The Siam-Burma Railway Line

The invasion of Malaya begun just after midnight on the 8th of December 1941, a day after the attack on Pearl Harbor with a naval assault on the 8th Indian Infantry Brigade stationed in Kota Bharu, Kelantan, followed by an amphibious landing supported by air strikes by Air Group III.

The attack was led by General Tomoyuki Yamashita, the commander of the 25th Imperial Japanese Army (IJA), and the man that would later be dubbed the Tiger of Malaya. The destruction on the Malayan side of things was total and both British and Commonwealth troops were on the retreat from the start, driven back from the north to the south and by the 31st of January 1942, British and Commonwealth forces had completely withdrawn to Singapore, and Malaya had fallen. The allies suffered massive casualties with 9,000 dead and almost 130,000 captured.

Six days after the invasion of Malaya, on the 14th of December, 1941, troops from the 15th Imperial Japanese Army, under the command of Lieutenant General Shojiro Iida, supported by local mercenaries, would crossover from adjoining provinces in Thailand, into Burmese territory to invade Burma.

The nation would witness severe and intense fighting, especially for its natural resources that were highly sought-after by the Japanese war machine, and its oilfields would bear the full brunt of the war. The battle for Burma would continue until the 28th of March 1942.

In 1943 the Japanese commenced with the building of the Siam-Burma railway line, a necessity for the IJA at that stage to refurbish its lines in Burma.

Prior to that supplies to Japanese troops stationed in Burma were ferried by sea but the route around the Malay Peninsula, via the Straits of Malacca, in addition to being lengthy, was fraught with danger and allied vessels and submarines that patrolled the area were proving to be more than a handful.

In order to overcome these difficulties and to ensure that their troops in Burma were adequately supplied and reinforced, the Japanese embarked on the rather ambitious project of building a railway line that ran all the way from Thailand (a buffer state or a state that was neutral) to Burma and despite the difficulties of constructing such a line it was completed well ahead of schedule and was in operation within a year.

The line started from Ban Po in Thailand and stretched all the way to Thanbyuzayat in Burma and ran for about 258 miles. Hence it was a fairly long trip but much shorter than the 2,000-mile sea route that was used previously.

Thousands of prisoners of war (POWs) were deployed to lay the tracks that often ran through dense rainforests. In addition to POWs the Japanese army also conscripted thousands of Tamil men of Indian origin to help with the construction of the railway line.

Among the men that were taken was my grandfather on my dad’s side Nadisan Thevar. My grandfather was born in 1890 in Chidambaram and he came to Malaya in 1900 at the age of 10 to work. It must have been very difficult in India back then because there was a big outflow of workers that not only went to Malaya but also went to Thailand, Myanmar and various other countries in Indo-China.

My grandfather was taken at the age of 53, so he was by no means young, but he was employed by the railway services, as a matter of fact he was an engine driver, so that might have had something to do with it but as I understand it groups of men were indiscriminately taken from their homes and herded away by the truckloads so it could have been random.

Nothing was heard from him until he returned in 1946 after spending some three or so years in Thailand. From all accounts it was a very, very difficult life. He died 9 years later from a heart attack at the age of 65.

In total, approximately 180,000 civilian workers were taken from various countries to help lay the tracks and it is estimated that almost half that number died during the construction of the railway line. Of those that remained many didn’t return home and because of the extremely high death toll the Siam-Burma railway line is sometimes called the death railway.

It is difficult to say, with any degree of certainty, what happened to the POWs and the civilians that did not return home but it would be fair to speculate that many continued as laborers or remained behind and became either Burmese or Siamese nationals.