to O’Connor.
“Coordinate through Pick on this work.”102
Pick was strongly opposed to the whole concept of building the road along the trail, which wound through the mountains and over the steep ridges of the Himalayan spurs in northern Burma. He regarded it as a visionary undertaking, incapable of fulfillment with available resources. Upon receiving an unfavorable analysis of the project from his own engineering branch in June, Pick had ordered out a reconnaissance party in the last week of that month to gather additional data on the problems involved. Pick radioed Farrell on 18 July that it might be desirable to have a combat road through the Tengchung area and even to consider routing a pipeline that way, but he wanted nothing to do with building a truck road along the trail until more was known about the terrain.103 The question was left undecided during the summer.
While the Chinese were advancing westward from the Salween, the tide was turning in favor of the British in eastern India. By 22 June the British had broken through to relieve Imphal. The Japanese forces were now withering at the end of a communications line consisting of little more than a network of jungle trails sodden from more than a month of monsoon rains. Malaria and starvation were hastening the decimation of the invading army. The enemy commanders resolved early in July to pull back the survivors of the ill-fated offensive. The Japanese withdrew to their Chindwin River lines, leaving a third of their 155,000 troops dead on the Manipur Plain or along the mountain footpaths. The threat to the Ledo Road and to the Allied forces in northern Burma thus ended for good.104
And things continued to go badly for the Japanese in western Yunnan. The Chinese blasted the Japanese from one stronghold after another west of the Salween. Only Sung Shan Mountain remained. The Y-Force commanders, resorting to classic siege tactics, decided to mine the seemingly impregnable stronghold. With their American counterparts advising, the Chinese engineers on i 1 August began to dig two tunnels under the main centers of resistance; nine days later they set off three tons of TNT, whereupon some of the Chinese engineers rushed into the breach with flame throwers as a spearhead for the infantry. Nothing remained but to hunt down the survivors; by the first week of September, the last ones were mopped up. Farther west, Y-Force engineers gave active support to the Chinese troops besieging Tengchung. The first serious attempt to reduce this bastion took place early in August. Chinese engineers under American supervision mined the southeastern section of the city wall. The breach, together with the damage subsequently inflicted by Chennault’s bombers, was not sufficient to insure Tengchung’s immediate fall. But Chinese troops secured a foothold
at the site of the mining, and the capture of the city was only a matter of time.105
On 3 August the Japanese lost Myitkyina, and their forces retreated south-ward. The fall of the city doomed the enemy hold on northern Burma. A turning point had been reached in the long American struggle to help China. The rest of Stilwell’s Chinese troops now came out of the Mogaung Valley to assemble at Nlyitkyina in preparation for the next phase of the offensive—down the road toward Bhamo. General Pick began moving in engineer and other service troops to convert Myitkyina into the key Allied base for the final drive to open northern Burma; at the same time he took back from Stilwell his decimated engineer combat battalions, which had suffered nearly 500 casualties, and flew them to Ledo for recuperation.106
With the collapse of enemy resistance, Col. Ailanuel J. Asensio, Tenth Air Force engineer, prepared to carry out Stratemeyer’s plan for a ring of airfields around Myitkyina, capable of making this area a vital hub for transport and air combat operations.107 The existing airfield at Myitkyina, with a plane landing or taking off every two minutes, was already the busiest in the theater.108 By 1 August the engineers had extended the second four-inch line from Digboi to Ledo. To provide the all-important petroleum installations for the air and
ground efforts to come, Colonel MacIsaac launched District 2 2 on a strenuous effort to extend the first of the 4-inch pipelines into Myitkyina by October.109 With the coming of dry weather in the fall, engineer work could once more be undertaken in earnest.
