You know how this works
[Heads Up: Pretty much this entire story is rated R]
In part one, I explained the origins of Unit 731 and described a few of their exploits. Read it below for a bit more context.
For part two, I'll go into much more detail…
Means to an End
Unit 731 was not just a tool of torture. That's certainly how they look from the 21st century, with our 20/20 hindsight. But many of their human experiments were actually intended to develop treatments for real medical problems.
For example, through their experiments, Unit 731 researchers proved the best treatment for frostbite is to immerse affected areas in water slightly warmer than 100 degrees. The prevailing treatment at the time was to rub frostbitten parts of the body.
How they discovered this treatment involves what amounts to the torture of several prisoners.
Historians can argue that maybe Unit 731's experiments saved more lives than they cost. Obviously, this is debatable and likely never to be proven. Even if it were proven, can we claim medical advancement is worth committing war crimes?
A good analogy for Unit 731 is perhaps modern biomedical testing conducted on animals. Little concern is given to the life of the animals. They're viewed as tools or test subjects. They are simply a means to an end.
However, modern animal testing pales in comparison to the careless cruelty inflicted on the victims of Unit 731. No matter how many medical advancements they achieved, I cannot imagine a justification for Unit 731's experiments listed below.
Their Experiments
One gruesome experiment tested how easily diseases could spread from host to host. Researchers locked up sick subjects (likely purposely infected) with healthy subjects, then started a timer.
Pressure tests were conducted on prisoners. Locking them up in a pressure chamber, researchers cranked the nob to pressures high enough to pop eyes out of sockets.
In exploration for a better frostbite treatment, they would leave subjects outside in subzero temperatures with limbs exposed and periodically drench them with water. To test if frostbite had set in, a guard would whack the exposed skin with a stick, listening for a sound "resembling that which a board gives when it is struck."
One researcher, Dr. Yuasa, admitted to cultivating typhoid germs in test tubes and giving them to Japanese Army units. Troops would then infect the wells of villages in Communist China-held territory.
Researchers force-fed subjects food and drinks laced with pathogens such as chocolate with anthrax and cookies with plague bacteria. Ishii himself conducted experiments with virus-infected fruit and vegetables which he found preferable to other foods.
Human test subjects referred to as "material" were hung upside down in order to determine the amount of time it takes to choke to death in the position.
Researchers injected air into the bloodstream to time and test the rate of onset of embolisms. They also injected horse urine into the kidneys of living subjects.
One account recalls Unit 731 researchers releasing plague-infected rats into densely populated Chinese city centers. They would also drop plague-infused ink pens along sidewalks or roads where the poor or needy would pick them up. The unsuspecting victims literally walked the plague into their homes and communities. Once an epidemic broke out, Japanese soldiers would evacuate residents and torch the area in order to keep outsiders from discovering what had really taken place.
Researcher Mitomo Kazuo admitted to putting:
as much as a gram of heroin into some porridge to an arrested Chinese citizen... about thirty minutes later he lost consciousness and remained in that state until he died fifteen to sixteen hours later.
In the summer of 1940, forty Manchurian teenagers returning from a school field trip bought and drank locally bottled lemonade. They subsequently died of typhoid fever. It was later discovered the lemonade was manufactured with water from a well poisoned by Unit 731.
In 1940, General Ishii himself pulled a brutal bait and switch on the city of Changchun. He told local officials that a cholera epidemic was imminent and the general population needed to be inculcated. The solution he posed as a vaccine was actually a solution containing cholera germs. A cholera epidemic followed shortly after.
Last on the list (and the worst in my opinion); a Russian mother and her daughter were locked inside a gas chamber while doctors watched from the outside, timing their convulsions and how long it took the two to die. The mother sprawled over her daughter in a useless attempt to save her from the gas.
Most "logs" lasted only a few weeks before dying from an experiment or before becoming unviable test subjects and being executed. The longest surviving log lasted 6 months. The dead were almost always cremated.
Moral Coverage
I posed a question in part 1: How could the researchers internally justify committing these brutal acts?
A Unit 731 researcher who gave an interview in the 1990's answers the question:
Vivisection should be done under normal circumstances. If we'd used anesthesia, that might have affected the body organs and blood vessels that we were examining. So we couldn't have used anesthetic.
He goes on to explain away experiments conducted on infants:
Of course there were experiments on children. But probably their fathers were spies.
When asked if he believes Unit 731 is a unique phenomenon he said:
There's a possibility this could happen again, because in a war, you have to win.
These three quotes perfectly outline Unit 731's moral justification:
It's a matter of scientific precision
Their subjects were probably criminals or spawn of criminals anyways
It was wartime! And the Japanese had to win
Therefore, the experiments were morally justified.
Unit 731's inhuman view of its victims cannot be overemphasized. Other than "logs" or "material", in their writing, researchers referred to human test subjects as "monkeys" or "Manchurian monkeys."
Deep down, they knew the acts were heinous and illegal. Unit 731 researchers did not hide their experiments from the global scientific community, they just failed to disclose that their test subjects were human.
Historian Sheldon H. Harris writes:
For them, ethics were not an issue. They knew right from wrong. In their minds, however, advanced research was not to be inhibited by ethical or moral restraints.
Part 3 detailing the United States’ cover-up of Unit 731 atrocities comes out next week.
Sources
https://www.nytimes.com/1995/03/17/world/unmasking-horror-a-special-report-japan-confronting-gruesome-war-atrocity.html?pagewanted=all
Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare, 1932-45 and the American Cover-Up (https://www.routledge.com/Factories-of-Death-Japanese-Biological-Warfare-1932-45-and-the-American/Harris/p/book/9780415932141#)
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