Page 83 - Unit 731 Testimony

exploitation of Japanese fear of USSR, and desire to cooperate with the
US." America was showing interest in matters more practical than turning
up defendants for war crimes trials.

(Ironically, the Japanese were not entirely correct about who would
mete out the most generous treatment in the wake of the war. The Soviet
Union certainly justified Japanese fears of revenge, with tens of thousands
of Japanese soldiers dying and disappearing at the hands of the Red Army,
as it swept through Manchuria. The Chinese Communists, however,

behaved much differently. In the oral history Japan at War, by Theodore
and Haruko Cook, a former Japanese POW held by the Chinese
Communists reports that "there were one thousand sixty-two of us
altogether . . . Forty-five of us were indicted and the others were given a
reprieve." By contrast, the same book reports that "of 4,000 arrested as war
criminals by Allied nations in the Pacific and Asian theaters, 1,068 were

executed or died in prison from 1946 to 1951." Another former POW
remarks, "I really believe the Chinese Communist Party were the ones who
spared my life.")
At this point in time, the question of whom to prosecute in war crimes

trials had not been completely settled. Testimony reported by the Soviets
was convincing enough for IPS to inform the War Department of its opinion
that it "warrants conclusion that Japanese BW group headed by Ishii did
violate rules of land warfare, but this expression of opinion is not a
recommendation that group be charged and tried for such," adding that
corroboration and evaluation of the suspects and their testimony for

trustworthiness would be necessary first. In favor of prosecution,
MacArthur recognized that high-ranking Japanese liable for prosecution for
war crimes were not necessarily the best sources of information. "A large
part of data including most of the valuable technical BW information as to
results of human experimentation and research in BW for crop destruction
probably can be obtained in this manner from low echelon Japanese
personnel not believed liable to 'War Crimes' trials."

On the other hand, the general also clearly perceived benefits to be had
from pardoning the higher ranking researchers. His feelings on this matter
are particularly evident in his advice to the War Department that "additional

data, possibly including some statements from Ishii probably can be
obtained by informing Japanese involved that information will be retained
in intelligence channels and will not be employed as 'War Crimes'