The Scotsman - Top Stories - Revisiting Rommel's nightmare over supply lines For the 90,000 troops now inside Iraq, the logistical teams must deliver 400,000 gallons of water a day, and there are 48 million MREs (meals ready to eat) stockpiled for consumption in the warehouses of Kuwait.

All supplies are delivered on convoys of 20 to 30 trucks that can stretch along the road for more than a mile - every day of the war, there are more than 20 of these convoys on the move. The ten-tonne Heavy Expanded Military Tactical Truck can carry 11 tonnes of cargo and pull a further 11 tonnes on a trailer.

The journey from Kuwait to the frontline should take about 18 hours but, because of the fighting and jams on the roads, it now takes about 24 hours to deliver supplies.

Small supply depots, which are heavily guarded by razor wire and up to 200 troops, have been set up every 50 miles along the 300-mile route and they include forward helicopter re-fuelling stations. Larger supply depots have been set up at captured air bases, including one at Tallil, just outside An Nasiriyah.

Major General Dennis Jackson, the director of logistics at US Central Command, said: "We try to think of everything, and then we think about what�s the thing we haven�t thought about."