The CBI Is Cut Back
The Decision to Reduce the Engineer Effort
Since the fall of 1943 Anglo-American planning circles had been increasingly reluctant to give their support to extensive military undertakings on the Asian mainland. Many factors in late 1943 and in the first months of 1944 had encouraged a shift of interest toward operations in the Pacific. Among them were China’s interminable delay in reforming its military forces, British aversion to campaigning in the Burmese jungles, the victory over the Japanese in the Gilberts in November, the Russian promise at Tehran in December to attack Japan after the surrender of Germany, and a growing desire in the spring of 1944 to avoid frittering away military resources that might be needed in the coming invasion of the Philippines or Formosa.110
Such was the feeling when General Stilwell asked the War Department on 21 April 1.944 for additional service
troops, including fourteen engineer construction battalions. He regarded these reinforcements as vital if he was to carry out the War Department’s known desires for moving supplies by truck into China and expanding deliveries by air to 20,000 tons a month by early 1945. Many in the War Department strongly opposed meeting Stilwell’s requests.111 Arguments as to whether the Ledo Road should be finished raged back and forth. General Somervell fended off proposals from the Air Forces and the British mission in Washington that the road should be extended no farther than Myitkyina. In July 1944 the Operations Division proposed that the road be completed to Myitkyina; beyond that point work should be limited to repairing and maintaining the existing one-way road which ran from that city through Bhamo to Mong Yu, where it joined the Burma Road. Trucking into China should be restricted to carrying military equipment that could not be sent by air. The Air Forces and the British heartily indorsed this view. They maintained, furthermore, that the Ledo Road could not be completed in time to support the final phases of the war against Japan; worse than that, it would constitute a logistical drain on these operations.112
General Somervell was determined to preserve intact the planned overland line Of communications to China. On 24 July he warned the Operations Division that if the optimistic assumptions regarding the early defeat of Japan proved unwarranted, everyone would be thankful that there was a Ledo Road to enable the Allies to support the Chinese locked in battle with Japan’s mainland armies. He discounted arguments that continued construction of the road would cut deeply into resources needed elsewhere. Seventy percent of the material approved for the road had already been shipped. A major proportion of the troops deemed necessary for construction and operation would still be needed to patrol and maintain the airfields at Myitkyina, the pipelines, and the existing road from Myitkyina through Bhamo to China.113 Somervell’s arguments were of no avail. The Operations Division stood its ground and prevailed upon Marshall to reduce the scope of the Ledo project. On 23 August 1944 the War Department directed Stilwell to limit construction beyond Myitkyina to a one-lane, all-weather road to make possible sending supplies by truck to China and helping the construction forces pushing the pipelines through to Kunming. Work in the theater continued at a fairly high rate after August, but it became increasingly obvious that a cutback was on the way.114
Work Resumes on the Ledo Road
During August and September there was no letup in the controversy over whether the Ledo Road should be routed east from Myitkyina through the mountains on the China-Burma border to the
Chinese city of Tengchung or continued south through Bhamo. Despite the enthusiasm of the engineers in China and of General O’Connor for the undertaking, Pick insisted that the Ledo Road should go 116 miles south by way of Bhamo and then east to connect with the Burma Road at Mong Yu.115 Aware of the developing controversy, Stilwell late in August approved construction of both routes. The Chinese would build a road over the 135 miles from Tengchung to Myitkyina; at the same time, Pick’s engineers would build the road via Bhamo.116 Pick’s reconnaissance party, sent out in the summer, returned early in September and confirmed his original adverse opinion of the Tengchung project by singling out the paucity of timber and gravel in some sections and the need for excessive excavation in others.117
As the end of the monsoon season approached, Pick redoubled preparations for resuming work on the road. During the summer months he had moved up heavy equipment and stockpiled it in the Hukawng Valley. In August Colonel Hirshfield began building a supply depot at Myitkyina not only for the road but also for combat, using men from engineer units in the area together with several thousand Burmese laborers recruited by the British. By the end of the monsoon, Pick had approximately 14,000 engineers ready for work on the road. He felt he at last had enough troops to meet any demands which might be made on him.
