POW Group Testifies to Congress

STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD

to the

Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee and House Veterans' Affairs Committee

 

Joint Hearing

 

To Receive Legislative Presentations of Veterans Service Organizations

 

By

Jan Thompson

President

American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society

 

13 March 2024

 

AMERICAN DEFENDERS OF THE PACIFIC

TIME FOR A CONGRESSIONAL GOLD MEDAL

&

MEMORIALS IN JAPAN

 

 

Chairmen Tester and Bost, Ranking Members Moran and Takano, and Members of the Senate and House Veterans Affairs Committees, thank you for allowing us to describe how Congress can meet the concerns of veterans of World War II in the Pacific.

 

The American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor (ADBC) was founded in January 1946 at the Fort Devens, Massachusetts hospital by former POWs of Imperial Japan. The ADBC represented the men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces in the Pacific who participated in the early resistance to, and defensive battles against, the armed forces of Imperial Japan from December 8, 1941 to June 9, 1942. Nearly all the survivors endured four years of merciless imprisonment by Imperial Japan throughout the Empire.

 

Our Memorial Society now represents their families and descendants, as well as scholars, researchers, and archivists. Our goal is to preserve the history of the American POW experience in the Pacific and to teach future generations of the POWs’ sacrifice, courage, determination, and faith—the essence of the American spirit.

 

Background

 

The common perception of an American POW of Imperial Japan is as a casualty of the infamous Bataan Death March 82 years ago next month. The fall of the Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines and the start of the March, April 9, 1942, is National Former POW Recognition Day and is recognized with a Presidential Proclamation.

 

In fact, Americans—Marines, sailors, and merchant marines in China and Japan—became POWs of Imperial Japan starting with the first day of the War on December 8, 1941. Over the following months, Americans unprepared for war in outposts throughout the Pacific were surrendered en masse often after furious, unaided battles—Wake Island, Guam, Java, Sunda Strait, Luzon, Corregidor, Mindanao, Kiska, Attu—against the invading Japanese.

 

As POWs, the Americans were subject to torture, abuse, starvation, and neglect. Significantly, they were used as slave laborers for Japan’s military and private industry. The men toiled on the Thai-Burma Death Railway; built airfields with their bare hands—such as at what is now the Antonio Bautista Air Base on Palawan, Philippines; died constructing military projects such as the Soto Dam in Nagasaki Prefecture; and slaved in Japanese corporate mines, mills, and factories. For example, Nippon Steel, which is now attempting to purchase U.S. Steel, used more than 6,000 American and Allied POWs as forced labor with ten percent dying in the process.

 

I testify today to encourage a greater effort to remember and to advocate for these American men and women who gave their all under desperate conditions and who demonstrated determination and resourcefulness against a ruthless enemy. And all this against the backdrop of a long-decided U.S. and British policy to prioritize the war in Europe. The result was that thousands of these soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen became POWs of Japan and suffered some of the War’s worst consequences. One-third did not return home.

 

Our asks

To ensure that the sacrifices and unique history of our fighting men and women in the Pacific during 1941 and 1942 are not forgotten I ask Congress to:

 

1. Award the Congressional Gold Medal collectively to the American defenders of Bataan and Corregidor, as defined in U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich’s and Representative Teresa Leger Fernandez’s forthcoming bill. This group represents every U.S. state, territory, tribe, and military service. It is the most diverse World War II Congressional Gold Medal cohort.

 

2. Call on Nippon Steel and other Japanese companies to acknowledge their history of using American and Allied POWs as slave laborers and to establish an educational foundation to support research and learning about the POW experience in Imperial Japan. Respect for the sacrifices of American veterans should be fundamental to Nippon Steel’s acquisition of a U.S. company. It is the only way that trust can be established.

3. Ask the Government of Japan, to create two central government-funded memorials in Japan, as none exist, to the Allied POWs of WWII. One would be in Tokyo and the other at the Port of Moji on Kyushu, Japan where most of the “hellships”–floating dungeons where POWs were denied air, space, light, sanitation, water, and food–first arrived in Japan to unload their sick and dying human cargo. Currently, the only monuments at Moji are to Japanese war horses, Japanese soldiers, and bananas.

 

4. Instruct the U.S. Department of State to prepare a report for Congress on the history and funding of the 2010-2023 “Japan/POW Friendship Program.” The report should include (i) how other Allied POW reconciliation programs initiated by the Government of Japan in 1995 compare both in funding and programming with the one for the Americans; (ii) how the U.S. program compares with its “kakehashi” people exchange programs in the United States funded by the Government of Japan starting in 2015; and (iii) a breakdown of the budgets of these various exchange programs and the types and ages of participants.

 

5. Ask the Government of Japan to reestablish and institutionalize the “Japan/POW Friendship Program.” Inaugurated in 2010 as a reconciliation visit to Japan for former U.S. POWs and family members, it was modeled after ones initiated in 1995 for British, Dutch, and Australian POWs. Japan ended the visitation program for Americans in 2023. Instead of stopping reconciliation efforts, Japan should transform the American POW program into a permanent educational, remembrance, and exchange initiative that encompasses history, justice, and democratic resilience.

 

6. Ask the Government of Japan to publish in Japanese, English and other Allied languages on the website of the Foreign Ministry of Japan the 2009 Cabinet Decision making a formal apology to all the prisoners of war of Japan and the text of Ambassador Ichiro Fujisaki’s May 30, 2009 speech to the final convention of the ADBC offering an apology to the POWs.

 

7. Ask the Government of Japan to honor its 2015 written promise to include the “full history” of Japan’s UNESCO World Industrial Heritage properties of the Meiji Industrial Revolution: Iron and Steel, Shipbuilding and Coal Mining. Despite the government’s written commitments to UNESCO, the history of POW slave labor at many of the Heritage sites is not included at those locations or at the Tokyo Information Center. Two of these locations are owned by Nippon Steel.

 

High price of freedom

By June 1942, most of the estimated 27,000 Americans ultimately held as military POWs of Imperial Japan had been surrendered. By the War’s end, roughly 12,000 Americans POWs had died in Japan’s squalid POW camps, in the fetid holds of “hellships,” or in slave labor camps owned by Japanese companies. This was a death rate of 40 percent. In contrast, 1.5 percent of Americans in Nazi POW camps died putting the mortality rate for POWs of Japan as 20 times greater.

Eighty-three years after the start of the War in the Pacific, it is time to recognize the Americans who fought the impossible and endured the unimaginable in the war against tyranny and fascism in Asia. The American men and women in the early months of the war in the Pacific fought with limited and outdated weapons and no hope of reinforcement or resupply.

 

Current and future generations can be inspired by their “victory from within.” As President Franklin D. Roosevelt said in August 1943, when the outcome of WWII was still uncertain, “The story of the fighting on Bataan and Corregidor—and, indeed, everywhere in the Philippines–will be remembered so long as men continue to respect bravery, and devotion, and determination.”

 

In return for their sacrifices and service, they ask that their government keep its moral obligation to them. They do not want their history ignored or exploited. What they want most is to have their government stand by them to ensure that they will be remembered, that our Japanese allies respect them, and that their American history is preserved accurately.

