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Unit 731

Unit 731 was a secret military medical unit of the Imperial Japanese Army that researched biological warfare and other topics through human experimentation during the Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945) and World War II era. The unit was disguised as a water purification unit. It was based in Pingfan, near the city of Harbin in northeastern China, the region which was then part of the puppet state of Manchukuo.

There were other units besides Unit 731, which serves as a general term in describing the Japanese biological warfare program. Other units include Unit 100 (Changchun), Unit 543 (Hailar), Unit 773 (Songo unit), Unit 1644 (Nanjing), Unit 1855 (Beijing), and Unit 8604 (Nami).

Table of contents

1 Formation 2 Activities 3 Members 4 Divisions 5 Facilities 6 Disbanding and End of World War II 7 Politicization of history 8 Cultural depictions and representations 9 External links 10 References

Formation

In 1932, Ishii Shiro and his men built the Zhoghma Fortress, a prison on the outskirts of Harbin. In 1935 a jailbreak forced Ishii to shut down Zhoghma Fortress. Ishii moved closer to Harbin at Pingfang to set up a new facility.

Activities

• vivisections
• grenade tests using humans at various distances and positions
• test subjects were gathered from the surrounding Chinese population and were sometimes known as "logs"
• frostbite experiments

Members

• Lieutenant-General Ishii Shiro
• Lieutenant Colonel Naito Ryoichi
• Dr Kitano Masaji
• Shinozuka Yoshio

Divisions

Unit 731 was divided into eight divisions.

• Division 1: Research on bubonic plague, cholera, anthrax, typhoid, tuberculosis on live subjects. For this purpose a prison was constructed to contain around three to four hundred people.
• Division 2: Research for biological weapons used on the field, in particular the production of devices to spread germs and parasites.
• Division 3: Production of shells containing biological agents. Stationed in Harbin.
• Division 4: Production of other miscellaneous agents.
• Division 5: Training of personnels.
• Division 6-8: Eqipment, medical, and administrative units.

Facilities

The 731 complex covered six square kilometers and consists of more than 150 buildings. The facilities were very well designed making it hard to destroy them. Some of 731's satellite facilities still remain and are open to tourists.

The complex contained various production facilities. It had around 4,500 containers for raising fleas, six giant cauldrons to produce various chemicals, and around 1,800 containers to produce biological agents. Approximately 30kg of bubonic plague bacteria can be produced in several days.

Tens of tons of these biological weapons (and some chemical) were stored in varous places in northeastern China throught the war. The Japanese attempted to destroy every last evidence of the facilities after disbanding; however, this was not successful as evidence remained and sometimes harmed the civilians to this day. In particular, in August 2003, twenty-nine people were hospitalized after a construction crew in Heilongjiang inadvertantly dug up chemical shells buried deep in the soil more than fifty years ago.

Disbanding and End of World War II

Ishii wanted to use biological weapons in the Pacific conflict since May 1944, but his attempts were repeatedly foiled by poor planning, and Allied intervention. When it was clear that the war would soon end, Ishii destroyed the facilities, and told his men "to take the secret to the grave."

The United States believed that the research data was valuable because the allies had never conducted this type of human experimentation. Also, the U.S. did not want any other nation, particularly the Soviet Union, to acquire data on biological weapons. Therefore, in exchange for the data, the United States did not charge the officers of Unit 731 with war crimes.

On the other hand, the Soviet Union relentlessly pursued the case and persecuted several officials from the unit because many Soviets were also tortured and experimented upon, along with some Mongolians and Koreans. The officials were tried in the Khabarovsk War Crime Trials.

Many former members of Unit 731 became part of the Japanese medical establishment. Dr Katano Masaji led Japan's largest pharmaceutical company, the Green Cross. Others headed medical schools or worked for the Japanese health ministry.

Politicization of history

Unit 731 activities are denied by right-wing nationalist Japanese historians, who say they are fabrications by Chinese propaganda. Meanwhile left-wing organizations have published histories of Unit 731 that stress the supposed cover-up by the US (in exchange for the data). As with many WWII topics (and the subsequent political debate) references to Unit 731 are omitted from many Japanese history textbooks. Some see this as evidence that, in modern Japan, revisionist history is part of the mainstream, which contributes to the perception that Japan has yet to accept full responsibility for the crimes of its past.

In 1997, 180 Chinese, either victims or the family of victims of Unit 731, sued the Japanese government for a full disclosure, apology and compensation.

In August 2002, the Tokyo District Court acknowledged the existence of Unit 731 and its biological warfare activities, but ruled that all compensation issues were settled by the Joint Communique of the Government of Japan and the Government of the People's Republic of China of September 29, 1972.

In 2000, the United States Congress passed the Japanese Imperial Government Disclosure Act to declassify most classified U.S. Government records about war criminals and crimes committed by the Japanese during World War II. As of 2003, this will be done through the Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group (IWG) [1].

Cultural depictions and representations

Chinese movie Black sun 731 (Man behind the sun) is a somewhat snuff film on the atrocities committed by the Japanese.

External links

• "History of Japan's biological weapons program". In "Federation of American Scientists". 2000-04-16.
• Green, Shane. "The Asian Auschwitz of Unit 731". In "The Age". 2002-08-29.
• "Biochemical Warfare - Unit 731". In "Alliance for Preserving the Truth of Sino-Japanese War (APTSJW)". No date.
• "Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group (IWG)". In "National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)". No date.
• Unit 731

References

• Gold, Hal. Unit 731 Testimony, Charles E Tuttle Co., 1996. ISBN 4900737399
• Williams, Peter. Unit 731: Japan's Secret Biological Warfare in World War II, Free Press, 1989. ISBN 0029353017
• Harris, Sheldon H. Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare 1932-45 and the American Cover-Up, Routledge, 1994. ISBN 0415091055 ISBN 0415932149
• Endicott, Stephen and Edward Hagerman. The United States and Biological Warfare: Secrets from the Early Cold War and Korea, Indiana University Press, 1999. ISBN 0253334721
• Handelman, Stephen and Ken Alibek. Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World--Told from Inside by the Man Who Ran It, Random House, 1999. ISBN 0375502319 ISBN 0385334966
• Harris, Robert and Jeremy Paxman. A Higher Form of Killing : The Secret History of Chemical and Biological Warfare, Random House, 2002. ISBN 0812966538
• Barnaby, Wendy. The Plague Makers: The Secret World of Biological Warfare, Frog Ltd, 1999. ISBN 1883319854 ISBN 0756756987 ISBN 0826412580 ISBN 082641415X