“I am expressing my firm conviction with complete frankness as the officer in command of three armies, that, for their successful operations, we must at once start laying a second track throughout the whole Siberian trunk line and on the Eastern Chinese Railway. Our army must be connected with Russia by a line capable of running 48 pairs of trains in the day. “I have some experience of my profession, and was for eight years in charge of the management of the Trans-Caspian Railway, and I am convinced that all these difficulties can be overcome if Your Majesty is pleased to order it. Possibly the war will be finished before we shall have laid the second line of rails over more than a fraction of the whole distance; on the other hand, it may continue so long that only a double track will save the situation. Only with a double line also shall we be able at the end of the war to send back rapidly all the troops which came from Russia and to demobilize. We are living in the midst of events of immense importance on which depends the future, not only of the Far East, but, to a certain extent, that of Russia. We must not shirk sacrifices that will insure victory and subsequent peace in the Far East. Neither a conquered Japan nor a sleeping China will permit such peace unless Russia possesses the power to despatch army corps to the Far East more rapidly than she can at present. A double line alone will enable this to be done. While keeping this as our main ultimate object, we should make every effort now to work the railways up to a traffic capacity of 14 pairs of trains as far as Harbin, and 18 beyond. “Having set to work to double the line, we must try to arrange that one section will give us 18 pairs of military trains a day (perhaps it will be best to begin from the hilly portions). As the second line is laid, we shall be able to work up to a running and carrying capacity along the whole line to Harbin and southwards of at first 24 pairs of trains, then 36, and eventually 48.” Upon receipt of this letter from me, the first thing that the St. Petersburg authorities did was to work out the details of the preliminary arrangements for doubling the line. They tried to formulate some scheme whereby the necessary construction material could be carried on the railway without cutting down the number of troop trains. It was suggested that the rails should be sent via the Arctic Ocean, and apparently some attempt to do this was carried out, but later all idea of doubling the line during the war was abandoned. It was a pity, for the earth-work might have been carried out without interfering with the traffic. Had we carried out this important measure, we should have made our position in the Far East far stronger than it is now.