In the first week of October, work began once more. Elements of the 330th Engineers and of the 1304th Construction Battalion, together with the Chinese 12th Engineer Regiment, started to build a dry-weather road along the trail leading southward from Mile 178 to Myitkyina, to make possible sending trucks into the town as soon as possible. At the same time the Chinese 10th Engineer Regiment began to clear the right-of-way of the Ledo Road itself beginning at Mile 178. Behind the Chinese were grading parties of the 330th to do finished grading, surfacing, and maintenance. The 1304th was responsible for bridge building. On to October it began work on a 560-foot Bailey bridge over the Mogaung River, using materials supplied by British depots in India. In mid-October, with the opening of the offensive by Chinese troops from Myitkyina into eastern Burma, the 209th and 236th Combat Battalions began to repair the road running east of the Irrawaddy from Myitkyina to Bhamo.118
The Burma Road
The Burma Road engineers, commanded by Colonel Seedlock after Colonel Dawson left for the United States in September, got ready to help the Highway Administration build the road from Tengchung to Myitkyina. On 2 October Seedlock set up Burma Road Engineer Division 2, with headquarters
at Tengchung, and Division 3, with headquarters at Sadon, just inside the Burma frontier, some forty miles east of Myitkyina.119 Seedlock used most of his 257 engineers as supervisors and equipment operators. He kept a small force to maintain the Burma Road east of the Salween and another to make emergency repairs on the road immediately behind the Chinese XI Group Army. The dark spot in the picture, as autumn came on, was the unexpected stalling of Governor Lung in conscripting the 20,000 laborers who were to work under Seedlock. All that Seedlock could do during September and October was to push surveying, accumulate some equipment, and organize such forces for construction as he had.120
The Pipelines
When Myitkyina fell on 3 August, Stilwell’s headquarters again turned its attention to the second 4-inch pipeline, which by then had almost reached Pangsau Pass. Stilwell’s deputy, Maj. Gen. Daniel I. Sultan, stressed the urgency of extending this line to Myitkyina in time to support the coming autumn offensive in eastern Burma. Sultan set MacIsaac’s completion date as October, and MacIsaac made use of every available resource to meet his deadline. The Tenth Air Force flew 1,500 tons of pipe to Myitkyina, and drivers of the 778th Petroleum Distribution Company hauled thousands of tons more from Likhapani down the Ledo Road into Burma. Two of Kinsolving’s petroleum distribution companies, the 709th and 776th, joined the six already working on the line.121 “We have pipeline people,” Pick wrote to Covell, “road troops, ponton outfits, Pioneer Indian Labor, Nepalese Porter Corps people, a battalion of Chinese, and a herd of elephants working on it.”122 Because the pipeline left the route of the road in some localities, it was often necessary to construct cableways to feny pipe across rivers. Sometimes the men had to carry pipe by hand through the hip-deep water of the flooded lowlands. Despite such obstacles, together with the snakes, leeches, and malaria, the engineers strove to “get it through.123 On 27 September Pick radioed Farrell that the line was completed to Myitkyina. Mountbatten wired his congratulations to Covell and to Pick “and all his men who were responsible for putting the pipeline through from Tinsukia to Myitkyina in record time under monsoon conditions.” Covell, forwarding Mountbatten’s message to Pick, observed, “Our team is going strong.” Col. Birney K. Morse, former chief engineer of the Susquehanna Pipeline Company, who had succeeded MacIsaac on 22 September, took over the job of pushing the line on to China. There was no advance of the other 4-inch line beyond Tingkawk Sakan. It was already operating to capacity just to support construction and trucking along the Ledo Road.124
Plans made at QUADRANT had called
