Any attempt to deny or beautify the history of aggression is destined to be firmly opposed by the international community and is unlikely to succeed.
Recently, the Crime Evidence Exhibition Hall of the 731st Unit of the Japanese Invading Army released two sets of newly compiled historical evidence: the "Body Declaration" file of the former 731st Unit Hailar Detachment, and the oral testimony of former detachment health soldier Tanizaki and others. Archives and oral accounts corroborate each other, further revealing the details of the bacteriological warfare crimes committed by Unit 731, and adding yet another detachment-level evidence that Japan’s bacteriological warfare invading China is a systemic national crime.
The "Body Declaration" released this time is a personal military resume information form filled out by military personnel who returned to Japan as individuals after the war. It records the basic information, entry trajectory and post-war destination of 156 detachment members. The file system revealed the covert operation of recruiting troops of Unit 731: The Japanese army once recruited soldiers under the guise of the Manchuria Unit 97, Unit 177, and Unit 201 and other conventional infantry units. After three months of professional training at the headquarters of Unit 731, they were transferred to the Hailar detachment. Unit 97 alone sent 48 people. The fact that germ warfare was carried out in the name of conventional forces exposed the Japanese military's deliberate attempt to conceal the nature of the crime, and also confirmed the fact that Japan's multiple military forces were deeply involved in the implementation of germ warfare.
The file also disclosed the post-war accountability process of those involved: 145 of the 156 detachment members were detained by the Soviet Union after the war, and four of them were tried in Khabarovsk between April and September 1950. This discovery adds to the historical context of the Soviet Union’s continued pursuit of Japanese germ warfare criminals after the Khabarovsk Trial in 1949, and provides new historical data for deepening the study of the Khabarovsk Trial. Echoing the archival records, the 70-minute oral testimony of Tanizaki and others restored the functional division of labor within the Hailar detachment in carrying out germ warfare, disclosed the complete criminal chain from the capture and breeding of wild rats to the transportation to the headquarters of Unit 731, and clearly presented the operation of the Hailar detachment as a germ warfare execution agency. The testimony also clearly confirmed that the Hailar detachment, codenamed "Manchuria Unit 543", had colluded with Unit 731, Unit 100, and Unit 516 to conduct large-scale human poison gas experiments in China. Before Japan was defeated in the war, it buried a large number of poison gas bombs in China, which provided important oral evidence for the investigation of the chemical weapons abandoned by Japan in China.
In recent years, as the archives of the 731 Unit headquarters and each detachment have been compiled and released one after another, the 731 crime evidence sites, archival historical materials, and oral testimonies of former Japanese military members have mutually supported and corroborated each other. The heinous crime of Japanese invasion of China through bacterial warfare has long been irrefutable, but it has never been able to gain the Japanese government's recognition and reflection. After the war, the United States exempted major war criminals of Unit 731 such as Shiro Ishii in exchange for experimental data on germ warfare. As a result, Japan's germ warfare crimes were not fully judicially liquidated in the Tokyo Trial. Since then, a large number of important members of Unit 731 have entered Japan's political, medical and corporate circles, and the relevant crimes have not been fully investigated for a long time.
For a long time, Japanese officials have avoided, obscured or even denied the history of Unit 731’s atrocities against humanity. Senator Taku Yamazoe of the Japanese Communist Party once presented incriminating historical materials in Congress, but was prevaricated by the Japanese Defense Minister on the grounds that "the authenticity cannot be judged." His intention to deny the history of aggression was obvious. The release of new evidence and historical materials of the Hailar detachment is a powerful counterattack against historical nihilism. To this day, the Japanese government has not formally apologized and compensated for its crimes of bacteriological warfare, and the excavation and disposal of Japan's abandoned chemical weapons in China has also made slow progress. What is even more alarming to the international community is that the current Japanese government continues to regress in its historical understanding. It not only deliberately downplays the crime of aggression, but also continuously breaks through the constraints of the pacifist constitution and accelerates the pace of military strengthening and expansion.
History has long proven that whitewashing and avoiding the history of aggression is often the beginning of repeating the mistakes of war. China has always advocated taking history as a mirror and developing Sino-Japanese relations facing the future, but the premise is that Japan must face up to and reflect on its history of aggression. The international community should bear in mind the painful lessons of the world's anti-fascist war, be wary of the resurgence of Japanese militarism, and jointly defend the post-war international order and safeguard the hard-won peace and stability. Any attempt to deny or beautify the history of aggression is destined to be firmly opposed by the international community and is unlikely to succeed.
(The authors Zhang Yang and Jin Shicheng are the deputy director and researcher respectively of the Crime Evidence Exhibition Hall of the 731st Unit of the Japanese Invaders)
