'IRAQ AND THE PERSIAN GULF' [‎374r] (750/862)

RAILWAYS 581
object was partly to supply troops operating towards Kirkuk and
partly to form the first section of a line to Ramadan in Persia to assist
British troops operating in the Caspian region. The latter was never
built, its place being taken by a metalled road [7].
(/) Baghdad-Fallaja. A standard-gauge line was completed be
tween Baghdad West and Falluja in December 1917 to supply the
troops operating on the Euphrates.
(<?) Baghdad—IIillci . A standard-gauge line was laid to Hilla during
1918, with narrow-gauge extension to Kifl, to control the Euphrates
region south of the Hindiya barrage, and to transport local supplies to
Baghdad.
(ti) Samarra-Baiji. The Baghdad—Samarra standard-gauge line
was extended beyond Tikrit, and was approaching Baiji near the
Fat-ha gorge when the war ended in 1918 (photos. 230, 231).
The railway system existing at the time of the Armistice had thus
come into being along the line of the British advance by the Tigris to
Baghdad, mainly to supplement road and river transport, and had
thence been extended outwards for operational purposes. The gauges
had been governed by stocks of second-hand material in India and by
the pressing needs of the army. There were gaps between Amara and
Kut on the Tigris, and between Nasiriya and Hilla on the Euphrates.
The immediate problem was to convert this system into one suited to
peace-time needs and development, taking into consideration the
financial limitations of the country and the necessity for post-war
economy. A single line from Basra to Baghdad was deemed sufficient
for post-war purposes, and the Euphrates route was selected as offer
ing a more economic return than the Tigris. It was shorter and more
direct; it passed through more populous, better irrigated, and more
fertile land; and there was no alternative of transport by river-craft,
as on the Tigris, because the Euphrates waters were more dispersed
by irrigation cuts and swamps.
The reconstruction of the railway system took several years, but it
was not unduly delayed, since much of the material already in the
country was used again. The system was divided into two sections,
standard gauge north of Baghdad along the Tigris, and metre gauge
elsewhere. The standard-gauge tracks from Baghdad to Falluja and
Hilla were removed almost at once and used to extend the ‘Baghdad
Railway’ from Baiji to Qala Sharqat in 1919. The metre-gauge line
from Kut to Baghdad was dismantled in 1922 and relaid as an ex
tension from Table Mountain to Kirkuk and to Khanaqin. The
metre-gauge track to Amara was also taken up and some of it used on