for two 6-inch pipelines from Calcutta to Assam.125 The first, built entirely with invasion-weight pipe, had been in operation since the last week of August. Kinsolving planned to start work in October on the second, to be standard-weight throughout. A heavier line could be operated at greater capacity to meet the great demand for aviation and truck gasoline in upper Assam. Since the line would pass through heavily populated areas, it would, like the first, have to be put underground. The improving tactical situation in Burma in the late summer of 1944 enabled Kinsolving to shift the southern terminus of the second line from Calcutta to the Burmah Oil Company’s port facilities at Chittagong, 180 miles to the east across the Ganges estuary. The Chief’s Office in July 1944 expressed misgivings about this move, pointing out that construction and operation in the rugged lands north of Chittagong would require a much larger number of troops. Besides, Chittagong’s shallow harbor would necessitate building a costly offshore mooring together with a submarine unloading line. But Farrell and Kinsolving knew that the eastern route would require 180 miles less pipe, would obviate crossing the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, and would lessen the dangers implicit in concentrating so many storage facilities at Calcutta. By mid-October, Kinsolving
had the 777th and the 138th Petroleum Distribution Companies at work along the railway from Chittagong to Tinsukia. Three thousand Indian laborers were clearing the route and digging the ditches.126
Airfields
By the fall of 1944 few airmen set a very high value on the advantages of the MATTERHORN airfields to the American war effort. Between June and October the B-29’s made four raids on steel and aircraft plants on the Japanese island of Kyushu, three attacks on a major steel plant in Manchuria south of Mukden, one on an aircraft factory on Formosa, and another on an oil refinery on Sumatra. It was logistically impossible to increase the rate of attack beyond an average of two sorties monthly for each B-29. The craft could not be supplied with sufficient gasoline to make their sorties profitable. Gasoline and munitions for each strike against Japan had to be flown to Chengtu by transports or by B-29’s working overtime.127 On 3 October 1944 Secretary of War Stimson observed that the drain of transports to CBI “... bids fair to cost us an extra winter in the main theater of war.”128 It was expected that the B-29 fields being built in the Marianas, much closer to Tokyo, would soon be ready. After a few more raids on Formosa and Kyushu in support of the American drive in the
Philippines and after several strategic bombing missions in southeastern Asia, the B-29’s in CBI prepared to transfer to the Pacific. By late 1944 the main engineer job on the fields in India and China was maintenance only.129
The airfields now of most concern in CBI were those around Myitkyina. While the siege was still in progress, Colonel Asensio’s men had begun work on the runways there. According to plans which had been worked out with Godfrey’s representative in June, Asensio was to complete by 1 October 1944 a 6,000-foot all-weather field at the original Myitkyina airstrip, now called Myitkyina South. A similar field was to be built just above the town—Myitkyina North. Ten miles south of Mogaung, Asensio was to build a fair-weather strip by 15 November to support the British offensive rolling southward toward Mandalay. At the same time, six miles southwest of Myitkyina, he was to have a fair-weather runway capable of taking B-29’s. Finally, to support the Chinese advance into eastern Burma, there was to be a fair-weather strip, just across the Irrawaddy, to be known as Myitkyina East, and to be finished by 1 January 1945. During July the Tenth Air Force flew in the 1888th aviation engineers so that they would be ready to begin work on Myitkyina North as soon as tactically feasible. When, after capture of Myitkyina, it became clear that the Ledo Road would not reach the town before November, Asensio began bringing in by air the rest of his units and their equipment.
The 930th and 1877th engineers arrived during September and October. By the latter month, Asensio’s projects were well under way.130
The Tactical Situation
After their victories on the Manipur Plain and at Myitkyina, the Allies made fairly steady progress along their fronts. The Japanese were being constantly forced farther south in Burma. In September General Sultan, having taken the field as Stilwell’s deputy, sent the British 36th Division on a long, southward drive along the Burma Railway from Mogaung to Mandalay. At the same time the newly organized and American-trained Chinese Sixth Army moved out of the Mogaung area and pushed southward over hills and through jungles toward a crossing of the Irrawaddy west of Bhamo. In mid-October the Chinese 1st Army advanced from Myitkyina along the road to Bhamo. The military picture in Burma grew constantly brighter for the Allies.
