On September 2, 1945, Japan signed the act of unconditional surrender, thereby ending World War II. Although some Japanese soldiers continued to guerrilla for many years, and according to the Japanese Embassy in the Philippines, they may still be fighting in the jungle. The fighting spirit of the Nippon army was amazing, and the willingness to give their lives was respectable, but the cruelty and fanaticism, along with war crimes, are extremely controversial.

We talk about what the army was like imperial japan in World War II, what kaiten and Oka are, and why hazing was considered a moral duty of the commander.

Wash the heels of a sergeant for the Emperor - training in the Japanese army

The Japanese Empire at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries nurtured ambitions to expand living space, and, naturally, for this it needed a powerful army and navy. And if on the technical side the Japanese did a lot, turning a backward army into a modern one, then on the psychological side they were greatly helped by the warlike mentality that had developed over many centuries.

The Code of Bushido required the samurai to unquestioningly obey the commander, contempt for death and an incredible sense of duty. It was these traits that were most developed in the imperial army. And it all started from school, where the boys were taught that the Japanese were a divine nation, and the rest were subhumans who could be treated like cattle.

The young Japanese was told that he was a descendant of divine ancestors, and his whole life was a path to glory through military exploits in the service of the Emperor and superior officers. Here, for example, is what a Japanese boy wrote in an essay during Russo-Japanese War 1904-1905:

I will become a soldier to kill Russians and take them prisoner. I will kill as many Russians as possible, cut off their heads and present them to the emperor. And then I’ll rush into battle again, I’ll get even more Russian heads, I’ll kill them all. I will become a great warrior.

Naturally, with such desires and support from society, the boy grew into a fierce warrior.

The future soldier learned to endure hardships from an early age, and in the army this skill was brought to perfection not only through jogging and exercises, but also through the bullying of colleagues and senior ranks. For example, a senior officer, who felt that the recruits had not given him the military salute well enough, had the right to line them up and slap each one in the face. If the young man fell from a blow, he had to jump up immediately, standing at attention.

This harsh attitude was complemented by ingratiation with higher authorities. When, after a tiring march, the senior man sat down on a chair, several soldiers immediately raced to unlace his shoes. And in the bathhouse there was literally a line lining up to rub the officer’s back.

As a result, the combination of powerful propaganda and education, coupled with difficult service conditions, created fanatical and hardy soldiers, extremely disciplined, persistent and monstrously cruel.

Kamikaze and a war that lasted for decades

Fierce kamikazes were met on the battlefields first by the Chinese, and then by the Russians and Americans during the Second World War. Japanese soldiers, throwing themselves under tanks with magnetic mines and fighting hand-to-hand to the end, were almost impossible to capture.

An example is the capture of the island of Saipan, where soldiers, at the last order of Generals Saito, Igeta and Admiral Nagumo, who shot themselves, launched a banzai attack. More than three thousand soldiers and civilians, armed with bamboo pikes, bayonets and grenades, first drank all the alcohol they had and then rushed screaming towards the American positions.

Even the wounded and one-legged galloped on crutches after their comrades. The Americans were shocked that their ranks were broken, and the attackers ran to the artillery, but then more experienced Yankees appeared and killed all the suicide bombers. But the worst thing happened to the Americans later - they saw how the remaining soldiers with women and children blew themselves up with grenades or jumped into the sea.

The famous kamikaze headband

The practice of suicide attacks was very common in the Japanese army at that time. Partly it was based on the readiness to die for the emperor, cultivated from a young age, partly it was a necessary measure due to the serious superiority of opponents at sea, land and air. Such suicides were called kamikazes, which translated meant “divine wind.” The name was given in honor of the typhoon that in ancient times drowned the Mongol armada sailing to conquer Japan.

Kamikazes in early WWII used planes with huge bombs, which they aimed at American ships. Later they began to use manned winged projectiles called Oka (sakura flower). “Flowers” ​​with explosives, the weight of which could reach up to a ton, were launched from bombers. At sea they were joined by manned torpedoes called kaiten (changing fate) and boats loaded with explosives.

The kamikaze recruited exclusively volunteers, of whom there were many, since serving in suicide squads was a very honorable thing. In addition, the family of the deceased was paid a decent amount. However, no matter how effective and terrifying the suicide attacks were, they failed to save Japan from defeat.

But for some soldiers, the war did not end even after Japan's surrender. On numerous islands in the jungle, several dozen Japanese remained partisans, who staged attacks and killed enemy soldiers, police and civilians. These soldiers refused to lay down their arms because they did not believe that their great emperor had admitted defeat.

For example, in January 1972, Sergeant Seichi Yokoi was discovered on the island of Guam, who had been living all this time in a hole near the city of Talofofo, and in December 1974, a soldier named Teruo Nakamura was found on the island of Marotai. And even in 2005, 87-year-old Lieutenant Yoshio Yamakawa and 83-year-old Corporal Suzuki Nakauchi were found on the island of Minandao, hiding there, fearing punishment for desertion.

Hiroo Onoda

But, of course, the most sensational case is the story of Hiroo Onoda, a junior lieutenant of Japanese intelligence, who, first with his comrades, and after their death alone, fought on the island of Lubang until 1972. During this time, he and his comrades killed thirty and seriously wounded about a hundred people.

