US paid for Japanese human germ warfare data

[Judi Lynn]

Last Update: Monday, August 15, 2005. 0:19am (AEST)
US paid for Japanese human germ warfare data

The United States gave money and other benefits to former members of a Japanese germ warfare unit two years after the end of World War II to obtain data on human experiments the unit conducted in China.

The Imperial Japanese Army established Unit 731 in 1936 to develop biological weapons using plague, anthrax and other bacteria.

Headquartered in the suburbs of Harbin in China's Heilongjiang Province, the unit conducted germ warfare in various places in China and used Chinese, Russians and others as subjects in human experiments.

The US-led allied powers that occupied Japan offered to waive war crime charges at the war tribunal for officers of Unit 731 set up by the Imperial Japanese Army in exchange for experiment data.

But two declassified US Government documents reveal Washington's eagerness to obtain such data extended to providing monetary rewards, despite the awful nature of Unit 731's activities, in an apparent attempt to beat the Soviet Union in the arms development race.
(snip/...)

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200508/s1437314.htm

[madrchsod]

1. this has been known for years

i wonder why the aussies are just finding this out?

[psychopomp]

4. No, the cash reward detail is new

If you have some interest in what went on there are some accounts of these experiments online that will shock even somebody familiar with accounts of the horrors of WWII.

There was one place on Japanese soil where these experiments were carried out on POW's, too. I know that because, for a time, I worked there (in the last few years). Strange thing, that.

[ConcernedCanuk]

2. First I heard of it, but then I's a Canuk . . .

.
.
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BUT

I found some more info

Germ warfare timeline

Published: Aug. 13, 1995

# 1925 -- Geneva Convention governing wartime conduct bans biological weapons. Japan refuses to approve treaty.

/snip/

# 1946 -- U.S. coverup of secret deal with Ishii and Unit 731 leaders -- germ warfare data based on human experimentation in exchange for immunity from war-crimes prosecution -- begins in earnest. Deal is concluded two years later.


# 1981 -- John Powell, a former publisher of a Shanghai magazine who was unsuccessfully tried for sedition in the early 1950s after accusing the United States of using germ warfare in Korea, exposes immunity deal in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.

/snip/


# 1986 -- Congressional subcommittee holds one-day hearing in Washington, called by Rep. Pat Williams of Montana, aimed at determining whether U.S. prisoners of war in Manchuria were victims of germ-warfare experimentation. Hearing is inconclusive.

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I don't think the Aussies just found out about it -

I think someone thinks it's time to bring this back out into the limelight


And I for one would concur if that was the reason

[Ms. Clio]

3. Funny how that wasn't mentioned in the History Channel documentary

I saw a couple of years ago.

[Judi Lynn]

5. Proabably an oversight! I'm sure that's it. n/t

[wli]

6. news to me, but not a surprise

I wonder how much post-WWII dirt is going to come out because of the US' implosion.