Page 140 - Unit 731 Testimony

We were ordered out. On the way to the station an officer told us, "You
fellows will be headed southward. So I now cut all connection with the
Epidemic Prevention and Water Supply Unit. You have no reason to feel

guilty about anything, so go fight proudly."
We were a disease prevention unit, so we were issued only small arms.
On the way, I had a barber take clippings of my hair and nails and send
them to my home.

We crossed Korea to Pusan and boarded a ship. En route, we were hit
by a torpedo from an American submarine. About two thousand men were
killed. We survivors were transferred to another ship, and we headed for
Shanghai. Again, we got hit by an American torpedo. I escaped death again.

About eighty percent of those on board went down. The ship rolled over,
and I could hear the men trapped inside calling out, "Tenno heika banzai!"
["Eternal life to His Imperial Majesty"] Others cried, "Mother!"
Finally, we docked in Taiwan and took on medical supplies. We were
supposed to head for Mindanao but ended up landing in the Philippines in

December 1944. We were sent to a field hospital bringing medical supplies
to a station in the mountains. In early January, we were shelled by a
warship.

From there, we had combat against the Americans. That was rough.
Nothing in Unit 731 was even a fraction that bad. The war ended, and we
knew nothing about it. In January 1946, a plane flew over and dropped
leaflets to inform us that the war was over. They carried pictures of General
MacArthur and General Yamashita shaking hands. One day, my buddies
and I had laid our guns under a tree and were eating apricots when a
Japanese and an American officer came and said, "Let's go back to Japan

together." I was ready to keep fighting, but I gave in and was taken prisoner.
Later we were taken back to Japan, and I landed at Nagoya.
One reason I came to this Unit 731 Exhibition was to see if I might
contact other former members. I spoke with one man who had lost his sight

in an American bombing attack. He died recently and until the end he did
not want to meet with other former members.
Another man that I located and contacted by phone laughed, "That was
fifty years ago." That's about all he would say.

I was never ordered not to speak about the unit, or not to contact other
members. So, wherever I go, I speak about it, and search for others who