Even when a Japanese journalist found him and told him that the war was long over, he refused to surrender until his commander canceled the order. We had to urgently look for his former boss, who ordered Onoda to lay down his arms. After his pardon, Hiroo lived a long life, wrote several books, and trained young people in survival skills. wildlife. Onoda died on January 16, 2014 in Tokyo, a couple of months shy of 92 years old.

Speed ​​decapitation and the Nanjing Massacre

The harsh upbringing, which exalted the Japanese and allowed them to consider other peoples as animals, gave reasons and opportunities to treat captured soldiers and civilians with unimaginable cruelty. It was especially hard on the Chinese, whom the Japanese despised, considering them soft-bodied subhumans unworthy of human treatment.

Young soldiers were often trained to stab bound prisoners, and officers practiced chopping off heads. It even got to the point of competitions, which were widely covered by the Japanese press of that time. In 1937, two lieutenants held a competition to see who could be the first to cut down a hundred Chinese. To understand the madness that was happening, it is worth reading the headline of one of the Japanese newspapers of the time: “Stunning record in the beheading of a hundred people: Mukai - 106, Noda - 105. Both second lieutenants begin an additional round.” In the end, the reward did find the “heroes” - after the war, the Chinese caught them and shot them.

Editorial with the “exploits” of lieutenants

When Japanese army took Nanjing, some of the Chinese believed that order and calm would come with disciplined foreign troops. But instead, on the orders of a member of the imperial house, Prince Asaka, a massacre began in the city. According to Chinese historians, the occupiers killed from three hundred to five hundred thousand inhabitants, many were brutally tortured, and most of the women were raped. The most striking thing is that the main culprit, Prince Asaki, who gave the monstrous order, was not brought to justice, being a member of the imperial family, and lived quietly and peacefully until 1981.

Another no less monstrous side of the Japanese army were the so-called “comfort stations” - military brothels where Koreans and Chinese girls who were forced into prostitution. According to Chinese historians, 410 thousand girls passed through them, many of whom committed suicide after abuse.

It is interesting how modern Japanese authorities are trying to deny responsibility for brothels. These stations were allegedly only a private initiative, and the girls went there voluntarily, as stated in 2007 by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Only under pressure from the United States, Canada and Europe were the Japanese eventually forced to admit guilt, apologize and begin paying compensation to the former “comfort women”.

And, of course, one cannot help but recall Unit 731, a special unit of the Japanese army engaged in the development of biological weapons, whose inhumane experiments on people would make the most seasoned Nazi executioner turn pale.

Be that as it may, the Japanese army in World War II is remembered both for examples of endless courage and adherence to a sense of duty, and for inhuman cruelty and heinous acts. But neither one nor the other helped the Japanese when they were completely defeated by the Allied troops, among whom was my great-uncle, who beat the samurai in Manchuria in 1945.

On August 23, 1939, the notorious Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was concluded between Germany and the Soviet Union. Less than a year later, on April 13, 1941, another agreement was signed in Moscow, this time on neutrality between the USSR and Japan. The purpose of concluding this pact was the same as when concluding an agreement with Germany: to at least temporarily delay the involvement of the Soviet Union in the Second world war both in the West and in the East.

At that time, it was also important for the Japanese to prevent the outbreak of war with the USSR until the moment that they (the Japanese) would consider favorable for themselves. This is the essence of the so-called “ripe persimmon” strategy. That is, the Japanese always wanted to attack the Soviet Union, but were afraid. They needed a situation where the USSR would be involved in a war in the West, weaken, and withdraw its main forces in order to save the situation in the European part of the country. And this will allow the Japanese, with little loss of life, as they said, to grab everything that they were aiming for back in 1918, when they intervened.

It was no coincidence that the neutrality pact with Japan was signed

Japanese logic actually worked: Germany attacked the Soviet Union, there was a clash, but the Japanese never carried out their aggressive plans. Why?

On July 2, 1941, an imperial meeting was held at which the question was decided: what to do next in the context of the outbreak of war between Germany and the Soviet Union? Strike to the North, help Germany and manage to capture what was planned, that is, the Far East and Eastern Siberia? Or go to the South, because the Americans, as you know, declared an embargo, and the Japanese faced the prospect of an oil famine?

Japanese infantry on the march during the attack on Hong Kong, December 1941

The fleet advocated that it was necessary to go to the South, because without oil it would be extremely difficult for Japan to continue the war. The army, traditionally aimed at the Soviet Union, insisted on what it called one of a thousand chances - to take advantage of the Soviet-German war in order to achieve its goals regarding the USSR.

Why couldn't they? Everything was already prepared. The Kwantung Army, which was located on the border with the Soviet Union, was strengthened and increased to 750 thousand. A war schedule was drawn up, and a date was set - August 29, 1941, when Japan was supposed to treacherously stab the USSR in the back.

But, as they say, it didn’t happen. The Japanese themselves admit this. Two factors interfered...

Japan was afraid to attack the USSR, remembering the lessons of Hassan and Khalkhin Gol

Yes! Why was August 29th set as the deadline? Because then autumn, thaw. Japan had experience of fighting in winter, which ended extremely unfavorably for it.