But it was darkening in eastern China. Disaster had begun in the spring of 1944, as the Japanese bestirred themselves to seize the airfields that the Fourteenth Air Force was using in its strikes against enemy shipping. A major Japanese drive had begun on 26 May with a thrust in the direction of Changsha. On 18 June the Chinese abandoned the city. Before the end of the month the Japanese
had reached Hengyang, where they at last encountered a Chinese force determined to hold. After a staunch but hopeless defense that lasted nearly two months, the Chinese surrendered the city on 8 August. At the beginning of September the invaders started their advance from Hengyang. While one column moved westward out of the valley toward the bomber field at Shaoyang, the main body advanced toward Lingling. Meanwhile, a Japanese expedition, moving west from Canton, threatened the bomber fields in the region to the south of Kweilin. As Stilwell had feared, the Chinese armies in the eastern provinces were incapable of stemming the enemy’s drives. It became the painful duty of Chennault’s engineers to undertake the task of destroying the airfields which would soon be overrun by the enemy. On 4 September the resident engineer at Lingling applied the torch and dynamite to the field there, four days before the Japanese arrived. On 14 September the field at Shaoyang was destroyed.131
As the Japanese were advancing rapidly along the 100-mile road from Lingling to Kweilin, the Americans had to decide quickly what to do about the major airfields clustered around the latter city. Stilwell himself went to Kweilin on 14 September to canvass possibilities for holding the area. He found that the Japanese were only seventy miles away. Equally ominous was the fact that the local commander had strict orders from Chungking to employ the classic but futile stratagem of retiring within the city’s walls. This news convinced Stilwell that Kweilin was destined to become “another rat trap.”132 He gave the order that afternoon to destroy the three heavy bomber fields near the city. The engineers complied during the night. They buried and ,detonated bombs in the taxiways and runways, while air force personnel burned the buildings. Eleven days later the process was repeated 120 miles to the south at Tanchuk, just before a Japanese column from Canton arrived.133
The loss of airfields in eastern China created a need for new ones in the central and southern part of the country. Leaving some of his planes in the eastern pocket around Kanchow and Suichuan, Chennault planned in October to redeploy the bulk of his force to fields along a north-south axis running through Chungking.134 Thus Byroade, who returned to Washington in September, bequeathed to Col. Austin W. Betts, the new Fourteenth Air Force engineer, the task of beginning construction and improvement of several fields north and east of Chungking and east of Kunming. During October Betts arranged with the Chinese to build a medium bomber base 180 miles northwest of Kweilin and another 400 miles west of that city, together with several fighter fields in these areas.135
Reorganization of CBI
The deterioration of the military situation in eastern China intensified the longstanding animosity between Chiang and Stilwell. The bitterness became obvious after President Roosevelt, seeking to stave off a total collapse of the Chinese front, had proposed in July that Stilwell assume unified command of all Nationalist and Communist military forces in China. On 25 September Chiang formally demanded Stilwell’s recall, and on 18 October the President complied.136 Within a week, CBI was split into two theaters. China Theater was headed by General Wedemeyer, who was to “advise and assist the Generalissimo in the conduct of military operations against the Japanese” and to “carry out air operations from China.” India-Burma Theater was commanded by General Sultan, whose main mission was to “support the China Theater” by assuring the “establishment, maintenance, operation, and security” of overland communications with China. To the extent specified by the Combined Chiefs, Sultan was to support Mountbatten’s operations in southeast Asia.137
Wedemeyer organized his theater with a forward echelon at Chungking and a rear echelon at Kunming. There were three major engineer offices—one for the theater at Chungking, one for the air forces at Kunming, and a third for the Services of Supply, also at Kunming. Almost no changes were made in the engineer setup in the India-Burma Theater.138
Road, Pipeline, and Airfield Projects in Late 1944
General Pick, with a relatively large force of engineers and a substantial amount of machinery under his command, made rapid progress on the Ledo Road during the fall of 1944. On to November the 330th General Service Regiment and the 1304th Construction Battalion, with the aid of the Chinese 12th Engineer Regiment completed work on the dry-weather trail from Mogaung to Myitkyina. Early in December the leading bulldozer reached the west bank of the Irrawaddy, some twenty miles downstream from Myitkyina.
The outstanding feature of the work on the road in late 1944 and early 1945 was the building of several major bridges. From 10 October to 14 January, the 1304th engineers alone built 104 spans, totaling 5,105 feet. Among their more noteworthy accomplishments were the building of a 164-foot Bailey over the Mogaung, and the construction of three H-20’s, totaling 788 feet in length.139 On 6 December the 75th Light Ponton Company completed a 1,200-foot ponton bridge across the Irrawaddy at Myitkyina to facilitate supply of the Chinese troops marching southward to join the Y-Force.
