Kanchanaburi is the closest town to the Bridge over the river Kwai, made famous in the film of the same name. The sole purpose for visiting this small town just a few hours from Bangkok, is to learn about how and why the Death Railway was built and to visit the Allied war cemetry in the town. In WWII, Japan was allied with Germany and Italy, but its main aim was to invade China and "release other Asian countries from western colonisation" - by colonising them themselves. After the raid on Pearl Harbour in December 1941, Japan had naval supremecy of the Pacific and began an aggressive invasion of SE Asia and by mid 1942, Japan had control of Indonesia, the Phillipines, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia and Malaya. However, it needed to supply it's troops in Burma who were pushing into China. Allied Naval forces could still cause the Japanese problems in the Andamen Sea near India thus thwarting the resupply efforts. Japan had to find an overland route for resupplying troops from Japan to Burma and decided that as they had control over the Pacific, they could get supplies by sea to Bangkok or Singapore and then go overland to Burma. Thus began the idea for the 415km Thai - Burmese railway. The British had looked at several alternatives to achieving this a number of years earlier and had put the idea of a completed railway in the waste bin because the mountainous terrain to be covered meant it would be "impossible". The Japanese, however, had little other choice and set about building the railway line following from Thailand along the the spine of the mountains, to Burma. It quickly became obvious that they could not use the heavy machinary normally employed on such a project and that manpower was their only real resource. There just weren't enough local workers to complete the job in record time so the Japanese marshalled the allied (mainly British caotured in Malay and Singapore, Australians and Dutch Prisoners of War (POW's) to the task. Many were imprisoned in camps as far flung as Java and Singapore and were forced to make the horrendous journey by cattle trains, cargo boats and on foot, carrying not only their own personal things but the medical and construction equipment as well. For those forced to march at the beginning of their internment this was not too bad as at this point they were building the railway in the south of Thailand, so there wasn't much distance to cover. They were also still fairly well nourished. However, for those forced to march many months later during the rainly season, which created bogs of the jungle tracks and prime breeding gournds for cholera, the journey was more than arduous, sometimes covering distances of up to 300km and taking 17 days. Many died of disease and malnutrition along the way. The Japanese high command put the pressure on for the 415km railway to be completed in a staggering 17 months - a engineering project that should have taken 5 years - and the on site engineers pushed harder, dishing out cruel beatings to get the men to work even harder. The railway was completed and in use by June 1943. More than 250,000 men had been conscripted to build the railway and its bridges of which 100,000 were to die in the effort. Death was more from diseasees such as cholera and many from malnutrition, rather than accidents. A staggering 85,000 of the men who died were of Asian origin, but none of their bodies were ever recovered and given proper burial, as the Japanese would often have mass graves for Asians, burning the bodies to rid the area of disease. The allied POW's were given proper burials in the camps, of which there were 117 along the route of the railway. Unbelievabley the Japanese would even sometimes attend the burials to pay their repects to the dead. After such a staggering effort though, the railway was only ever used for 21 months, before large sections of it were ripped up by both the British and Thai forces after the war for fear that it could transport troops quickly causing an invasion. About 7,000 British POW's died building the railway; the most of all the Allied POW's. After the war the bodies of all the Allied soldiers were relocated to 2 large war cemetries, one of which is here in Kanchanaburi. We visited there yesterday and it was a very solemn occasion for both of us. Reading some of the headstones and their inscriptions to loved ones lost on the field of battle was heart wrenching, even so many years after the war ended. Today we visited and walked across the bridge on the river Kwai -which is a narrow iron bridge and somewhat precarious to cross safely as there are no safety barriers on either side and big drops down to the river below. The bridge itself was taken from Java and reconstructed over the river here. It was attacked by Allied forces and hit twice during the war and you can still see the bomb marks on the support columns. The bridge and this part of the railway are still in use today. We managed to get a picture of the train crossing the bridge whilst we were on it; a case of breathing in whilst the train went by! On the other side of the river we encountered a group of elephants, two young ones and 3 fully grown adults - but this too was a sad affair as the adults looked undernourished and poorly treated. All in all this has been a nice town, where we have met some very nice local people, but a vey sad experience. It is also sad to think that if so many people had not died in this tragic project and the film been made of the atrocities that occurred on the Kwai, this town may never have existed in it's current form. Now we go to Bangkok before heading north towards Laos.