Unveiling the Shadows of Japan's Infamous WWII Biological Warfare Scheme
As we edge closer to the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, memories of the conflict continue to surface, presenting new discoveries and unresolved disputes. One such revelation is the uncovering of documents relating to Japan's notorious biological warfare program, which operated from 1936 to 1945.
A movie about these grim historical events in China was recently delayed, sparking a wave of online speculation and protest. The film, originally titled "731 Biochemical Revelations" in English, describes the horrifying medical experiments conducted on Chinese victims by Japan's Imperial Army Unit 731. The sudden postponement of the movie's premiere sparked questions about possible interference to prevent straining already delicate relations between China and Japan.
Reliving the Horrors: A Survivor's Tale
One of the few remaining witnesses able to talk about Unit 731 is a 95-year-old man named Hideo Shimizu, who resides in Nagano prefecture, central Japan. Shimizu was recruited into Unit 731's Youth Corps when he was only 14 years old and arrived at the unit's headquarters in Japanese-occupied Northeast China in 1945, just months before the end of the war.
Shimizu initially believed he would be assigned a manufacturing job, so he was surprised to find himself among doctors donned in white lab coats. He never thought he would end up working in a place infamous for conducting live dissections on prisoners without anesthesia, infecting them with diseases, and deploying germ warfare against Chinese soldiers and civilians.
Shimizu recalls the moment he realized the horrifying reality of his situation when he entered a room filled with jars containing human organs. He was particularly shocked by a specimen of an entire female body with a fetus in its womb. Shimizu fell seriously ill after an older unit member gave him a piece of bread, leading him to believe the unit conducted experiments on its own Youth Corps trainees.
As the end of the war approached, unit 731 members were ordered to destroy all evidence and witnesses. They referred to their human experimental subjects as "maruta," or logs, dehumanizing them completely. Shimizu admits he never saw any of the "maruta" alive. His role was to collect their bones after they were killed and their bodies incinerated.
The Legacy of Unit 731
It is estimated that Unit 731 was directly responsible for the deaths of around 3,000 people. Biological weapons developed by other branches of the program are believed to have caused many more deaths. Despite these atrocities, the Japanese government has yet to apologize for Unit 731's actions and maintains that there is no evidence that the unit experimented on Chinese prisoners.
Shimizu took it upon himself to travel to China to apologize last year. His decision to speak out has been met with criticism in Japan. However, some individuals, such as a former school teacher who curated an exhibit related to Unit 731 at a local museum in Nagano, support Shimizu.
Unraveling Hidden Histories
Another individual keen to delve into this dark chapter of history is 77-year-old Katsutoshi Takegami. He unearthed photographs in his father's trunk that showed his father's involvement in Unit 1644, another part of Japan's biological warfare program. Takegami has since been researching his father's military service.
Newly released personnel rosters of Unit 1644 are seen as a treasure by historians, offering valuable insights into the structure of Japan's germ warfare system. Lv Jing, a historian at a university in the city where Unit 1644 was based, believes these rosters will enable researchers to gain a better understanding of Japan's germ warfare system.
Following the war, seven Japanese officials were sentenced to death for war crimes by an international tribunal. However, leaders of Unit 731 returned to Japan and enjoyed successful careers as heads of medical institutions and pharmaceutical companies. This was due to immunity granted by the U.S. in exchange for data from the unit's medical experiments. The details of Unit 731 and its immunity deal were kept hidden by the U.S. for many years.
Cambridge University professor of East Asian History, Barak Kushner, referred to this as a "lapse of justice to the highest degree" and noted that the immunity offered was reflective of the political situation and limitations of justice during the post-war era.