This bridge was apparently the third longest ponton structure built by U.S. Army Engineers up to this time.140
After the engineers had completed the first 4-inch pipeline to Myitkyina on 27 September, emphasis turned to running the line through to Kunming. Parties worked toward each other from these two points. On 26 October Colonel Morse established an advanced headquarters at Yunnanyi and assigned to it the 779th, 180th, and 1381st Petroleum Distribution Companies; a fourth unit, the 1382nd, arrived in December. Pipe was flown in from Assam. Lt. Col. Frank H. Newnam, Jr., SOS engineer in the China Theater, making an inspection on 27 November, was favorably impressed with the work of the “well-equipped, well-manned, and efficient” units. Meanwhile, two petroleum distribution companies, the 709th and the 775th, were laying pipe out of Myitkyina. The two groups were expected to meet in 1945. Three other companies were operating the lines from Tinsukia to Myitkyina. On 19 November the second 4-inch line was complete to Myitkyina, eleven days ahead of schedule.141
Work continued in eastern Bengal and Assam on the second 6-inch line. Taking advantage of the proximity of the pipeline’s right-of-way to the railroad from Chittagong northward, Colonel Kinsolving made up work trains for his men. Each train, with cars for troops, equipment, and supplies, moved forward as needed from siding to siding. From the outset his work was hampered because much of the salvaged British pipe made available under reverse lend-lease had been seriously damaged in transit from the Middle East. As was the case with the first 6-inch line, Kinsolving had to change specifications while construction was in progress. Despairing of getting enough new standard-weight pipe from the United States in time to complete the project on 1 April 1945, he decided in late December to convert the northernmost 150 miles to invasion-weight, which would mean a reduction in the line’s capacity from 13,000 to 10,000 barrels a day. For the northern reaches of the line he used some of the pipe intended for the 6-inch line across Burma. At times, Kinsolving had difficulty in getting cargo space on British vessels operating between Calcutta and Chittagong, and the scarcity of workmen was a problem at first. One obstacle appeared well out of the way by Christmas; the Indian Navy had by then agreed to install the offshore mooring at Chittagong’s harbor, and the Burmah Oil Company had agreed to connect this mooring to its tank farm with two underwater unloading lines.142
Colonel Asensio pushed work on the airfields around Myitkyina. Additional engineer troops and equipment came in by air from India during November. Between July and November the Tenth Air Force had flown in 149 2½-ton trucks, 66 tractors, 32 scrapers, 30 motorized graders, 27 rollers, 9 power shovels, 4 cranes, and great quantities of lesser equipment. Impressed by the ingenuity of Asensio’s subordinates in preparing so much heavy machinery for air transportation, General Stratemeyer declared on 5 October that it was impossible to “give too much publicity” to this significant operation. The opening of the Ledo Road’s cutoff near Mogaung made it possible to bring into Myitkyina the aviation engineers’ 12-yard Tournapulls, D-8 tractors, and 4-ton trucks during November. Asensio’s work was now in high gear. He strove not only to meet the operational target dates for all fields but also to bring them to all-weather standards before the next monsoon.143
With regard to the Tengchung Road, the Chinese displayed their usual mixture of enthusiasm and procrastination. The Central Government held back the first allotment of funds until mid-November; Mr. Kung, director of the Highway Administration, then made a concerted effort to organize his laborers and to get hand tools. Work began in earnest in the latter part of the month, but prospects for rapid construction were not encouraging. Governor Lung delayed a full month before conscripting labor in large numbers. Parties working eastward from Myitkyina were showing encouraging progress. They were comparatively well supplied with machinery. Pick’s depots had sent them 4 D-7 bulldozers, 4 motor graders, 4 air compressors, and 4 trucks; during the latter part of November, the Air Transport Command flew in additional machinery. Still, by early December it was obvious that the target-date for completion of a one-lane, surfaced road would have to be moved back from 15 January.144
Work was going ahead on the Ledo Road, although Japanese forces were still astride the route in eastern Burma. Until mid-December work east of the Irrawaddy was designed primarily to maintain a supply line for the troops besieging Bhamo. Thereafter, the 1875th Aviation Battalion moved across the river to begin in earnest the construction of a military highway. While Company C built a 14-mile, all-weather link eastward from the Irrawaddy crossing to the dry-weather track to Bhamo, the major part of the battalion undertook regrading, widening, and surfacing of the track south of its projected junction with the Ledo Road. The 209th Combat Battalion worked on fixed bridges; the 71 st Light Ponton Company erected and maintained ponton bridges
