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. The unit based in
Ping Fang[?], near the city of
Harbin in northeastern
China, the region which was sometimes referred to as
Manchuria or
Manchukuo.
- live 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"
The
United States believed that the research data was valuable because the US and its allies would never conduct this type of
human experimentation[?]. Also, the US did not want any other nation, particularly
Communist Russia, 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.
Many former members of Unit 731 have become part of the Japanese medical establishment. Dr Masaji Kitano[?] led Japan's largest pharmaceutical company, the Green Cross[?]. Others have headed medical schools or worked for the Japanese health ministry.
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.
Unit 731 activities are
denied[?] by
right-wing nationalist Japanese historians, who say they are fabrications by Chinese
propaganda. 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.
In
2000, the
United States Congress passed the
Japanese Imperial Government Disclosure Act[?] to
declassify[?] most
classified[?] US 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] (
http://www.archives.gov/iwg/).
- "History of Japan's biological weapons program". In "Federation of American Scientists". <http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/japan/bw/ (http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/japan/bw/)>. 2000-04-16.
- Green, Shane. "The Asian Auschwitz of Unit 731". In "The Age". <http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/08/28/1030508070534.html (http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/08/28/1030508070534.html)>. 2002-08-29.
- "Biochemical Warfare - Unit 731". In "Alliance for Preserving the Truth of Sino-Japanese War (APTSJW)". <http://www.sjwar.org (http://www.sjwar.org)>. No date.
- "Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group (IWG)". In "National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)". <http://www.archives.gov/iwg/ (http://www.archives.gov/iwg/)>. No date.
- Gold, Hal. "Unit 731 Testimony". Charles E Tuttle Co. 1996. ISBN 4900737399.