 

Ms. Jan Thompson

President, American Defenders of Bataan & Corregidor Memorial Society

Daughter of PhM2c Robert E. Thompson USN, USS Canopus (AS-9)

Survivor of the hellships Oryoku Maru, Enoura Maru, and the Brazil Maru

Survivor of the POW Camps Bilibid (Philippines), Fukuoka 3B (Japan), & Mukden (China)

 

See previous testimony to the Veterans’ Affairs Committees for a fuller background

on the history and efforts of the ADBC-MS.

https://www.adbcmemorialsociety.org/

January 9, 1945 and The Smothers' Brothers

Pacific War historians usually remember January 9th, for General Douglas MacArthur's 1945 return to the main island of the Philippines, Luzon. In October 1944, the liberation of the Japanese-occupied archipelago had begun with the Battle of Leyte. On January 9th, the campaign moved to Luzon's Lingayen Gulf with 60,000 American troops landing to cheering Filipinos.

The last time MacArthur walked on Luzon was January 10, 1942. It was his one and only visit to the front on the Bataan Peninsula from his command center on the island of Corregidor. It is possible that this one day was chosen as the Bataan battlefield would have been relatively safe. Just days before, Japan's experienced 14th Army 48th Division (15,000 men) on Bataan had been transferred to the Dutch East Indies and replaced with the untrained reservists of the IJA's 65th Brigade (6,600 men).

Task Force 38
As MacArthur planned his return, Adm William Halsey's Third Fleet was tasked with disrupting Japanese shipping in the South China Sea, especially the Empire's resupply of the Philippines. Led by Vice Admiral John S McCain (yes, the grandfather of Senator McCain) Task Force 38 attacked Japanese shipping and air fields throughout the region. Historians call the Task Force's January 1945 operations a "rampage" toward Formosa, Luzon, and Indochina. By the time the Task Force exited the shipping lanes of the South China Sea, over 300,000 tons of enemy shipping and dozens of Japanese warships had been sunk. With follow-up air strikes against Japanese harbors and airfields in Formosa and the Ryukyu Islands, the success of the sweep was unprecedented.

This "carrier rampage" had dire consequences for the American POWs. It was on January 9th, that the Enoura Maru, a hell ship carrying 1,070 POWs from the Philippines, was bombed by planes off the USS Hornet (CV-12). The ship carrying mainly the last officers held in the Philippines was docked in Takao Harbor, Formosa and moored next to a tanker. One-third of the POWs onboard were killed or wounded. The survivors were put aboard the Brazil Maru on January 14 and transported north to the port of Moji, Japan. Only 600 or so survived the 16-day trip. MORE ON THE ENOURA MARU

Major Thomas Smothers
One of those survivors in Moji, Japan was Major Thomas Smothers, the father of the Smothers brothers. Major Smothers was CO of the 3rd Battalion of the 45th Infantry Regiment, Philippine Scouts. Major Smothers survived the Battle of Bataan and the Bataan Death March. It is possible he was among a number of 45th Inf. officers to have made the journey to the POW death Camp O'Donnell by truck. He then endured harsh captivity for nearly three years in Cabanatuan, a POW camp in the Philippines.

On 13 December 1944, he was among 1621 prisoners, the majority officers, who were marched from Bilibid Prison to Pier 7, Manila. At dusk, they were herded aboard the Oryoku Maru, divided into three groups, and forced down into three dark holds. What followed was probably the most infamous of the Hell Ship voyages. American bombers off the USS Hornet and USS Cabot sank the Oryoku Maru barely out of Manila near Subic Bay. Nearly 200 POWs died. The survivors were kept for five tortuous days on an abandoned tennis court, exposed to the tropical sun with little water, food or medical care .

On December 27, the men were packed aboard two freighters, the Enoura Maru and Brazil Maru to Formosa. The ship's holds were not cleaned of its previous cargo, horses and other livestock. Men picked through the animal waste looking for oats to eat. Although they arrived in Takao, Formosa on New Year's Day, they were not allowed to disembark, On January 9, planes from the USS Hornet again bombed the hellships. The Enoura Maru with Major Smothers aboard took direct hits. Days passed before the Japanese allowed the dead to be removed or help to the wounded. Four hundred or so who died were buried in shallow graves near the harbor's shore.

Badly wounded and suffering from the cold, starvation, and lack of medical care, Major Smothers was eventually taken to the Fukuoka #22 POW Camp administered by Sumitomo Mining to provide slave labor for one of its coal mines (the company is now part of Nippon Steel). At the Sumitomo camp medical care was poor or nonexistent during the historically cold winter of 1944/5.

On April 25, 1945, he was transported by stretcher from Fukuoka #22 to the Fukuoka City docks (Moji) for transport to Fusan, Korea [today's Busan, South Korea], and then on to Mukden, China. Some speculate that the Japanese were consolidating the American officers at Mukden to use as hostages. Smothers perished that night on the dock.

According to an oral history by British Lt. Geoffrey Pharoah Adams (available online through the Imperial War Museum. See Reel #11 with the key part of the story beginning at about 10 min 40 sec.), on April 25, 1945, he and a group of POWs were put aboard a ferry, but taken off around midnight after an air raid alarm. Adams and some 15 other comparatively healthy officers were tasked with taking off the ferry the American stretcher cases. Adams and his friend, British Lt. John Vincent Bowen, took an American Major (Smothers) off the ship. They and two of their friends from Fukuoka Camp #17 (Mitsui's Omuta coal mine), Americans Lt. Charles P. Christie, and 2nd Lt John Allen, who were also stretcher bearers, decided to stick together. "We carried the man off who was a Major, so emaciated and thin." Since they were the last off the ship the other prisoners were out of sight.

Those carrying the stretcher cases were told to lay down on the concrete beside the walls of a warehouse. It was very cold. The Major on the stretcher had a blanket over him. Because he said he felt so cold, the four men (Adams, Bowen, Christie, and Allen) laid down all around him, one on either side, one on the top, one across the bottom. "During the course of the night he died." "He just expired from hypothermia, from despair...I don't know, but he died anyway."

The next morning there was a bit of a row, because the man had died and upset the roll call figures. "We were ordered to take the dead man with us." "The Japan Japanese had handed us over to the new Japanese and we had to have the right count aboard the ferry. So we carried the poor Major back on board with us." The ship set sail. "Some of these people who had been sunk and who had had these terrible trials were hysterical." (Col. Ben Skardon, Clemson University alumnus and professor, corroborated this detail about the men being hysterical). After the ferry arrived at Pusan, Korea, "We got off the ship. We still had to take our stretcher with the Major off." Shortly, after roll call, they were told to leave him on the dock. Smothers had been assigned the Mukden POW Camp number of 2006 and appeared on the Mukden death roster with that number. There is no record indicating that his body ever left Fusan, Korea.

USS Hornet (CV-12) was awarded a Presidential Unit Citation for the its operations: January 3 – January 22, 1945 — Philippines, Formosa, China Sea, Ryukyu

###

You can read more about the Task Force 38 campaign in the new (February 28, 2023) book, South China Sea 1945: Task Force 38's bold carrier rampage in Formosa, Luzon, and Indochina (Air Campaign, 36) by Mark Lardas (Author), Irene Cano Rodríguez 96 pages.

See HERE for an interesting diary account of the USS Hornet during January 1945. An official Navy history is HERE.

POWs of Japan testify to Congress

click for testimony

Every year, for at the last 10 years the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society has submitted testimony for the record at one of the annual joint House and Senate Veterans Committees hearings for Veterans Service Organization.

On Tuesday, March 3, ADBC-MS testimony was part of the Legislative Presentation of Multiple Veterans Service Organizations (AXPOW, PVA, SVA, GSW, MOAA, FRA, IAVA)..