over the many streams. By January the 236th Combat Battalion, working closely behind the advancing Chinese infantry, was improving the 72-mile blacktop road from Bhamo to its junction with the Burma Road at Mong Yu. The work consisted mostly of widening the road, putting in culverts, and repairing the bridges.145
Two Roads to China
Meanwhile, Seedlock’s Burma Road engineers, now 500 strong and assisted by nearly 12,000 Chinese laborers, made unexpectedly rapid progress in pushing a road along their route from both ends. Initially the job had seemed an “impossible” one. The road reached elevations of 8,500 feet, skirted towering cliffs, and in places had to be cut through deep jungle; parts of the area were so inaccessible that food and supplies had to be brought in by mule pack or dropped from planes. Nevertheless, a 100-mile-stretch of virgin trail was pushed through in 60 days. In the belief that the road to Tengchung would soon be open, China Theater on 6 January approved the departure from Myitkyina of a “convoy” consisting of two trucks and an 1-ton wrecker; in command was 1st Lt. Hugh A. Pock. On 20 January Seedlock’s engineers met in the mountainous frontier region. (Map 22) A one-lane, unsurfaced track was open from Myitkyina to China. Pock’s convoy continued on to Kunming and reached the city on the evening of 2 2 January. The Southeast Asia Command and China Theater flashed to the world the news that the blockade of China was broken.146
General Pick had his own plans for a “first convoy.” Early in January he had assembled at Ledo a caravan of “jeeps, weapon carriers, ambulances, [and] heavy cargo trucks”—113 vehicles in all—loaded with enough artillery and ammunition to equip two Chinese batteries and one weapons company. The drivers had been selected from all the engineer units which had worked on the road. Among the civilian passengers were 65 radio, magazine, and newspaper correspondents. At Ledo, the convoy passed in review before General Sultan. On 12 January, Pick led the procession out of the city. Three days later it reached Myitkyina, where it was forced to halt because the Japanese were still in control of the area around Namhkam, seventy miles east of Bhamo. While waiting, Pick received the news that the Myitkyina–Tengchung Road was open. He gave it a frosty reception. On the 23rd the convoy resumed its forward movement. When it reached Namhkam three days later, it had to halt again because of the fighting near Mong Yu. The next day, the Chinese drove the Japanese from the city. Company B of the 236th Combat Battalion rushed to Mong Yu to connect the Ledo and Burma Roads; at the same time, the 71st Light Ponton Company hastily put a 450-foot ponton bridge across the Shweli at
Map 22 The Ledo Road
Wanting on the Chinese border. On the 28th Pick’s convoy left Namhkam and soon covered the 40 miles to Wanting, where T. V. Soong, the Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs, welcomed the Americans in a brief ceremony. On 4 February the caravan reached Kunming. A series of celebrations culminated in a banquet given by Governor Lung in Pick’s honor. Pick sent a congratulatory message to his command, in which he described the Ledo Road as a “major contribution to the war effort” and expressed to his troops his “sincere appreciation” and “pride” in their achievement.147
Overland communications with China had been restored, but much still remained to be done. For the engineers, months of hard work lay ahead to bring the Ledo Road to all-weather standards, improve the Burma Road, and extend
the 4-inch pipeline to Kunming. Now that the major engineer missions in Asia were certain of fulfillment, a policy of retrenchment, particularly in the India-Burma Theater, was well under way. Some units were transferred to China. The organization in India-Burma was reduced, and a number of officers returned to the United States. General O’Connor and General Farrell left in December; in January, Col. Alvin C. Welling was given the triple responsibilities of Theater Engineer, SOS Engineer, and Commanding Officer, Construction Service. Work continued much as before, and all construction projects related to the supply of China remained in full force. Additional troops and equipment arrived at Calcutta to insure the earliest possible completion of the line of communications across India and Burma. Nevertheless, the favorable progress of the war against Japan in other theaters meant a decline in the importance of CBI.148