So, first, Hitler did not fulfill his promise to carry out a blitzkrieg and capture Moscow in 2 - 3 months, as planned. That is, “the persimmon is not ripe.” And the second, most important thing, is that Stalin still showed restraint and did not reduce the number of troops by Far East and in Siberia as much as the Japanese wanted. (The Japanese planned for the Soviet leader to reduce the troops by 2/3, but he reduced them by about half. And this did not allow the Japanese, who remembered the lessons of Hassan and Khalkhin Gol, to stab the Soviet Union in the back from the East).

Leaders of the “Big Three” of the anti-Hitler coalition at the Potsdam Conference: British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, US President Harry Truman, Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and Chairman of the State Defense Committee of the USSR Joseph Stalin, July - August 1945

Note that from the allies, that is, from the Third Reich, pressure was exerted on Japan. When Matsuoko, the Japanese Foreign Minister, visited Berlin back in April 1941, Hitler believed that he could easily deal with the Soviet Union and would not need Japanese help. He sent the Japanese south, to Singapore, to Malaya. For what? In order to fetter the forces of the Americans and the British there so that they would not use them in Europe.

And yet, in February 1945, during the Yalta Conference, Stalin violated the Soviet-Japanese neutrality pact: the USSR entered the war with militaristic Japan at the urgent requests of its allies.

Interesting fact. The day after Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt turned to Stalin with a request to help in the war with Japan, to open a second front in the Far East. Naturally, Stalin could not do this then. He very politely explained that, after all, the main enemy for the USSR at that time was Germany, and made it clear that let’s first defeat the Reich, and then return to this issue. And, indeed, they returned. In 1943, in Tehran, Stalin promised, after the victory over Germany, to enter the war with Japan. And this greatly inspired the Americans. By the way, they stopped planning serious ground operations, expecting that this role would be fulfilled by the Soviet Union.

But then the situation began to change when the Americans felt that they were about to have an atomic bomb. If Roosevelt was completely “for” the second front and repeatedly asked Stalin about it, then Truman, having come to power, was anti-Soviet. After all, it was he who owned the phrase said after Hitler’s attack on the Soviet Union: “Let them kill each other as much as possible...”.

But Truman, having become president, found himself in a very serious situation. On the one hand, the entry of the Soviet Union into the war with Japan for political reasons was extremely unfavorable for it, since this gave Stalin the right to vote in the settlement of affairs in East Asia. And this is not just Japan. This is huge China, the countries of Southeast Asia. On the other hand, the military, although they were counting on the effect atomic bomb, but were not sure that the Japanese would surrender. And so it happened.

Soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army surrender. Iwo Jima, April 5, 1945

It is worth noting that Stalin did not know the date of the nuclear attack on Hiroshima. In Potsdam, Truman, outside, so to speak, the framework of the conference, somewhere during a coffee break, in agreement with Churchill, approached Stalin and said that the United States had created a bomb of enormous power. Stalin, surprisingly American President, did not react at all. Truman and Churchill even thought that he did not understand what they were talking about. But Stalin understood everything perfectly.

But the Americans about the entry date Soviet army they knew very well during the war against Japan. In mid-May 1945, Truman specially sent his assistant Hopkins to the USSR and instructed Ambassador Harriman to clarify this issue. And Stalin openly said: “By August 8 we will be ready to take action in Manchuria.”

Stalin did not know the date of the nuclear attack on Hiroshima

A few words about the Kwantung Army. Politicians and historians often use the term “million-strong Kwantung Army.” Was this really so? The fact is that the word “millionth” means, in fact, the Kwantung Army, plus 250 thousand military personnel of the puppet regime of Manchukuo, created on the territory of occupied Manchuria, plus several tens of thousands of troops of the Mongolian prince De Wang, plus a fairly strong group in Korea, troops on Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands. Now, if we combine all this, we will get an army of millions.

In this regard, the question arises: “Why did the Japanese lose? They're not the worst warriors, are they? It must be said that the USSR's victory over Japan was the highest manifestation of operational art and strategy that was accumulated by the Soviet Union during the years of the war with Nazi Germany. Here we must pay tribute to the Soviet command, Marshal Vasilevsky, who brilliantly carried out this operation. The Japanese simply did not have time to do anything. Everything was lightning fast. It was a real Soviet blitzkrieg.

When we talk about World War II, we most often think of the European theater of war. Meanwhile, in the vastness of Asia and Pacific Ocean, where the Japanese were allies of the Germans, battles took place, which also had a significant influence on the outcome of the war and the further fate of the Asian peoples.

Lightning Strike

Military operations in Asia began for the Japanese several years before they entered Poland. Taking advantage of the weakness of China, where there was a struggle for power between several military factions, Japan already in 1932 successfully captured Manchuria, creating a semblance of an independent state there. 5 years later, the descendants of the samurai began a war to capture all of China. Therefore, the main events of the Second World War in 1939-1940 took place only in Europe, and not in the Asian expanses. The Japanese government was in no hurry to disperse its forces until the leading colonial powers capitulated. When France and Holland found themselves under German occupation, preparations for war began.