Jan Thompson, President of the ADBC-MS called on Congress to do the following in this 75th Anniversary of Liberation:

1. Award, collectively the American POWs of Japan the Congressional Gold Medal.
2. Instruct the U.S. Department of State to prepare a report for Congress on the history and funding of the “Japan/POW Friendship Program” began in 2010 and how it compares with programs for Allied POWs and Takahashi groups.
3. Encourage the Government of Japan to continue the “Japan/POW Friendship Program.”
4. Encourage the Government of Japan to expand its “Japan/POW Friendship Program” into a permanent educational initiative.
5. Request the Government of Japan to include the history of POW slave labor in the information provided about the sites of Japan’s “Meiji Industrial Revolution: Iron and Steel, Shipbuilding and Coal Mining” on the UNESCO World Industrial Heritage list.
6. Work with the Government of Japan to create a memorial at the Port of Moji on Kyushu where most of the POW hellships docked and unloaded their sick and dying human cargo.

Included in the testimony is a Timeline of events during 1945, the 75th Anniversary of the end of WWII.

POWs speak to Congress

STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD

to the

Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee

Hearing on the Fiscal Year 2019 Budget for Veterans’ Programs

and Fiscal Year 2020 Advance Appropriations Requests

 

By

 

Jan Thompson

 

President

American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society

21 March 2018

AMERICAN PRISONERS OF WAR OF JAPAN

PROTECTING THE HISTORY OF WORLD WAR II

Chairmen Isakson, Ranking Member Tester, and Members of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, thank you for allowing us to present the unique concerns of veterans of World War II’s Pacific Theater to Congress. The American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society (ADBC-MS) represents surviving POWs of Japan, their families, and descendants, as well as scholars, researchers, and archivists. Our goal is to preserve the history of the American POW experience in the Pacific and to teach future generations of the POWs’ sacrifice, courage, determination, and faith—the American spirit.

Today, I want to speak to you about how integral the American POW history with Japan is to our greater understanding of how we need to care for and remember all our veterans. These veterans had the highest rate of post-conflict hospitalizations and psychiatric disorders of any generation. Their traumas have had multi-generational consequences. Their history of perseverance and patriotism speaks to the need for the civic remembrance of our country’s veterans.

Our history
April 9th will mark the 76th anniversary of the Bataan Death March. By March 1942, Imperial Japanese Armed forces had destroyed the U.S. Asiatic Fleet and the U.S. Far East Air Force. On May 6, 1942, all the Philippines fell. These were the greatest military setbacks in American history and all happened in Asia where Imperial Japan started WWII for the United States.

On December 7, 1941, Imperial Japan attacked not only Pearl Harbor but also the Philippine Islands, Guam, Wake Island, Howland Island, Midway, Malaya, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong and Shanghai. Three days later, Guam became the first American territory to fall to Japan. Although the aim of the December 7th surprise attack on Hawaii's Pearl Harbor was to destroy the U.S. Pacific Fleet in its homeport and to discourage U.S. action in Asia, the other strikes served as preludes to full-scale invasions and military occupation.

Only in the Philippines did combined U.S.-Filipino units mount a prolonged resistance to Imperial Japan’s invasion. They held out for five months. On April 9, 1942, approximately 10,000 Americans and 70,000 Filipinos became POWs with the surrender of the Bataan Peninsula. April 9th also marked the beginning the 65-mile Bataan Death March. Thousands died and hundreds have never been accounted for from the March and its immediate aftermath.

By June 1942, most of the estimated 27,000 Americans ultimately held as military POWs of Imperial Japan had been surrendered. If Filipino soldiers, who were released before the end of 1942, and American civilians in Japan and throughout the Pacific are also counted, this number is closer to 36,000. By the War’s end, 40 percent or over 12,000 Americans had died in squalid POW camps, in the fetid holds of “Hell ships,” or as slave laborers for Japanese corporations.

Surviving as a POW of Japan was the beginning of new battles: that of acceptance into society and living with then-nameless mental and physical ailments. In the first six years after the war, deaths of American POWs of Japan were more than twice those of the comparably-aged white male population. These deaths were disproportionally due to tuberculosis, suicides, accidents, and cirrhosis. In contrast, 1.5 percent of Americans in Nazi POW camps died (as noted above this number was 40 percent as POWs of Japan) and in the first six years after liberation Nazi POW camp survivors deaths were one-third of those who survived Japanese POW camps.

Meet the special needs of all veterans
As the representative of veterans with the highest rate of post-conflict hospitalizations and psychiatric disorders, we encourage Congress to fight for adequate medical care, disability benefits, housing, and job training. We are especially supportive of the DAV’s efforts to expand access to the VA’s Program of Comprehensive Assistance for Family Caregivers (PCAFC) to severely disabled veterans.

And we applaud the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee for approving S. 2193, the Caring for Our Veterans Act of 2017 that extends caregiver benefits, which includes provisions to improve and phase in expanded eligibility for the VA’s Comprehensive Program for family caregivers. We also recognize Chairman Roe for his leadership in the House to address this inequity and encourage him to introduce companion legislation.

The VA’s current rule of granting benefits only to families of veterans injured on or after September 11, 2001 is plainly dismissive of members of our Greatest Generation, those veterans of WWII. Surviving POWs of Japan know well that their caregivers—their families—were instrumental in their reintegration into their communities and their ability to achieve the highest levels of recovery and quality of life. Family caregivers are critical members of every veteran’s health care. The American POWs of Japan and their families know intimately the difficulty of re-incorporation into civil society with little support as well as the toll PTSD and war-related illnesses takes on the entire family.

My members would welcome opportunities to discuss with you their caregiving experiences so that Senators and Members of Congress can better understand the importance of expanding caregiver assistance to all generations of veterans.

Progress Toward Remembrance, Reconciliation, and Preservation
An important aspect of showing respect and acceptance to returning servicemen and women is to ensure that they are not forgotten. This is the primary mission of the ADBC-MS. To this end, we have had a number of significant achievements in the last decade.

Yawata POW Camp down on its luck

Old age, depopulation decimating A-bomb-spared Kitakyushu

[But there is something missing from this story]

BY YOSHIAKI NOHARA

BLOOMBERG/Japan Times, MAR 30, 2017

Few places evoke the rise and fall of Japan’s industrial might than the head office of the Imperial Steel Works in Kitakyushu. The red brick Meiji Era building was the heart of the nation’s first big steelworks. Now it’s a UNESCO World Heritage site.

[And it was Fukuoka #3 POW camp where over 1,200 Allied POWs from the U.S., UK, Australia, the Netherlands, Java, India, Arabia, Portugal and Malaya slaved. There is no mention of this at the site. Further the Port of Moji in Kitakyushu was where most of the POWs and forced laborers were brought into Japan. Many off the hell ships died on the docks. In addition, Japan's "industrial world heritage" bid was carefully crafted to emphasize Japan's difference from the rest of Asia. It highlights superiority and indigenous inventiveness and underplays technology borrowing and Western investment.]

Kitakyushu, with nearly a million people, embodies the struggle of Japan’s cities to adapt to a future where citizens are older, workers are fewer and many houses are emptying. The emblems of government efforts to revitalize the economy — a billion-dollar airport, a robotics factory — stand beside the empty lots, an idle blast furnace and shuttered shops.

Five hours west of Tokyo by shinkansen, Kitakyushu lost over 15,000 people in the five years to 2015, more than any other city in the country apart from those evacuated because of the Fukushima nuclear disaster. More than 100,000 residents have gone since the peak in 1979, and half of the factory jobs have disappeared with them.

Provincial cities are competing for a declining pool of talent, workers and investment to replace vanishing industries. Kitakyushu’s task is especially stark because of the contrast with Fukuoka, an hour’s drive southwest, where efforts to lure entrepreneurs have made it one of the few big cities outside Tokyo whose population is growing.

