The Corps of Engineers

Contributions of the Corps of Engineers to victory in war, and to our country's peacetime history, are well known and appreciated. The skill and versatility of this talented body of soldiers met a supreme test in operations against the Japanese, many of which were conducted in the most primitive and undeveloped regions of the world. Engineers built the Alaska Highway, Canol, and the Ledo Road in Burma. They cleared the jungles to build airfields for heavy bombers and supervised the work of Filipinos, Chinese, and Melanesians as they built runways by hand. They built ports, roads, and docks where none had existed. Indeed, one of the most familiar recollections of the U.S. veteran of the war against Japan is the ubiquitous engineer operating a bulldozer.