The Land of the Rising Sun had very limited resources. Therefore, the main emphasis was on the rapid seizure of territories and their colonization. It can be said that Japan used tactics similar to the German blitzkrieg in World War II. After the surrender of the French and Dutch, the most serious opponents in this region remained the USSR and the USA. After June 22, 1941, the Soviet Union had no time for Japan, so the main blow had to be delivered to the American fleet. On December 7, this was done - in the attack on Pearl Harbor, almost all American aircraft and ships in the Pacific Ocean were destroyed.

This event came as a complete surprise to the Americans and their allies. No one believed that Japan, busy with the war in China, would attack any other territory. Meanwhile, hostilities developed more and more rapidly. Hong Kong and Indochina quickly fell under Japanese occupation; in January 1942, British troops were driven out of Malaysia and Singapore, and by May the Philippines and Indonesia were in Japanese hands. Thus, a huge territory with an area of ​​10 million square kilometers came under the rule of the descendants of the samurai.

Japan's early successes in World War II were aided by well-thought-out propaganda. it was suggested that the Japanese had come to liberate them from white imperialism and build a prosperous society together. Therefore, the occupiers were initially supported by the local population. Similar sentiments existed in countries that had not yet been captured - for example, in India, to which the Japanese prime minister promised independence. It was only later, having seen that “our own” aliens at first glance were no better than Europeans, local residents began an active insurgency.

From victories to defeats

But the Japanese blitzkrieg collapsed with the same crash as the Barbarossa plan. By mid-1942, the Americans and British had come to their senses and launched an offensive. Japan, with its limited resources, could not win this battle. In June 1942, the Americans inflicted a crushing defeat on the enemy at Midway Atoll, not far from the famous Pearl Harbor. Four Japanese aircraft carriers and the best Japanese pilots went to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. In February 1943, after bloody battles that lasted several months, the Americans occupied Guadalcanal.

Over the course of six months, the United States, taking advantage of the lull at the front, increased the number of aircraft carriers many times over and launched a new offensive. The Japanese abandoned the Pacific archipelagos one after another under the onslaught of an enemy who outnumbered them in weapons and numbers.

At the same time, it is worth saying that these victories were not easy for the Americans. The battles that Japan lost in World War II brought many losses to the enemy. The soldiers and officers of the imperial army, in accordance with samurai traditions, were in no hurry to surrender and fought to the last. The Japanese command actively used this resilience, a striking example of which are the famous kamikazes. Even the besieged units blocked on the islands held out to the last. As a result, by the time of surrender, many soldiers and officers of the Japanese army simply died of starvation.

But neither heroism nor selflessness helped the Land of the Rising Sun survive. In August 1945, after the atomic bomb, the government decided to capitulate. So Japan was defeated in World War II.

The country was quickly occupied by American troops. War criminals were executed, parliamentary elections were held, and a new constitution was adopted. Conducted agrarian reform forever eliminated the samurai class, which already existed more in tradition. The Americans did not dare to abolish the monarchy, fearing a social explosion. But the consequences of World War II for other Asian countries were such that they forever changed the political map of this region. The peoples who fought the Japanese no longer wanted to tolerate the colonial authorities and entered into a fierce struggle for their independence.

In the fall of 1939, when the war began and Western European countries, one after another, began to suffer defeats and become the object of occupation by Nazi Germany, Japan decided that its time had come. Having tightly tightened all the screws within the country (parties and trade unions were liquidated, and instead the Association for Assistance to the Throne was created as a fascist-type paramilitary organization designed to introduce a total political and ideological system of strict control in the country), the highest military circles, led by the generals who headed the cabinet of ministers, received unlimited powers to wage war. Military operations in China intensified, accompanied, as usual, by atrocities against civilians. But the main thing that Japan was waiting for was the capitulation of the European powers, in particular France and Holland, to Hitler. Once this became a fact, the Japanese began to occupy Indonesia and Indochina, and then Malaya, Burma, Thailand and the Philippines. Having set their goal to create a gigantic colonial empire subservient to Japan, the Japanese declared their desire for “East Asian co-prosperity.”

After the bombing of the American base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii in December 1941, Japan found itself in a state of war with the United States and England, which, despite some initial successes, eventually led the country to a protracted crisis. Although the Japanese monopolies benefited greatly by gaining uncontrolled access to the exploitation of the wealth of almost all of Southeast Asia, their position, like that of the Japanese occupation forces, was precarious. The population of the occupied countries spoke out, often with arms in hand, against the Japanese occupation forces. Maintaining troops simultaneously in many countries and waging an ongoing and increasingly obvious futile war in China required considerable resources. All this led to a deterioration in the economic balance and to an aggravation of the internal situation in Japan itself. This manifested itself with particular force at the beginning of 1944, when a certain turning point was outlined in the war in the Far East. American troops landed in one or another of the island areas and drove the Japanese out of there. Japan's relations with the USSR also changed. In April 1945, the USSR denounced the neutrality pact concluded in 1941 with Japan, and in August of the same year, shortly after the atomic bombing of Japan by the Americans, Soviet troops entered the territory of Manchuria and forced the Kwantung Army to surrender, which meant not only defeat Japan, but also the beginning of revolutionary changes in Manchuria, and then in the rest of China.