“I feel like Fukuoka is taking away all the good,” said Masahiro Urabe, 73, who runs a men’s clothing store that his father started on the Yahata Chuo shopping street. Nearby, under a flickering florescent light, is a deserted bar. Urabe says the street used to be filled around the clock with steelworkers coming off shift. “Manufacturing is a tough sell for young people,” he said. “It can’t be helped when the (steel mill) isn’t doing well.”

Kitakyushu, formed by the merger of five towns in 1963, owes its manufacturing roots to the Imperial Yawata Works, which poured its first steel in 1901. Today, the mills are run by Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp., [never apologized for its use of POW slave labor.] with about 4,200 staff making high-value products such as shinkansen rails. The company declined an interview request.

At its peak, the works had nearly 50,000 people, said Akinori Yamamura, 78, who worked there for four decades. The city was so vital to industry during World War II that it was the original target for the second U.S. atomic bomb, which was eventually dropped on Nagasaki because of clouds and poor visibility over the Kitakyushu area. [because it had been bombed a day or so before.]

The city’s mills attracted steel-consuming businesses such as Toyota Motor Corp. and Nissan Motor Co., which still have major plants in the area.

“The city used to be full of energy and at its heart was Chuo (shopping street),” said Yamamura, who volunteers as a guide at the Yawata Works’ old head office. “Now, abandoned houses are everywhere and fewer people means the shutters are coming down.”

Other parts of the steelworks have also been listed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, including a repair shop that is still in operation after more than a century. The Space World amusement park set up in 1990 at Yawata Works’ idle land, will close at the end of this year.

“It’s not easy to create a new industry. It’s a hard-fought battle,” said Kitakyushu Mayor Kenji Kitahashi, 64. He’s looking to encourage growth from sectors like tourism, robotics, health care and offshore wind power. One of the primary tools in his arsenal is the airport.

Opened in 2006 on an artificial island in the bay after 12 years of construction, the 24-hour airport gives Kitakyushu an advantage over Fukuoka [originally built by Allied POWs], whose downtown runway has to close at night due to noise.

One Kitakyushu company that managed to adapt is robot-maker Yaskawa Electric Corp., which started in 1915 making electric motors and now produces Motoman industrial robots. The company’s stock has risen 75 percent in the past year. High-tech toilet-maker Toto Ltd. and airline Star Flyer Inc. are also based here.

But Kitakyushu’s strategic special zone status granted by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in 2016 has more to do with demographics than its industrial heritage. The city was designated as an area for innovation in elderly care.

Even that sector is struggling.

“It’s very hard to find staff,” said Ikuko Kamei, a manager at a local care center within sight of the abandoned Yawata Works blast furnace. “We put out ads at job centers and offer extra cash for new employees, but workers are getting old here.”

Almost 30 percent of Kitakyushu’s residents are 65 or older. Kamei herself is 61.

“I think our future lies in tourism,” she said, ruefully. [Dark Tourism, which is a thing.]

Veterans urge Obama to halt visit to Hiroshima

Ben Steele of Montana at Liberation

U.S. Veterans Ask President

To Halt Hiroshima Visit Planning

Demand a Memorial for POWs in Japan

Makanda, Illinois, April 15, 2016/American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society/ -- Survivors of wartime Japan’s death camps and slave labor call on President Barack Obama to halt planning a visit to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial until he breaks ground in Japan for a memorial to American and Allied POWs.

The leading American veterans’ organization for former prisoners of war of Imperial Japan, their families, and historians, the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society (ADBC-MS), sent a letter to the President on April 14th asking him to forego a trip to Hiroshima until he “can first make an equally poignant memorialization of the Americans who perished in Japan.”

Specifically, they want the President to “break ground for a memorial to the American and Allied POWs at their port of entry and slavery into Japan, the dock at Moji on Kyushu.”

For a President’s visit to Hiroshima to be successful, they advise “it must include the acknowledgement of all the victims of the war in the Asia Pacific. Hiroshima symbolizes not only the destructiveness of mankind, but also what lengths we may need to go to end suffering and tyranny.”

The ADBC-MS is alarmed that “Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his administration have been working since taking office to replace the established history of Japan’s abuses during the war with a denier’s view.” As a result, they believe the President’s “visit will not merely be unreciprocated; it will sanction the Abe Administration’s anti-historical efforts and abrogate your mission, which is to remind us all what we are capable of both good and bad.”

It is estimated that over 300,000 American and Allied POWs and civilian internees were held in inhumane conditions by Imperial Japan. Nearly half died in squalid POW camps, aboard fetid “hell ships,” or as slave laborers for Japanese corporations. Over 14,000 died on the “hell ships” to Japan. And more than 30, 000 Filipino soldiers with the U.S. Forces in the Far East died as POWs.

The letter concludes “War is about how it is remembered. We hope that you will respect the interests and memory of America’s Pacific War veterans.”

For more details, contact the ADBC-MS President, Ms. Jan Thompson.

A quid pro quo for Hiroshima

1930s Postcard of Moji
click to purchase

On March 3rd, Ms. Jan Thompson, President, American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society submitted a Statement for the Record to the House Veterans' Affairs Committee and Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee Joint Hearing To Receive Legislative Presentations of Veterans Service Organizations.

Her testimony AMERICAN PRISONERS OF WAR OF JAPAN: PROTECTING THE MEMORY OF WORLD WAR II VETERANS OF THE PACIFIC emphasized that reconciliation with Japan continues and needs to be further encouraged. It is far from complete.

In listing what still needs to be done, she touched on U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's upcoming visit to the memorial for the atomic bombing victims at Hiroshima. Such a visit appears detached from the reality of what little Japan has done to acknowledge its own culpability for the war. She thus suggests: 

that if President Obama or his successor were to visit Hiroshima, the trip would be inappropriate without first the memorialization of POWs at the Port of Moji, where most of the “hell ships” docked and unloaded their sick and dying “human cargo,” and a remembrance for the POWs at the UNESCO World Industrial Heritage sites where so many toiled and died.

Full text of the statement below

Chairmen Isakson and Miller, Ranking Members Blumenthal and Brown, Members of the Senate and House Veterans Affairs Committees, thank you for allowing us to present the unique concerns of veterans of World War II’s Pacific Theater to Congress. The American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society (ADBC-MS) represents surviving POWs of Japan, their families, and descendants as well as scholars, researchers, and archivists. Our goal is to preserve the history of the American POW experience in the Pacific and to communicate its enduring spirit and inspiration to future generations.

Today, I would like to review the history of the American POWs of Japan, describe some of the incredible progress that we have made, and show what still needs to be done.

This year is the 75th Anniversary of America’s entry into World War II. It began in Asia.

As Japanese bombs rained down on Peal Harbor on December 7, 1941, so they also did on the Philippines, Guam, Wake Island, Howland Island, Midway, Malaya, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong and Shanghai. On December 8th nearly 300 American Marines, sailors, and diplomats stationed in China became the first American POWs of Japan.

By the beginning of 1942, there were more than 2,000 American POWs. In March 1942, over 900 sailors, soldiers, airmen and Marines were captured in Java—survivors of the sinking of the USS Houston CA-30, a Texas-based U.S. Army Field Artillery battalion, and a U.S. Army Air Corps squadron. On April 9, 1942, another 10,000 Americans became POWs with the surrender of the Bataan Peninsular in the Philippines. And in early May 1942, over 11,500 Americans were surrendered on Corregidor, a fortress island in Manila harbor, and in the Southern Philippine Islands. The surrender of American and Filipino forces on the Philippines Islands was the largest surrender in United States military history. Over 26,000 Americans were ultimately held as POWs of Imperial Japan. Nearly 11,000 died in squalid POW camps, aboard fetid “hell ships”, or as slave laborers. Tragically, only 15,000 returned home to their families.

