Page 30 - Unit 731

Nishi Toshihide, a former chief of the training and education division of Unit 731, stated during the Khabarovsk war crime trials:

I read the report written by Hisato Yoshimura about human experimentation. Regarding this point, there was a video. The video showed four to five people in fetters put outdoors. They were wearing
cotton garment and had bare hands. Later, a huge electric fan was put in front of them to speed up the process of frostbite. Then their hands were hit by a small wooden stick to check if they were
already frostbitten. 8
Military police of Unit 731 Kurahara explained:
When I walked into the laboratory at the prison, I saw five Chinese men sitting on a bench. Two of them had already lost all their fingers. Their palms were dark. Bone was visible on the hands of the
remaining three Chinese men. Although they still had their fingers, they were just finger bones. 9
Frostbite Experiment on a Hundred People
After the end of the Second World War, Yoshimura published an article titled ‘Research on Skin Reaction under Severe Cold’ in Physiology Society of
Japan. Yoshimura used 100 Chinese civilian men and women, aged from fifteen to seventy-four, to observe the reaction of humans in water of 0 degrees
Celsius. Judging by the number of civilians used in a single experiment, one can conclude that Unit 731 had an abundance of test subjects, and using
subjects of different ages could provide relatively comparable data.
Human Experimentation on a Baby
According to the same research paper, ‘Research on Skin Reaction under Severe Cold’, Yoshimura conducted experimentation on a three-day-old baby. He
put the baby’s fingers into 0-degree Celsius water for thirty minutes daily for a month.
To a normal human being, such action is unimaginable. There is no way to conduct it without help from a third party, and what kind of human could
witness such cruelty to a baby and jot notes? We were particularly interested in understanding their thoughts at that time. Who was the baby? Where were
the parents? These questions remain unanswered, and the life of the baby is reflected only in statistics in Yoshimura’s paper.
Yoshimura lived to the age of eighty-four. As a father and grandfather, what were his thoughts about his own children? Did he ever think of his past
when he was with his family? Where was his conscience with that baby? He was educated in an upper-class institution, but where had his human nature
gone?
Results of Human Experimentation Applied in War
For eight years, Hisato Yoshimura’s frostbite division conducted human experimentation on human beings of varied nationality, age, and gender. His work
was supported and praised by the Japanese Kwantung Army as well as the Ministry of War of Japan. The experiments and research were filmed as
promotional documentaries, and the data were used as educational materials for the Japanese Army to avoid frostbite in wars against China and Russia.

Life after the Second World War and Academic Results
Under the protection of the US, Hisato Yoshimura escaped the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. His acts in Unit 731 were forgotten by the
public. The experimental data and statistics gained from his dirty and bloody acts in Unit 731 were permanent contributions to Japanese medical
development. Yoshimura was appointed principal of the Kyoto Imperial Medical University, chairperson of the Japan Weather Association, and held other
important roles in universities and research centres. In addition to research papers, he published several books, including PH Theory and Measurement;
Kwashiorkor: The Theory and Fact of Protein Nutrition; Medical Psychology: Adaptability of Humans—Case Study on Adaption to Climate Change;
Summary of Human Physiology; Outline of Medical Psychology; and more.
Memoir of Hisato Yoshimura

On Hisato Yoshimura’s seventy-seventh birthday, he wrote Kijyu kaiko (Memoir of My 77th Birthday). In this book, he said: ‘I published my research
outcomes during wartime in the English Physiology Magazine and received massive feedback from Western scholars. Even now, these are major
references not only in Japan but many universities and research centers in the world’. 10
From this statement, Yoshimura seems to be a leader in the field, but where did his statistics come from? All these useful materials were from his
abundant cruel human experiments. Those such as Yoshimura, who committed medical crimes and war crimes, should have been tried and imprisoned for
what they did in Unit 731 instead of spending their rest of lives publishing and giving talks on their ‘data’. Yoshimura, however, did not regret his acts in
Unit 731. When he was interviewed by reporter Tomizo Asano (朝野富三) from Mainichi Shimbun, Yoshimura claimed: ‘It was war. All the evil is due to
the country, and is the country’s responsibility’.
A Kyoto physician, Dr Ichiro Kadowaki (門脇一郎), published an article titled ‘Former Principal of Kyoto Imperial University Hisato Yoshimura and
Unit 731’ in which he wrote:
They called the people who conducted human experimentation and their forced guinea pigs as ‘contributors’ to the improvement in medical progress and research on frostbite prevention and recovery
from frostbite for the Japanese Army. This is discrimination on human beings. From the principles of health and value of life, it was an unfair and selfish statement toward all mankind. The inventors
took away the property of victims, not only material life, health and property, and even their basic human rights. Did they have the right to do so? This is a fundamental mistake. Everyone is equal.
Everyone has the right to life and health. The fundamental purpose of medical development is to support and uphold basic rights for all mankind. It is not allowed to break this rule for any reason. And
it is not possible to give up the right of anyone for other’s happiness. Of course, to give up other’s right, no one can gain happiness. 11
Errors in the Hundred-Year History of the School of Medicine at Kyoto University

Reflections of Two Memoirs
I visited the School of Medicine at Kyoto University in 2010. When I was talking with Professor Nagahiro Minato (湊長博), director of the school, he
explained that there was another Minato, Masao Minato (湊正雄). He and this Minato had no connection.
Professor Minato gave me a book with a long and interesting title in both English and Japanese, Curiosity, Challenge and Continuation: Kyoto Daigaku
Yigakubu Shoritsu 100 Shuunen Kinen Arubamu (Curiosity, Challenge and Continuation: The Centennial Memorial Album of the School of Medicine of
Kyoto University), published in 2004. Back in Harbin, I briefly flipped through the volume and placed it on the shelf as one of many reference books never
to be read again. Later, I had a chance to read the Graduation Year Book of 1920 from the same medical school in Kyoto. When I placed the two books
side by side and compared the photos and records in both, I was surprised to have found Shirō Ishii missing.
The two books shared some similarities: the same people appeared in both, including the president of Kyoto Imperial University Araki Torasaburō and
the professors from the School of Medicine, such as Ren Kimura, Kenji Kiyono, Seiwa Tanabem, and Shosan Toda. These men were Shirō Ishii’s teachers