The surrender of Japan in August 1945 led to the collapse of the plans of the Japanese military, the collapse of that aggressive foreign policy of Japan, which for several decades was based on economic development and expansion of Japanese capital, on the samurai spirit of the past. Like the samurai at the end of the last century, the militarists of the first half of the 20th century. suffered bankruptcy and were forced to leave the historical stage. Japan lost all its colonial possessions and conquered territories. The question arose about the status of post-war Japan. And here the Americans who occupied the country had their say.

The meaning of the transformations that were carried out by the Allied Council for Japan that they created boiled down to a radical restructuring of the entire structure of this country. A series of democratic reforms were implemented, including the revival of parties, the convening of parliament, and the adoption of a new constitution that left very limited rights for the emperor and cut off the possibility of a revival of Japanese militarism in the future. A show trial was held with the conviction of Japanese war criminals, not to mention a thorough purge of the state apparatus, police, etc. The education system in Japan was revised. Special measures included limiting the capabilities of the largest Japanese monopolies. Finally, the country carried out a radical agrarian reform in 1948–1949, which eliminated large landownership and thus completely undermined the economic position of the remnants of the samurai.

This whole series of reforms and radical transformations meant another important leap for Japan from the world of yesterday into new conditions of existence that corresponded to the modern level. Combined with the skills of capitalist development developed during the post-reform period, these new measures turned out to be a powerful impulse that contributed to the rapid economic revival of Japan, defeated in the war. And not only the revival, but also the further development of the country, its vigorous prosperity. The wounds of the Second World War were healed quite quickly. Japanese capital, in new and very favorable conditions for it, when external forces (such as “young officers” filled with the militant spirit of samurai) did not influence its development, began to increase its growth rate, which laid the foundation for that very phenomenon of Japan that is so good famous these days. Paradoxical as it may seem, it was the defeat of Japan in the war, its occupation and the associated radical changes in its structure that finally opened the door for the development of this country. All barriers to such development were removed - and the result was amazing...

It is important to note one more significant circumstance. In its successful progress along the path of capitalism, Japan took full advantage of everything that democratization on the European-American model could provide for such development. However, she did not give up much of what goes back to her own fundamental traditions and which also played a positive role in her successes. This fruitful synthesis will be discussed in the next chapter. In the meantime, a few words about Korea.

Asians still cannot forgive Japan for its actions in the occupied territories during World War II. One of the most terrible Japanese crimes against humanity is the biological experiments on humans carried out in Unit 731.The current negative attitude towards Japan from China, North Korea and South Korea This is mainly due to the fact that Japan - unlike Germany - did not punish most of its war criminals. Many of them continued to live and work in the Land of the Rising Sun, as well as hold responsible positions. Even those who carried out biological experiments on people in the notorious special “detachment 731”.

In particular, it was customary to use the Chinese to train Japanese doctors. Japanese doctor Ken Yuasa recalled in the mid-90s, talking to a reporter New York Times Nicholas Kristof, how during the war he was once invited to “practical surgery” in one of the cities in Shanxi province. The doctor and his colleagues spent an hour and a half performing various operations (removal of appendicitis, amputation of limbs, etc.) on two living Chinese. The Chinese were treated “humanely” - they were given general anesthesia before the operation and killed at the end of the “lesson”. Not all test subjects were so lucky. Dr. Ken Yuasa argues that conducting such “ practical classes"it was quite business as usual for Japanese doctors working in China.

This is not unlike the experiments of Dr. Josef Mengele. The cruelty and cynicism of such experiences does not fit into the modern human consciousness, but they were quite organic for the Japanese of that time. After all, what was at stake then was the “victory of the emperor,” and he was sure that only science could give this victory.

Enlightened Emperor

After officially taking the throne in 1926, Emperor Hirohito chose the motto "Showa" ("Era of Enlightened Peace") for his reign. Hirohito believed in the power of science: “In the name of religion, people died more people than for any other reason. However, science has always been best friend murderers. Science can kill thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of people in a very short period of time.”

The emperor knew what he was talking about: he was a biologist by training. And he believed that biological weapons would help Japan conquer the world, and he, a descendant of the goddess Amaterasu, would fulfill his divine destiny and rule this world.

The emperor's ideas about “scientific weapons” found support among the sober-minded Japanese military. They understood that the samurai spirit and conventional weapons alone could not win a protracted war against the Western powers. Therefore, on behalf of the Japanese military department, in the late 20s - early 30s, Japanese colonel and biologist Shiro Ishii made a voyage to the bacteriological laboratories of Italy, Germany, the USSR and France. In his final report, presented to the country's highest military officials, he convinced everyone present that biological weapons would be of great benefit to Japan.

“Unlike artillery shells, bacteriological weapons are not capable of instantly killing living force, but these non-explosive bombs - shells filled with bacteria - kill without noise human body and animals, bringing a slow but painful death. It is not necessary to produce projectiles; you can infect completely peaceful things - clothing, cosmetics, food and drinks, edible animals, you can spray bacteria from the air. Even if the first attack is not massive, the bacteria will still multiply and hit targets,” Ishii said. He stated that if Japan does not immediately begin research in the field of creating biological weapons, then it will be almost impossible to catch up with European countries in this direction.

