Page 242 - MaterialsTrial-JapaneseArmy-1950

stationed?

Answer: There were two branches in the area of the 5th Army, one of them at Hailin
Station, the other at Linkow.

Question: What branch was accused Onoue chief of?

Answer: He was Chief of Branch 643 at Hailin Station.

Question: Did you, at the request of accused Onoue, issue an order for the catching of rats
to help the branch in the breeding of fleas?

Answer: It was not an order, it was a request to unit commanders. The Chief of the army's
Medical Service had no right to issue orders to army units.

Question; So you wrote a special letter to the unit commanders on the subject?

Answer: Yes.

Question: What circumstances induced you to write this letter to the unit commanders?

Answer: Major Onoue had applied to me on the desirability of having rats. I therefore
wrote a letter saying that rats which were caught in the army units should not be killed, but
sent to Major Onoue. I should explain that it was not convenient to say in the letter that the
army units should go in for rat catching, and so it was put in the form of a suggestion that
they should not kill the rats they caught, but send them to Branch 643.

Question: As a bacteriologist, and, moreover, as former Chief of Detachment Ei 1644 in
Nanking, it was of course clear to you that these rodents were to be used by Detachment 731
for the breeding of fleas?

Answer: Although Major Onoue did not say as much, I could guess that this was so.

Question: How many bacteriological units were there in Nanking?

Answer: If bacteriological detachments are meant, there were none besides Detachment Ei
1644.

Question: You know that Detachment Ei 1644 in Nanking was at one time designated by
the code name "Tama"?

Answer: I do.

Question: Now, accused Sato, will you tell us what experiments on human beings were
conducted by Detachment Ei 1644, of which you were Chief?

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