Welcome to the History Extra podcast, fascinating historical conversations from the makers of BBC History Magazine.

Stories of the Second World War are dominated by Dunkirk and D-Day.

But did you know that one of the war's most treacherous missions took place

in the skies over the Himalayas? In this episode, author and historian Caroline Alexander

joins us to discuss her new book, Skies of Thunder, which encores the extraordinary ordeal of the

young, often under-trained pilots who flew

the so-called hump, navigating cargo planes from India into China across one of the most perilous

air routes on Earth. Caroline was speaking to Ellen Evans.

We're talking today about a remarkable aviation mission during World War II

in an arena of the war that's not so often covered. Caroline, before we go into the aerial

mission proper, I hoped we could give some vital context for our listeners in understanding

where we are in this story. Could we start with the Burma Road?

Where are we in the world and what's happening geopolitically?

And why is this transport route so important?

Well, the legendary Burma Road was a remarkable feat.

It's called the Burma Road, but it was instigated from China.

And in the background to this, is that in 1935,

Chiang Kai Shack, who was head of nationalist China,

had wished to build a supply road in southern, southwest China,

to help his battle against the communist.

So it began as a kind of self-serving military mission, and it went, pushed out a few

hundred miles towards the Burma border, and then stopped.

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