Ishii was truly a bioweapons fanatic. He conducted experiments on people in his Japanese laboratory. It is not surprising that his incendiary and alarmist report impressed the military, and they allocated funds to create a special complex for the development of biological weapons. Throughout its existence, this complex had several names, the most famous being “detachment 731.”

The unit called “logs” those prisoners on whom deadly strains were tested.

Not people

The detachment was stationed in 1936 near the village of Pingfang, southeast of Harbin (at that time the territory of the puppet state of Manchukuo). It was located on an area of ​​six square kilometers in almost 150 buildings. For the entire surrounding world, this was the Main Directorate for Water Supply and Prevention of the Kwantung Army units. “Detachment 731” had everything for an autonomous existence: two power plants, artesian wells, airfield, railway line. They even had their own fighter aircraft, which was supposed to shoot down all air targets (even Japanese ones) that flew over the detachment’s territory without permission. The detachment included graduates of the most prestigious Japanese universities, the flower of Japanese science.

The unit was stationed in China rather than Japan for several reasons. Firstly, when it was deployed on the territory of the metropolis, it was very difficult to maintain secrecy. Secondly, if the materials were leaked, the Chinese population would be affected, not the Japanese. Finally, thirdly, in China there were always “logs” at hand. Officers and scientists of the unit called “logs” those on whom the deadly strains were tested: Chinese prisoners, Koreans, Americans, Australians. Among the “logs” there were a lot of our compatriots - white emigrants who lived in Harbin. When the supply of “experimental subjects” in the detachment was running out, Dr. Ishii turned to the local authorities with a request for a new batch. If they did not have prisoners of war on hand, Japanese intelligence services carried out raids on the nearest Chinese settlements, driving captured civilians to the “water treatment plant.”

The first thing they did with the newcomers was fatten them up. The "logs" had three meals a day and even sometimes desserts with fruit. The experimental material had to be absolutely healthy so as not to violate the purity of the experiment. According to the instructions, any member of the detachment who dared to call a “log” a person was severely punished.

“We believed that “logs” are not people, that they are even lower than cattle. However, among the scientists and researchers working in the detachment there was no one who had any sympathy for the “logs”. Everyone - both military personnel and civilian detachments - believed that the destruction of “logs” was a completely natural thing,” said one of the employees.

“They were logs to me. Logs cannot be considered as people. The logs are already dead on their own. Now they were dying for the second time, and we were only carrying out the death sentence,” said Unit 731 training specialist Toshimi Mizobuchi.

In search of a miracle weapon

The specialized experiments that were carried out on experimental subjects were tests of the effectiveness of various strains of diseases. Ishii’s “favorite” was the plague. Towards the end of the war, he developed a strain of plague bacterium that was 60 times more virulent than the usual one. These bacteria were stored dry, and immediately before use it was only necessary to moisten them with water and a small amount of nutrient solution.

Experiments to remove these bacteria were carried out on people. For example, in the detachment there were special cells where people were locked. The cages were so small that the prisoners could not move. They were infected with some kind of infection, and then they were observed for days to see changes in the state of the body. There were also larger cells. The sick and healthy were driven there at the same time in order to track how quickly the disease was transmitted from person to person. But no matter how he was infected, no matter how much he was observed, the end was the same - the person was dissected alive, taking out his organs and watching how the disease spread inside. People were kept alive and not stitched up for days, so that doctors could observe the process without bothering themselves with a new autopsy. In this case, no anesthesia was usually used - doctors were afraid that it could disrupt the natural course of the experiment.

Those who were tested not with bacteria, but with gases were more “lucky”. They died faster. “All the experimental subjects who died from hydrogen cyanide had purple-red faces,” said one of the detachment employees. - Those who died from mustard gas had their whole body burned so that it was impossible to look at the corpse. Our experiments have shown that a person's endurance is approximately equal to that of a pigeon. Under the conditions in which the pigeon died, the experimental subject also died.”

Biological weapons tests were not limited to Pingfan. In addition to the main building itself, “Detachment 731” had four branches located along the Soviet-Chinese border, and one test site-airfield in Anda. Prisoners were taken there to practice the effectiveness of using bacteriological bombs on them. They were tied to special poles or crosses driven in concentric circles around a point, where ceramic bombs filled with plague fleas were then dropped. To prevent the experimental subjects from accidentally dying from bomb fragments, they were wearing iron helmets and shields. Sometimes, however, the buttocks were left bare when, instead of “flea bombs,” bombs filled with special metal shrapnel with a helical protrusion on which bacteria were applied were used. The scientists themselves stood at a distance of three kilometers and watched the experimental subjects through binoculars. Then the people were taken back to the facility and there, like all similar experimental subjects, they were cut open alive in order to observe how the infection went.

However, once such an experiment, carried out on 40 experimental subjects, did not end as the Japanese planned. One of the Chinese managed to somehow loosen his bonds and jump off the cross. He did not run away, but immediately unraveled his closest comrade. They then rushed to free the others. Only after all 40 people were untangled did everyone scatter.

