Playing about with a freeware C-46 piqued my interest about "the Hump" so I generated a quick & dirty FSX plan from Chabua to Wujiaba (Kunming's airport up until 2012) just going from the available NDBs and VORs in the sim. This should give me a "feel" for flying over the inhospitable terrain I think. I've no idea which beacons were available near the close of WWII, but surely some form of direction finding was used - it wasn't all on a paper map which is no use in IMC
Ignore the fuel burn - that's for the default Cessna!