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mementomaggie's review
5.0
Ridiculous to think that there could be as swirl if intelligence archives worldwide are opened to researchers
panthor's review
4.0
A well-researched book about the biological warfare "research" at Unit 571 and other sites in China, as well as the aftermath. It also touches on the American biological weapons research during the same period and how the unethical Japanese research results were used by the United States.
This book goes into great detail about names and places, but if you're looking for something like "Philosophy of a Knife" in book format this is not it. It is an academic work and somewhat detached from the events.
This book goes into great detail about names and places, but if you're looking for something like "Philosophy of a Knife" in book format this is not it. It is an academic work and somewhat detached from the events.
xterminal's review against another edition
4.0
Sheldon Harris, Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare 1932-45 and the American Cover-Up (Second Edition) (Routledge, 2002)
During the time of the Great Depression in America, and up through the end of World War II, the Japanese medical corps, operating through the imperialist Kwantung Army, conducted thousands of biological warfare experiments on live human subjects. These subjects were primarily Chinese peasants convicted of petty crimes, but also included, as WW2 wore on, prisoners of war and non-criminal Chinese. For over forty years, these facts were kept an almost complete secret from the general public; glancing references would surface now and again, or a slick TV documentary would pop up for a British of Korean version of the TV magazines that are those countries' parallels to something like 20-20 in America. No one treated the subject in depth; no one knew how to get enough proof. Even the Chinese government, when it attempted a full-length film documentary, was unable to come up with enough information (their aborted attempt was made into a fictional film, the notorious Men Behind the Sun).
Then came Williams and Wallace and their book Unit 731. Seven years later, Sheldon Harris expanded greatly on Williams and Wallace's knowledge with the definitive text on Unit 731's war crimes, Factories of Death. Another seven years has gone by since, and Harris and Routledge have released a second edition of Factories of Death that contains the updated information from documents that have been declassified since. As time goes on, the book gets even more horrifying.
Unlike Williams and Wallace or Hal Gold (whose book Unit 731: Testimony is a brilliant, if anecdotal, complement to this work), Harris keeps his feet rooted firmly on the ground, keeping any conjecture to the most logical conclusions to be drawn from the facts at hand. Gold, for example, speculates in Unit 731: Testimony that both MacArthur and Truman were fully aware of the American cover-up of Unit 731's activities; Harris refrains from even hinting at such a thing until all the evidence is completely laid out, and even then, he only glancingly makes reference to then-President Truman at all. Because of this loathness to speculate, when Harris does let the cork out and start ranting (which happens only very briefly, at the end of the penultimate chapter), some of the teeth are taken out of his vituperation; he's just not willing to go where he needs to go. One might cynically think that the stronger language that haunts the last third of the penultimate chapter is there simply because ranting sells and scholarship doesn't. (That said, those reviewers who have noted the book's dryness are right, to an extent, but anyone who considers this painfully dry should try reading any other book Routledge has ever released. This is a John Grisham novel in comparison, going by readability. I was surprised, and pleased, at how quickly the book flew by, given its imprint.)
That same failing is Harris' greatest sin here; not one of commission, but of omission. Other books on Unit 731 have raised a number of questioning specters that Harris doesn't touch on at all, including a few for which there is smoking-gun evidence (use of American biological warfare in North Korea in the 1950s that has Ishii Shiro's stamp on it, the biological munitions plant at Hiroshima that led to America's bombing of that city in 1945, etc.). It could reasonably be concluded that Harris didn't think the evidence was sufficient to warrant mentioning them in the text, but even the casual Unit 731 scholar is sure to have heard the allegations; better, if you're writing the definitive piece of scholarship, to address them rather than leave them twisting in the wind.
Still, an excellent piece of work, one that history buffs are well advised to seek out. Schoolchildren (for this material is definitely in need of dissemination) could do with an abridged version; those who seek this out because they loved Men Behind the Sun should probably stick with the film unless they're used to reading nonfiction. (The notion of Ishii as a two-dimensional villain will be shattered within the first few pages. Prepare yourselves.) ****
During the time of the Great Depression in America, and up through the end of World War II, the Japanese medical corps, operating through the imperialist Kwantung Army, conducted thousands of biological warfare experiments on live human subjects. These subjects were primarily Chinese peasants convicted of petty crimes, but also included, as WW2 wore on, prisoners of war and non-criminal Chinese. For over forty years, these facts were kept an almost complete secret from the general public; glancing references would surface now and again, or a slick TV documentary would pop up for a British of Korean version of the TV magazines that are those countries' parallels to something like 20-20 in America. No one treated the subject in depth; no one knew how to get enough proof. Even the Chinese government, when it attempted a full-length film documentary, was unable to come up with enough information (their aborted attempt was made into a fictional film, the notorious Men Behind the Sun).
Then came Williams and Wallace and their book Unit 731. Seven years later, Sheldon Harris expanded greatly on Williams and Wallace's knowledge with the definitive text on Unit 731's war crimes, Factories of Death. Another seven years has gone by since, and Harris and Routledge have released a second edition of Factories of Death that contains the updated information from documents that have been declassified since. As time goes on, the book gets even more horrifying.
Unlike Williams and Wallace or Hal Gold (whose book Unit 731: Testimony is a brilliant, if anecdotal, complement to this work), Harris keeps his feet rooted firmly on the ground, keeping any conjecture to the most logical conclusions to be drawn from the facts at hand. Gold, for example, speculates in Unit 731: Testimony that both MacArthur and Truman were fully aware of the American cover-up of Unit 731's activities; Harris refrains from even hinting at such a thing until all the evidence is completely laid out, and even then, he only glancingly makes reference to then-President Truman at all. Because of this loathness to speculate, when Harris does let the cork out and start ranting (which happens only very briefly, at the end of the penultimate chapter), some of the teeth are taken out of his vituperation; he's just not willing to go where he needs to go. One might cynically think that the stronger language that haunts the last third of the penultimate chapter is there simply because ranting sells and scholarship doesn't. (That said, those reviewers who have noted the book's dryness are right, to an extent, but anyone who considers this painfully dry should try reading any other book Routledge has ever released. This is a John Grisham novel in comparison, going by readability. I was surprised, and pleased, at how quickly the book flew by, given its imprint.)
That same failing is Harris' greatest sin here; not one of commission, but of omission. Other books on Unit 731 have raised a number of questioning specters that Harris doesn't touch on at all, including a few for which there is smoking-gun evidence (use of American biological warfare in North Korea in the 1950s that has Ishii Shiro's stamp on it, the biological munitions plant at Hiroshima that led to America's bombing of that city in 1945, etc.). It could reasonably be concluded that Harris didn't think the evidence was sufficient to warrant mentioning them in the text, but even the casual Unit 731 scholar is sure to have heard the allegations; better, if you're writing the definitive piece of scholarship, to address them rather than leave them twisting in the wind.
Still, an excellent piece of work, one that history buffs are well advised to seek out. Schoolchildren (for this material is definitely in need of dissemination) could do with an abridged version; those who seek this out because they loved Men Behind the Sun should probably stick with the film unless they're used to reading nonfiction. (The notion of Ishii as a two-dimensional villain will be shattered within the first few pages. Prepare yourselves.) ****
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