The Japanese experimenters, who saw what was happening through binoculars, were in a panic. If even one test subject had escaped, the top-secret program would have been in jeopardy. Only one of the guards remained calm. He got into the car, rushed across those running and began to crush them. The Anda training ground was a huge field where there was not a single tree for 10 kilometers. Therefore, most of the prisoners were crushed, and some were even taken alive.

Field tests

After “laboratory” tests in the detachment and at the training ground, the researchers of “detachment 731” carried out field tests. Ceramic bombs filled with plague fleas were dropped from an airplane over Chinese cities and villages, and plague flies were released. In his book “The Death Factory,” the California historian state university Sheldon Harris claims that more than 200 thousand people died from plague bombs.

The achievements of the detachment were widely used to fight Chinese partisans. For example, strains of typhoid fever contaminated wells and reservoirs in places controlled by the partisans. However, they soon abandoned this: their own troops often came under attack.

However, the Japanese military had already become convinced of the effectiveness of the work of “Detachment 731” and began to develop plans for the use of bacteriological weapons against the USA and the USSR. There were no problems with ammunition: according to employees, by the end of the war, so many bacteria had accumulated in the storerooms of “detachment 731” that if they ideal conditions were scattered across the globe, this would be enough to destroy all of humanity. But the Japanese establishment lacked political will - or maybe it lacked sobriety...

In July 1944, only the attitude of Prime Minister Tojo saved the United States from disaster. The Japanese planned with the help balloons transport strains of various viruses to American territory - from those fatal to humans to those that will destroy livestock and crops. Tojo understood that Japan was already clearly losing the war and that if attacked with biological weapons, America could respond in kind.

Despite Tojo's opposition, the Japanese command in 1945 developed the plan for Operation Cherry Blossoms at Night until the very end. According to the plan, several submarines were supposed to approach the American coast and release planes there, which were supposed to spray plague-infected flies over San Diego. Fortunately, by that time Japan had a maximum of five submarines, each of which could carry two or three special aircraft. And the leadership of the fleet refused to provide them for the operation, citing the fact that all forces needed to be concentrated on protecting the mother country.

122 Fahrenheit

To this day, members of Unit 731 maintain that testing biological weapons on living people was justified. “There is no guarantee that something like this will never happen again,” one of the members of this detachment, who celebrated his old age in a Japanese village, said with a smile in an interview with the New York Times. “Because in war you always have to win.”

But the fact is that the most terrible experiments carried out on people in Ishii’s detachment had nothing to do with biological weapons. Particularly inhumane experiments were carried out in the most secret rooms of the detachment, where most of the service personnel did not even have access. They had exclusively medical purposes. Japanese scientists wanted to know the endurance limits of the human body.

For example: soldiers of the imperial army in Northern China often suffered from frostbite in winter. “Experimentally” doctors from “detachment 731” found out that the best way The treatment for frostbite was not by rubbing the affected limbs, but by immersing them in water at a temperature of 100 to 122 degrees Fahrenheit. To understand this, “at temperatures below minus 20, experimental people were taken out into the yard at night and forced to put their bare arms or legs into a barrel of cold water, and then put them under artificial wind until they got frostbite, he said former employee squad. “Then they tapped their hands with a small stick until they made a sound like hitting a piece of wood.” Then the frostbitten limbs were placed in water of a certain temperature and, changing it, they observed the death of muscle tissue in the arms.

Among these experimental subjects was a three-day-old child: so that he would not clench his hand into a fist and not violate the purity of the experiment, a needle was stuck into his middle finger.

Experiments were carried out in pressure chambers for the Imperial Air Force. “They placed a test subject in a vacuum pressure chamber and began to gradually pump out the air,” recalled one of the squad’s trainees. - As the difference between the external pressure and the pressure in the internal organs increased, his eyes first bulged out, then his face swelled to the size of a large ball, the blood vessels swelled like snakes, and his intestines began to crawl out, as if alive. Finally the man just exploded alive.” This is how Japanese doctors determined the permissible altitude ceiling for their pilots.

In addition, to find out the fastest and most effective way to treat combat wounds, people were blown up with grenades, shot, burned with flamethrowers...

There were also experiments just for curiosity. Individual organs were cut out from the living body of the experimental subjects; they cut off the arms and legs and sewed them back, swapping the right and left limbs; they poured the blood of horses or monkeys into the human body; exposed to powerful X-ray radiation; left without food or water; scalded various parts of the body with boiling water; tested for sensitivity to electric current. Curious scientists filled a person's lungs with large amounts of smoke or gas, and introduced rotting pieces of tissue into the stomach of a living person.

However, such “useless” experiments yielded practical results. For example, this is how the conclusion emerged that a person is 78% water. To understand this, scientists first weighed the captive and then placed him in a hot room with minimal humidity. The man sweated profusely, but was not given water. Eventually it dried out completely. The body was then weighed, and it was found to weigh about 22% of its original mass.

Fill your hand

Finally, Japanese surgeons simply trained their skills by training on “logs.” One example of such “training” is described in the book “The Devil’s Kitchen,” written by the most famous researcher of Unit 731, Seiichi Morimura.