To remember all our veterans
Last year, the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, the leaders of both Japan and the United States recognized the American POWs and their contribution to the steady relationship between two countries. In his September 2nd VJ day statement, U.S. President Barak Obama remembered “those who endured unimaginable suffering as prisoners of war.” Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in his war anniversary statement on August 14th recognized “the former POWs who experienced unbearable sufferings caused by the Japanese military.”

Yet, there was no recognition from the U.S. Congress. The ADBC-MS was dismayed in 2012 when none of the 70th anniversaries of historic battles at the beginning of World War II were officially recognized. Surprisingly, December 7, 1941, “a date that will live in infamy,” has not been commemorated with a Congressional resolution for many years. Nor have the April 9, 1942, Fall of Bataan and the start of the infamous Bataan Death March been remembered as in past Congresses. And few in Congress note the annual Prisoner of War Remembrance Day in April or the National POW/MIA Recognition Day in September.

We hope that future Congresses will correct this oversight and not forget our POW veterans. We hope the events that started American involvement in World War II will be remembered with resolutions memorializing the simultaneous attacks on Pearl Harbor and the Philippines Islands. We would like to see the Battle of Wake Island commemorated. For nearly two weeks in December 1942, 400 Marines and 1,500 unarmed civilians held off an invading Japanese armada—the defense of Wake is still taught in our military academies as an example of brilliant tactics, heroic command, and tenacious effort. We hope too that the 98 Americans, who the Japanese kept on Wake as POW slave laborers, only to massacre them on October 7, 1943, before American forces liberated the island, will be memorialized.

Meet the special needs of all veterans
We applaud the efforts of all the veterans’ service organizations to fight for adequate medical care and disability benefits. We support the DAV’s efforts to pass S. 425, the Veterans Homeless Programs, Caregiver Services and Other Improvements Act of 2015, which contains provisions to make veterans of all eras eligible for the VA’s Comprehensive Caregiver Support program. Surviving POWs of Japan know well that their caregivers—their families—were instrumental in their reintegration into their communities and their ability to achieve the highest levels of recovery and quality of life. Family caregivers are critical members of every veteran’s health care.

The incidence and intensity of post-traumatic stress for American POWs of Japan is believed to be the greatest of any World War II veteran and possibly of any American war. These veterans had to survive the sordid POW camps, unimaginable and capricious torture, “hell ships” to Japan or its colonies, and years of brutal imprisonment and slave labor. Upon returning from the Pacific War, they found a government reluctant to recognize and treat the mental and physical effects that were consequences of the deprivations suffered while POWs of Japan.

At the time, PTSD was not yet a medical category and VA doctors limited the POWs’ access to disability benefits by dismissing the after-effects of years of abuse, disease, and malnutrition. That should not happen to any veteran, and thus, we strongly support the legislative goals of our fellow veterans service organizations to ensure medical and mental health care, as well as to expedite disability claims, to provide rehabilitation, and to establish job-training programs for all American veterans. The American POWs of Japan and their families know intimately the difficulty of re-incorporation into civil society with little support.

Progress Toward Remembrance, Reconciliation, and Preservation
An important aspect of showing respect and acceptance to returning service men and women is to ensure that they are not forgotten. This is the mission of the ADBC-MS. To this end, we have had a number of significant achievements.

In 2009, the Government of Japan, through its then-Ambassador to the U.S. Ichiro FUJISAKI, and again in 2010, through its then-Foreign Minister Katsuya OKADA, officially apologized to the American POWs of Japan. These Cabinet-approved apologies, first established as a Cabinet Decision on February 6, 2009, were unprecedented. Never before had the Japanese Government apologized for a specific war crime nor had it done so directly to the victims.

The Japanese Government further initiated the “Japan/POW Friendship Program” that sponsors trips for American former POWs to visit Japan and return to the places of their imprisonment and slave labor. Thus far, there have been seven trips, one each in the fall of 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, and two in 2015. In all, 43 former POWs, all in their late-80s or 90s, have been able to travel to Japan along with three widows and two descendants.

On July 19, 2015, the Mitsubishi Materials Corporation (MMC) became the first Japanese company to officially apologize to those American POWs who were used as slave laborers to maintain war production. The historic apology was to those who were forced to work in the mines operated by Mitsubishi Mining, Inc., the predecessor company of MMC. This apology was followed by a $50,000 one-time donation to the National American Defenders of Bataan & Corregidor (ADBC) Museum, Education & Research Center in Wellsburg, West Virginia.

Success should encourage more action
The benefits of these long-awaited acts of contrition have been immeasurable for former POWs and their families. The visitation Program is a great success. It has given the participating veterans a peace of mind and strengthened the bonds between our two countries. A former POW who was forced to be a miner in a dangerous, Mitsubishi copper mine declared it “a glorious day” when he accepted the company’s apology.

But we are concerned about the future. There is no formal agreement between the U.S. and Japan to continue the visitation program and Japan’s Foreign Ministry must request annually a line-item budget for it. One cannot help but get the impression that some in Japan count on time and the POWs advancing years to end the program. We view this as shortsighted.

The Program should not end with the ability of the nonagenarian POWs to visit Japan or with their deaths. A POW’s captivity has multigenerational effects on families. The wives, children, and siblings of those who died suffered irreparable loss. The families of those who survived suffered from the long-term physical and mental health problems caused by the ex-POW's years of cruel captivity. The original understanding was that the former POWs, their widows and their descendants would be invited to participate. Widows, children, and other descendants have all been profoundly affected by the POW experience of their relatives, and they too should be eligible for future programs.

We want this program to include funds to create visual reminders of history through educational groups and monuments. We want national memorials to the POWs who slaved and died on Japanese soil and territories as well as aboard the “hell ships.” We want to see a Japanese government-funded memorial at the Port of Moji, where most of the “hell ships” delivered their sick, dying, and dead human cargo to the Japanese mainland.

Concerns with moving backwards
To our dismay, there appears to be backtracking in Japan regarding the American POWs history. It was not until last month that the 2014 biographical film Unbroken about American Olympian and aviator Louis Zamperini’s ordeal as a POW was shown in Japan. It was preceded by a venomous campaign of misinformation and slander denouncing the scenes of abuse and torture and declaring them impossible. In contrast, surviving POWs believed the film to not show the full depravity and squalor of their imprisonment.

We are concerned by last year’s inscription of the Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution: Iron and Steel, Shipbuilding and Coal Mining on the UNESCO World Heritage List. In five of the eight new World Heritage areas there were 26 POW camps that provided slave labor to Japan’s industrial giants including, Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Sumitomo, Aso Group, Ube Industries, Tokai Carbon, Nippon Coke & Engineering, Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corporation, Furukawa Company Group and Denka. Californian Lester Tenney, the American POW of Japan who was honored at the President’s Veterans Day Breakfast last year, was a slave labor at one of the new UNESCO sites, the Miike Coal Mine.

Japan stated on July 4, 2015, that it “is prepared to take measures that allow an understanding that there were a large number of Koreans and others [emphasis added] who were brought against their will and forced to work under harsh conditions in the 1940s at some of the sites.” However, we do not know how the Japanese government interprets “others” and U.S. government officials have not asked. Frankly, we have not seen any effort toward including the history of the 13,000 Allied and American POWs held at the UNESCO sites.

Ironically, a prefectural government recently reported plans to submit records from a POW camp to UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register as a token of bilateral friendship. The Bando Camp in Tokushima Prefecture, however, was where German soldiers were treated humanely during World War I. It stands as a stark contrast to all Japan’s POW camps during WWII. Not far from the remains of Bando is the World War II Zentsuji POW camp that held Allied officers and enlisted men from Guam and Wake, including five U.S. Navy nurses and an American woman with a newborn.

