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Railroad wartime construction

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  • Member since
    September 2020
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Railroad wartime construction
Posted by Charwo on Saturday, September 5, 2020 12:25 AM

I'm looking for an accessible book about trains in wartime, especially about constructing rail lines in wartime, the costs, the manpower, how to defend, and rapidly repair rail lines when damaged by bombs or partisans or special forces. My interest is in World War II, specifically the rails or lack thereof in Lybia, the rail situation in the Soviet Union, how much oil the Berlin Baghdad railway could transport out of Iraq if it were in German hands, etc etc.

The most pressing issue and perhaps the most educational would be what kind of resources would it take to build a railway from Tripoli to Tobruk from scratch, which needed to be done. I'm assuming all the surveying was done, and Libya is mostly flat as a pancake until you get into the deep deserts with no rivers, so it's almost perfect building ground. And the Japanese built 400km of rail in 16 months under the most hellish conditions imaginable in the hospitable zones of the earth, with over 600 bridges and eight long spans, so it seems VERY doable.

Discussion or book suggestions would be very welcome. Anything that deals with the United States Military Railroad, cause I'm writing a story and my German protagonist is a serious student of the American Civil War. Thank you for your time

Tags: history

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