Page 144 - Unit 731 Testimony

to us. The boys lost interest in going and a lot of them became cranky
and cried. The education officer hit the criers with the scabbard of his
sword and screamed, "Don't cry!"

Y-SAN: I applied for the air corps also. We were mustered at Morioka
University.
T-SAN: But the name of the unit was not 731—it was 731-T. That's because
it was a secret unit. That got us angry when we found out.
Y-SAN: When I got to Unit 731, I thought it strange that on Mondays and
Fridays smoke always poured from the big chimney. One day, I was out
on the farm where the unit grew vegetables to maintain self-sufficiency in

food. The officer in charge of raising crops was there.
"They're burning again today," he said to me.

"Burning what?" I asked.
"Logs."

"But if there are no trees around, how come there are logs to
burn?" I wondered.
Then he leveled with me and told me that it was corpses that were

making the smoke. He added, "They're spies." In my fourteen-year-old
innocence, I thought, "Ah! They were bad people."

T-SAN: In June 1945, we celebrated the anniversary of the founding of Unit 731.
We were given special treats to eat.
K-SAN: That was a critical point in time for Unit 731. People were asking what
would happen to the unit. Japan had a nonaggression pact with Russia,
but that was a treaty made to be broken. The question was, When would

they attack? Unit 731 was researching for war against the Soviets.
Unit 731 was not a combat unit. That meant that in the event of an
attack, we would have to evacuate and run. The biggest problem would

be destroying the evidence.
From May 1945, the lights in the office of the unit leader's office
were burning bright. I knew then that something must be happening,
but I was too low down in rank to be told what. I found out later that
there were conferences of officers going on, and that things were

getting bad.
As I mentioned, the point that was constantly under discussion
was whether the Soviets would attack or not. And if so, when. Ishii

was very democratic. He asked me, an absolute lowest ranking