What we ask Congress
We ask Congress to encourage the Government of Japan to hold to its promises and responsibilities by preserving, expanding, and enhancing its reconciliation program toward its American former prisoners. We want to see the trips to Japan continued and extended to include widows and descendants. We want Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs to publicize the program, its participants, and its achievements.

We ask Congress to have Japan turn its POW visitation program into a permanent Future Fund supported by Japanese government and industry for research, documentation, reconciliation, and people-to-people exchanges that are not subject to the Japanese government’s yearly budget review. This Future Fund would spearhead the creation of visual reminders of Imperial Japan’s war history through museums and monuments. These would include national memorials to and public exhibitions about the POWs who slaved and died on Japanese soil and territories as well as aboard the “hell ships.”

We ask Congress to encourage the U.S. State Department to continue to vigorously represent the interests of the veterans’ community. It is only the U.S. government that can persuade Japan to continue the visitation program, to create a Future Fund, and to ensure that the stewards of the Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution take seriously the UNESCO mandate to produce meaningful educational materials at the Heritage sites that will include the history of forced and slave labor during World War II.

In April, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is expected to become the most senior American official to visit the memorial for the atomic bombing victims at Hiroshima. It is rumored that this will prepare the way for President Barack Obama’s journey to Hiroshima in May. We suggest that if President Obama or his successor were to visit Hiroshima, the trip would be inappropriate without first the memorialization of POWs at the Port of Moji, where most of the “hell ships” docked and unloaded their sick and dying “human cargo,” and a remembrance for the POWs at the UNESCO World Industrial Heritage sites where so many toiled and died.

High price of freedom
The American POWs of Japan and their families paid a high price for the freedoms we cherish. In return for their sacrifices and service they ask that their government, even after 70 years, keep its moral obligation to them. They do not want their history ignored or exploited. They do not ask for further compensation. What they want most is to have their government stand by them to ensure they will be remembered, that our allies respect them, and that their American history be preserved accurately.

The ordeal of the American POWs of Japan is not just another facet of war history. Nor is it simply another saga of WWII suffering. It is a history of resilience, survival, and the human spirit, good and bad. And it has become an example of a path toward mutual understanding and justice between Japan and its former victims.

We ask Congress for support and to help our veterans in their unique quest for justice and remembrance.

In the United States this history is being forgotten, and in Japan it is being revised. We cannot let this happen, on either side of the Pacific.

Thank you for this opportunity to address your committees.

Ms. Jan Thompson
President
American Defenders of Bataan & Corregidor Memorial Society
Daughter of PhM2c Robert E. Thompson USN, Bilibid, Fukuoka 3B, & Mukden, POW# 2011

Legacy: Being a War Criminal's Granddaughter

Makoto Inaki's POW Camp
Sendai 5-B

Newsweek Japan in its August 11-18, 2015 (Magazine released on August 4, 2015, Pages 34-40.) edition published a long piece by a Japanese reporter on her encounter with the POWs once entrusted to her grandfather's care.

She has written about this in other publications, generally conservative ones. She wants to believe that he was not a war criminal and that he did not make conditions in the POW camp so miserable that men died.

Her quest is a tricky one as she is dependent upon her hope and the memory old, traumatized men. POWs of Japan had their very survival dependent upon their ability to please; they curated their memories in order to coexist with them; and they barely had the strength to remember one day from the next. Among these fragments of memory she sought and found forgiveness. She should not, however, interpret this as absolution or confirmation that her grandfather was not fanatically cruel.

The lesson for her and what all historians grapple with is that POWs simply need to forget.

The following is a provisional translation by George Washington University graduate students who intern at Asia Policy Point, Han Yanchu and Lu Pengqiao. They used the piece to practice their translation skills with the hope of making this available for the personal use of the POW families mentioned in the article and to assist the POW the research community. They welcome your suggestions, edits, and comments.

SEEKING A SENSE OF CLOSURE
遠い記憶の先に終止符を探して

Granddaughter of a Former WWII Camp Commander Faces an ex-POW of Japan
元捕虜収容所長を祖父に持つ記者が日本軍の捕虜だったアメリカ兵と向き合う

By KOGURE Satoko
小 暮 聡 子(本誌編集部)

8月15 日、日本は戦後70周年を迎える。日本が語る「国家」としての歴史が議論される一方で、第二次大戦には当時を生きた一人一人の物語がある。それはそれぞれの国で、体験者それぞれの「真実」として、多くの場合苦しみを伴いながら今後も語られていく。その戦争の記憶に「終止符」を打てる日は来るのだろうか

On August 15th, Japan marks its 70th anniversary of the end of World War II. While Japan’s historical narrative as a “state” has been discussed, there are also stories of individuals who lived through the war. These stories were of people from different countries, each with their own “truth”. In most cases these stories were accompanied by suffering, and will continue to be told in the future. Will the day come when we can put an end to the memory of war?


捕虜たちが見た地獄
The Hell Prisoners of War Had Seen


6月初め、私は祖父が残した物語といま一度向き合うため、赴任先のニューヨークから米南部のニューオーリンズ空港に降り立った。ジャズの街ニューオーリンズは既に夏真っ盛りで、空港を出るとむわっという熱気が身を包む。車で30分も走れば音楽と酒にまみれた繁華街フレンチクオーターに到着するが、私を乗せたタクシーが向かう先は陽気な観光地ではない。

In order to look once more into the story my grandfather left behind, I flew to New Orleans International Airport in southern United States from my new post in New York. It’s already at the height of the summer in the Jazz town of New Orleans, and when I walk out of the airport I’m immediately surrounded by hot air. A 30 minute drive can take you to the downtown French Quarter filled by music and liquor, but the destination of my taxi is not a cheerful tourist destination.

旅の目的は、戦時中にフィリピンのバターン半島とコレヒドール島で日本軍の捕虜となったアメリカの元兵士や民間人、その家族や遺族が集う戦友会に参加すること。この「全米バターン・コレヒドール防衛兵の会 (ADBC)」年次総会では、1つのホテルに集った参加者が数日間にわたり戦中・戦後の体験を共有し、次世代に語り継ぐ。私がこの戦友会に参加するのは22 歳だった03年以来、 12年ぶりだ。

The purpose of my journey is to attend a comrades-in-arms meeting of veterans, civilians, and bereaved families. These veterans became prisoners of war (POWs) of Japan when defending Bataan Peninsula and Corregidor Island, Philippines during WWII. On this annual meeting held by the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor (ADBC), participants will gather in one hotel and share their stories during and after the war, and hand down their war experiences from generation to generation. It has been 12 years since my first participation of the meeting in 2003, when I was 22 years old.

日本軍に捕らわれた捕虜たちにとって、捕虜生活は「生きるか死ぬか」の戦いそのものだった。1941年 12月 8日、日本軍が真珠湾を攻撃して太平洋戦争に突入すると、本間雅晴中将率いる日本軍はダグラス・マッカーサー米極東陸軍司令官下のフィリピンに侵 攻を開始。首都マニラからマニラ湾を挟んで対岸に位置するバターン半島とコレヒドール島の米軍とフィリピン軍は、日本軍との戦闘を経て42年4月以降相次いで降伏、捕虜となった。

For those POWs captured by Japanese military, life was the very fight for survival. On December 8, 1941, Japan attacked the Pearl Harbor and initiated the Pacific War. Japanese military led by lieutenant general Homma Masaharu invaded the Philippines under the command of Douglas MacArthur, Commander of United States Army Forces in the Far East. Stationed in Bataan Peninsula and Corregidor Island on the opposite shore across the Manila Bay from the capital Manila, American and Filipino militaries fought several battles with Japanese troops, before surrendering and being taken prisoners after April 1942.

