A Bridge Over The River KwaiA bridge needed to be built over the River Kwai, connecting Bangkok to Rangoon along the Burma-Siam Railway. The task needed to be accomplished in 1943 by a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp in Burma. This camp was run by Colonel Saito. The prisoners of war at this camp were mainly British soldiers led by Colonel Nicholson. The prisoners had to work from dawn to dusk in jungle heat and contend with malaria, dysentery, beri-beri and jungle soars. They only had six months to complete the bridge.Colonel Saito uses the British soldiers because they are very skilled at building bridges and allows their colonel, Colonel Nicholson, to command them. Colonel Nicholson becomes ...view middle of the document...
Colonel Nicholson wouldn't allow that because he knew his honor was at stake.I also thought that the plot to blow up the bridge added the final suspense to the story. I thought that the bridge would blow up because the author gives details on how careful the soldiers of Force 316 set the mines up. I also thought that if Colonel Nicholson figured out the mining of the bridge, his duty to his country would keep him from telling anyone. But the author did a great job in keeping us in suspense and then ending the story with the main characters dying and the bridge staying in tact.I would recommend this book to anyone who likes suspense. The action in the story moves quickly and I feel that the reader is never bored. There are some details that are gory, such as when the soldiers get sick but that all adds to the setting of a prisoner-of-war camp.The author is trying to get across the point of the futility of war. He shows how one man can be so brutal to another man, not only with the common soldiers but also with the colonels. Colonel Saito and Colonel Nicholson are of different opposing...