Unit 731: the Japanese Army's secret of secrets

Unit 731: the Japanese Army's secret of secrets by DAVID WALLACE PETER WILLIAMS. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780340394632.

This book inspired by the TVS documentary of the same title, unlocks one of the last great secrets of the Second World War. For nearly half century, the Japanese Army Unit 731 has been shrouded in mystery. Set up in 1935 by brilliant bacteriologist Shiro Ishii, in a remote, high-security headquarters in a village in Japanese occupied Manchuria, the unit was where Japanese soldiers-scientists carried out freezing, ballistics and live vivisection experiments on Russian, Chinese, American, British and Australian prisoners.Ishii’s aim was to make a biological weapon that would win war for Japan. But, unlike his Nazi counterpart, Josef Mengele, Ishii had no reason to take refuge in the jungles of South America at the end of the War. For he and his colleagues pulled off the most incredible deal with their erstwhile enemies. The book charts the top-level deal under which Unit 731’s unique research data was secretly traded to the America in return for war-crimes immunity. Not a single mention is found of Unit 731 in the vast tomes of the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal.Emperor Hirohito, the only surviving wartime leader, could have known of this secret biological warfare unit. His seal is on the document establishing the “Epidemic Prevention and Water Supply Unit”-Unit 731’s cover name. This book seeks to answer the many questions raised about Unit 731. How far did the Unit’s activities stretch abroad? Was there human experimentation elsewhere? To what use did the America put the Japanese scientific data? Was it used in the Korean War? Did Britain know the full extent of Japanese biological warfare activities?