その後、日本軍が7万人余りの捕虜を約100キロ先の収容所まで炎天下のなか飢餓状態で歩かせ、約3万人の死者を出した「バターン死の行進」は、アメリカでは今も旧日本軍の残虐性の象徴とされている。

After that, the Japanese army forcibly transferred more than 70,000 Filipino and American POWs to a detention camp 100 km [or 65 miles] away. Starving POWs were forced to walk under the scorching sun in Bataan, and around 30,000 POWs died along the way. The so-called “Bataan Death March” is remembered by Americans even today as a symbol of the brutality of Japanese Imperial Army.

日本の市民団体「POW (戦争捕虜) 研究会」によれば、第二次大戦中、日本軍がフィリピンなどアジア・太平洋地域で捕らえた連合軍の捕虜は約14万人。そのうち約3万6000人は水や食糧、衛生設備が欠如した輸送船、いわゆる「地獄船」で日本に送られた。航海中は連合軍からの攻撃も加わって多くが命を落としたが、生き延びて日本に到着した捕虜たちは全国約130カ所の捕虜収容所に連行され、炭鉱や鉱山、造船所や工場などで働かされた。戦争末期にかけて日本側も疲弊するなか、捕虜たちの生活は過酷を極め、 終戦までに約3500人が死亡したという。死因は飢えや病、事故や虐待、連合軍による爆撃などだった。

According to Japanese civic group POW Research Network Japan, Japanese captured around 140,000 Allied POWs in the Philippines and other Asian Pacific regions during WWII. Among these POWs, an estimate of 36,000 POWs were sent to Japan via “hell ships”, transport ships with a significant shortage of provisions and unpleasant health conditions. Many of POWs lost their lives as a result of Allies’ attack on the sea, and those who survived the trip were taken to around 130 POW camps on Japan’s homeland, and were forced to work in mines, shipyards, factories, and other facilities. As Japan became impoverished towards the end of the war, life of POWs turned extremely harsh. An estimate of 3,500 POWs had died before the war ended. Causes of death include starvation, disease, accident, maltreatment, and Allied bombing.

ADBCのメンバーは、こうした悲惨な捕虜生活を生き抜いた人とその家族、または捕虜のまま亡くなった人の遺族たちだ。元捕虜の年齢が90歳を超え、組織の主体はその子供たちの世代に代替わりしているが、子世代もまた親の苦しみを受け継いでいる。元捕虜の多くが帰還後も心的外傷後ストレス障害(PTSD)に悩まされ、捕虜体験に口を閉ざす一方で、父親を理解しようと調べる内に日本に対して憎悪を抱く子世代も多いという。

Members of ADBC are former soldiers who lived through such miserable life, and their family members, as well as those bereaved families of those who died as POWs during imprisonment. As most of ex-POWs are over 90 years old, the majority of members are now from their children’s generation and they inherited their parents’ sufferings. Many of the ex-POWs have been haunted by PTSD after returning from Japan, and never talked about their experiences as POWs. On the other hand, many from the children’s generation began to harbor hatred against Japan while doing research to find out what their fathers had gone through.

そんな戦友会で受付登録を済ませた私は、03年にこの会に参加して以来元捕虜やその家族と面会するたび幾度となく経験してきた「居心地の悪さ」を感じた。もちろんここは、見知らぬ日本人がハグとキスで歓迎されるような場所ではない。だがそれ以上に、私 には参加者を遠ざける肩書があった。私は、「元捕虜収容所長の孫」。そして祖父は戦後、「戦争犯罪人」として裁かれた人物だったからだ。

I’ve been a registered member of ADBC’s meeting since 2003, and time and again I have an uncomfortable feeling when I meet with ex-POWs and their families. Of course this is not a place to welcome strange Japanese people by kissing and hugging, but my identity makes me even more alienated from participants—I’m the grandchild of a former POW camp commander, and my grandfather was tried as a war criminal after the war ended.

波乱含みで始まった取材
The interview with an unexpected start

参加1日目、体験談を聞くセミナーが続き、元捕虜のうち一人と翌日に個別にインタビューする約束を取り付けた。自己紹介の際には「記者」を名乗った。元収容所長の孫だと言えば、相手を怒らせるか、傷つけかねない。何より、先入観なく本音を語って欲しかった。だが結局、この取材は思わぬ方向に走り出すことになる。

On the first day of the meeting, a seminar on war experiences continued, and I made an interview appointment with one of the ex-POWs on the next day. I introduced myself as a journalist. If I introduce myself as the grandchild of a former POW camp commander, I could have offended or hurt him. Most of all, I wanted to hear what he really thinks without any prejudice. However, this interview ended up unfolding in an unexpected direction.

元捕虜ダレル・スターク（92）のインタビュー当日、約束の時間の少し前にホテルのロビーに行くと、別の捕虜の娘で、知り合って二年になるパム・エスリンガーが男性と談笑していた。エスリンガーは、私の祖父が元収容所長であることをこの会場で知る数少ない一人だ。そこに、スタークと娘のジュディ・ギルバードが現れた。

On the day of my interview with ex-POW Darrell Stark (92 years old), as I arrived at the lobby of the hotel a little earlier before the promised time, I found that Pam Eslinger, the daughter of another ex-POW whom I’ve known for two years, was chatting with a man. Eslinger is one of the few persons present that know my grandfather’s identity. Then, Stark appeared with his daughter Judy Gilbert.

エスリンガーはスターク親子と知り合いらしく、二年前に私がオクラホマ州に彼女の父親を訪ねたこと、今年秋には日本に行って私の両親に会うことを嬉しそうに話す。スタークの娘が私たちの関係を尋ねると、エスリンガーは少し戸惑い、間をあけたあとこういった。「彼女のおじいさんは、父がいた収容所の所長だったの」

Eslinger seemed to know Stark’s daughter, and she happily talked to them about my visit to her father in Oklahoma two years ago, and her visit to Japan in this fall to meet my parents. When Stark’s daughter asked about her relationship with me, Eslinger was a little puzzled. She thought for a while, and answered: “Her grandfather was the commander of the POW camp where my father was held.”

エスリンガーの父親ジャック・ヴォーナー（93）は、祖父が管理していた収容所にいた捕虜の一人だった。二年半前にニューヨーク支局に赴任した私は、知人を通してその存在を知っていたヴォーナーに連絡を取り、翌年に彼の自宅を訪ねた。ヴォーナーには祖父や日本への憎しみや敵意は全く見られず、私は彼の四世代にわたる大家族から思いもかけないもてなし出迎えられ、そのあとも交流が続いている。

Eslinger’s father, Jack Warner (93 years old [Mr Warner will travel to Japan October 2015 as part of the 6th POW Friendship Delegation), was one of the POWs held at the camp my grandfather managed. Two years ago when I was appointed to the New York bureau, I got in touch with Warner through an acquaintance and visited his home the next year. Warner didn’t show hatred or hostility towards my grandfather and Japan at all. Instead, I received a warm welcome that I’d never thought would come from his big four-generation family. We have been in touch since then.

だがスターク親子はそれを知らない。そのあとの数分間、これまでなんども見てきた光景と同じだった。祖父の話を切り出された相手は一様に、表情をこわばらせたまま固まる。

However, Stark and his daughter didn’t know that. For several minutes, I was seeing what I’ve seen for so many times—when told about my grandfather’s identity, every listener’s face stiffens and freezes.