Quote: “In 1943, a Chinese boy was brought to the section room. According to the employees, he was not one of the “logs”, he was simply kidnapped somewhere and brought to the detachment, but nothing was known for sure. The boy undressed as he was ordered and lay down on the table with his back. A mask containing chloroform was immediately placed on his face. When the anesthesia finally took effect, the boy’s entire body was wiped with alcohol. One of the experienced members of Tanabe's group standing around the table took a scalpel and approached the boy. He stuck a scalpel into chest and made a cut in the shape of the Latin letter Y. The white fat layer. In the place where Kocher clamps were immediately applied, blood bubbles boiled. The live dissection began. From the boy's body, the staff, with deft, trained hands, took out the internal organs: stomach, liver, kidneys, pancreas, intestines. They were dismantled and thrown into buckets that stood there, and from the buckets they were immediately transferred into glass vessels filled with formaldehyde, which were closed with lids. The removed organs in formaldehyde solution continued to contract. After the internal organs were removed, only the boy's head remained intact. Small, short-cropped head. One of Minato's team secured her to the operating table. Then, with a scalpel, he made an incision from the ear to the nose. When the skin was removed from the head, a saw was used. A triangular hole was made in the skull, exposing the brain. The detachment officer took it with his hand and quickly lowered it into a vessel with formaldehyde. “What was left on the operating table was something that resembled a boy’s body - a devastated body and limbs.”

There was no “production waste” in this “detachment”. After experiments with frostbite, crippled people went to gas chambers for experiments, and after experimental autopsies, the organs were made available to microbiologists. Every morning on a special stand there was a list of which departments would go to which organs from the “logs” scheduled for dissection.

All experiments were carefully documented. In addition to piles of papers and protocols, the detachment had about 20 film and photographic cameras. “Dozens and hundreds of times we drilled into our heads that the experimental subjects were not people, but just material, and still, during live autopsies, my head became confused,” said one of the operators. “The nerves of a normal person could not stand it.”

Some experiments were recorded on paper by the artist. At that time, only black and white photography existed, and it could not reflect, for example, the change in color of fabric due to frostbite...

Were in demand

According to the recollections of the employees of “detachment 731”, during its existence, about three thousand people died within the walls of the laboratories. But some researchers argue that the real victims were much higher.

The Soviet Union put an end to the existence of Unit 731. On August 9, Soviet troops launched an offensive against the Japanese army, and the "detachment" was ordered to "act at its own discretion." Evacuation work began on the night of August 10-11. The most important materials - descriptions of the use of bacteriological weapons in China, piles of autopsy reports, descriptions of etiology and pathogenesis, descriptions of the process of cultivating bacteria - were burned in specially dug pits.

It was decided to destroy the “logs” that were still alive at that time. Some people were gassed, and some were nobly allowed to commit suicide. The corpses were thrown into a pit and burned. The first time the squad members “cheated” - the corpses were not completely burned, and they were simply covered with earth. Having learned about this, the authorities, despite the rush to evacuate, ordered the corpses to be dug up and the work done “as it should.” After the second attempt, the ashes and bones were thrown into the Songhua River.

The exhibits of the “exhibition room” were also thrown there - a huge hall where severed human organs, limbs, severed in different ways heads, dissected bodies. Some of these exhibits were contaminated and showed various stages damage to organs and parts of the human body. The exhibition room could become the most clear evidence of the inhuman nature of “Detachment 731.” “It is unacceptable that in the hands of the attackers Soviet troops at least one of these drugs was ingested,” the detachment’s leadership told its subordinates.

But some of the most important materials were preserved. They were taken out by Shiro Ishii and some other leaders of the detachment, handing it all over to the Americans - as a kind of ransom for their freedom. For the United States, this information was of extreme importance.

The Americans began their biological weapons development program only in 1943, and the results of the “field experiments” of their Japanese counterparts came in handy.

“Currently, Ishii’s group, working closely with the United States, is preparing large number materials for us and agreed to put at our disposal eight thousand slides depicting animals and people subjected to bacteriological experiments,” said a special memorandum distributed among selected officials of the State Department and the Pentagon. “This is extremely important for the security of our country, and the value of this is significantly higher than what we would achieve by initiating a judicial investigation of war crimes ... Due to the extreme importance of information about biological weapons of the Japanese army, the US government decides not to charge any member of the detachment with war crimes on the preparation of bacteriological warfare of the Japanese army."

Therefore, in response to a request from the Soviet side for the extradition and punishment of members of the detachment, a conclusion was sent to Moscow that “the location of the leadership of “detachment 731,” including Ishii, is unknown and there is no reason to accuse the detachment of war crimes.”

In total, almost three thousand scientists worked in “Detachment 731” (including those who worked at auxiliary facilities). And all of them, except those who fell into the hands of the USSR, escaped responsibility. Many of the scientists who dissected living people became deans of universities, medical schools, academics, and businessmen in post-war Japan. Among them were the governor of Tokyo, the president of the Japanese Medical Association, and senior officials of the National Institute of Health. The military and doctors who worked with “log” women (mainly experimenting with venereal diseases) opened a private maternity hospital in the Tokaj area after the war.

Prince Takeda ( cousin Emperor Hirohito), who inspected the “detachment”, was also not punished and even headed the Japanese Olympic Committee on the eve of the 1964 Games. And the evil genius of the squad himself - Shiro Ishii - lived comfortably in Japan and died of cancer in 1959