驚いた様子のスタークの娘は、耳が悪くて聞き取れなかったオヤジにエスリンガーの言葉を繰り返す。すると、今度はスタークが目を大きく見開いてこちらを見た。エスリンガーがすかさず「父は、彼女のおじいさんはいい所長だったと言っている」というと、父娘の表情はいくらか和らいだ。そしてスタークは「君には、すべてを話す。私が知っているすべてを話す」と、怖い顔をして立ち上がった。私は自分の心も、みるみるうちに固まっていくのを感じていた。

With a surprised face, Stark’s daughter repeated to his father, who has a bad hearing, what Eslinger has said. This time, it’s Stark’s turn to look at my direction wide-eyed. Eslinger said immediately that “my father told me that her grandpa was a good person”, and the facial expressions of Stark and his daughter became somewhat softened. Stark stood up with a scary look, saying “I’ll tell everything to you. I’ll tell you everything I know.” At the time, I felt my heart was stiffening quickly.

UNESCO and Japan’s Act of Forgetting

Front gate Fukuoka #17 Mitsui Omuta POW Camp

Designation of Japan’s Meiji-era sites overlooks some important history.

By Mindy Kotler
The Diplomat, July 3, 2015

This is Karel Aster’s year. In April, the Czech Republic granted the 95-year-old Florida resident the nation’s highest honor, the Gratias Agit, for his valor and bravery during World War II. Aster had volunteered to fight with the Americans in 1941 to defend the Philippines against the Japanese invasion. He survived the battle, the Bataan Death March*, a hell ship to Japan, and years as a slave laborer at a Mitsui coal mine at Omuta, Kyushu Island.

Also at the Mitsui site were American Lester Tenney and Australian Tom Uren. Tenney, another survivor of the Bataan Death March, persuaded the Japanese government in 2009 to apologize to the American POWs of Japan. Uren, who died last January, was a leading Labor Party politician who secured supplementary payment to Australia’s 900 surviving prisoners from World War II and the Korean War.

Account of being a Scottish POW
at Mitsui's Miike Mine Omuta
click to order

This coming weekend, UNESCO will designate the Mitsui Miike coal mine at Omuta as a World Heritage site of Japan’s early modernization. The Japanese nomination, however, makes no mention of the history of any WWII POWs or of the thousands of Asian slave laborers at this site.


UNESCO is expected to approve 23 similar Japanese-nominated sites. Absent will be any accounting of the dark histories associated with these mines, foundries, and shipyards. Silence about the full history of these would-be global landmarks undermines UNESCO’s international goals and the U.S.-Japan alliance.

Currently there are 1,007 sites on the UNESCO World Heritage List. They are to serve as “instruments of international understanding and international cooperation.” The World Heritage accolade brings prestige and international attention to unique cultural accomplishments.

World Heritage sites often become tourist attractions and many nations view the designation as a path to reviving fading regions and cities. That is one motive behind Japan’s nomination of its sites. But the selective telling of their history is part of the Abe administration’s broader policy of restoring Japanese pride in their past.

Under the Samurai Sword
by CM Graham, best account
of Miike Mine slave labor
click to order

The regions of Japan’s UNESCO nominations are in search of tourist dollars as they are among the hardest hit by the country’s economic downturn. Tourism is a growth industry in Japan with visitors from China nearly doubling and Korea not far behind. Many of the nominated sites are also located in the home districts of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Taro Aso, and Agriculture Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi.

The family companies of Aso and Hayashi, The Aso Group and Ube Industries respectively, used Allied POW slave labor at company sites included among the nominations. Of the eight industrial areas nominated, five held 26 POW camps with nearly 13,000 Allied POWs providing slave labor to Japan’s industrial giants, including Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Sumitomo, Aso Group, Ube Industries, Tokai Carbon, Nippon Coke & Engineering, Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corporation, Furukawa Company Group, and Denka. The POWs came from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, India, New Zealand, Norway, Jamaica, Portugal, South Africa, Malaya, Arabia, and Czechoslovakia.

In addition, the nominated ports at Kitakyushu, then called Moji, and Nagasaki, were the entry points for nearly 35,000 Allied POWs, of which approximately 11,000 were American. Over 7,000 American and Allied POWs died traveling to Japan aboard the aptly called “hell ships,” and 3,500 more perished in Japan, 25 percent within the first 30 days of arrival.

Slave labor in Japan did not begin with World War II. Forced and conscripted labor was a critical part of the mining and manufacturing industries in nineteenth-century Meiji Japan. From late Meiji (1868-1912) onward, Japan used “industrial prisons” to supply labor to factories and mills at private companies. Up until the 1930s, the majority of the miners were convicts with the rest being peasants made landless by Meiji land reforms and “outcastes.” One-third were women. Cheap Chinese and Korean labor became important in Japan’s mines and factories, and on the docks.

Lester Tenney's account of
Mitsui's Miike Mine
click to order

Tokyo’s World Heritage nominations fail to address the full historical significance of these sites. Japan’s industrialization included Japanese and foreigners, nobles and outcasts, POW slaves and conscripted Koreans, as well as women and children. Without taking these into account, the story Japan wants to tell fails to meet UNESCO criteria of “universal value and meaning.”

Japan and UNESCO should look to the perhaps surprisingly positive experience of other World Heritage sites that do acknowledge their darker histories. The Liverpool-Maritime Merchant City site is a striking case in point. The Liverpool port served a key role in the triangular transatlantic slave trade of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

Liverpool has acknowledged its substantial role in a deplorable (and what would today be a criminal) business. Liverpool opened in 2007 the International Slavery Museum on the dock and, in 2006, a Centre for the Study of International Slavery at the University of Liverpool. Identical memorials to the victims of slavery stand on the docks of Liverpool, Richmond, Virginia, and Cotonou, Benin, linking this shared memory among them. These resources have drawn scholars and others and have in fact bolstered Liverpool’s reputation has a place where history – both good and bad – can be studied and understood.

An Australian's account of
slave labor at Mitsui's
Miike coal mine

Of the 21 nations represented on today’s UNESCO World Heritage committee, nationals from six were World War II POWs held on mainland Japan. These are: India, Malaysia, Jamaica, Finland, Poland, and Portugal. A seventh, South Korea, had hundreds of thousands of its men and women conscripted to work in near slavery conditions.

The U.S. does not have a vote in UNESCO. But Washington can speak to its Japanese ally to remind them of the debt they owe American veterans for defending their freedom.

On the morning of August 9, 1945, all the POWs in Omuta saw the red cloud rise from Nagasaki across the bay. Although a very modern weapon ended their ordeal at the Miike mine, they had experienced labor in Japan that had changed little since Meiji times. They would not want such forced labor to be repeated and certainly none would want it forgotten.

As it stands, Japan’s nomination of Meiji industrial sites is an act of forgetting. It omits the full history of Japan’s industrialization. For UNESCO to accept this is a disservice to its charter and to the memory of the thousands that slaved for Imperial Japan.

*Correction: Mr. Aster avoided the Bataan Death March by escaping to Corregidor. He was forced to participate in a "Victory March" of POWs six miles down Manila's Dewey Boulevard to Bilibid Prison. Where the Corregidor POWs stayed until they were packed on freight trains for the 90-mile trip to Cabanatuan Prison Camp. Mr. Aster was a POW in the Philippines until October 1944 and did not arrive in Japan until March 1945. Thus, he was less than six months at the Miike Coal mine, unlike Dr. Tenney who was there nearly three years. Czech government biographies, from which this article drew, are incorrect.

Grammatical corrections made July 7, 2015.