Occupied City (14 page)

‘I would imagine balloons might be rather hard to control and navigate, wouldn’t you, Dr Thompson?’

As you can see from the above exchange, Lt. Gen. Ishii is an
extremely confident man. However, Ishii – in my impression of the man – is also prone to boast about his achievements (for example, about his invention of a porcelain bomb for plague dissemination, about his water filters for field use, and an anti-dysentery pill he claims to have developed) and I believe this egotism and vanity will be his undoing.

In conclusion, and regardless of Ishii’s contention, it is evident to me from the progress that was made that BW research and development in all its phases was conducted on a large scale, and was officially sanctioned and supported by the highest military authority.

It is also evident that BW research was not confined to Pingfan and mainland China, as we have been led to believe. It is my belief that work in this field was also carried on in the Army Medical College in Tokyo. Therefore, it is impossible that the military leadership here in Tokyo was unaware of the program and that it was almost certainly conducted with the support and sanction of the highest military authority.

This leads, of course, to the inevitable (and political) question of exactly how high that sanction extended and I am aware that this is also the question uppermost in the minds (and worries) of both SCAP and Washington. In response to my direct questioning as to whether the Emperor himself was informed of BW research, Ishii replied that the Emperor was ‘a lover of humanity and never would have consented to such a thing.’

However, I strongly believe we have only scratched the surface of Ishii and his work. I am convinced that sometime soon, if we continue to question Ishii and his associates, we will be able to break him. Ishii is a proud, determined, almost ruthless individual and no one, in my experience, with such personal characteristics can fail to have made enemies. As you are aware, GHQ has received, and continues to receive, literally thousands of correspondences from disaffected Japs containing allegations of war crimes. Among these many telegrams and letters there are sure to be some which will refer to BW experiments in China and also in Japan. However, it is a slow and time-consuming process verifying each individual allegation and we simply do not have the necessary manpower at our disposal.

Finally, there are also some additional, highly important and extremely CONFIDENTIAL remarks I would like to make to you.

I took the liberty of showing the notes I had made of my interviews with Ishii and Kitano to my tame informant (the former BW engineer). As you know, it has been my experience that these Japs are simply not to be trusted (they are all good actors and accomplished liars). It was my intention therefore to verify the information I had received from Ishii and Kitano with my informant.

However, my informant gave me a startling and unexpected piece of information. He claims to have recently met with one of his
acquaintances, who himself was a member of Unit 731. This acquaintance told my informant that he had personally met with Lt. Gen. Kitano, who told him that ‘just prior to the American Army inquiry [that is to say, my own interrogation of Kitano and Ishii], GHQ gave Ishii and myself [Kitano] a hearing and granted us permission to consult with each other in order that we could arrange not to contradict each other over items which were to be kept secret.’

My informant also claims that ‘the Americans knew all along that Ishii, Kitano, etc., had secretly fled back to Japan after the end of the war and they planned to make secret contact with them. Between the end of last year and the early months of this year, the Americans held secret meetings with Ishii and other ranking officers [a total of five persons] in a restaurant in Kamakura [just south of Tokyo]. During these meetings, which are known as the “Kamakura Conference,” Ishii revealed all about the experimentation and the bacteriological weapons. In return for providing the data that he had brought back from Manchuria, he asked that none of the unit members would be indicted for war crimes. The Americans accepted this condition and a secret contract was made between them.’

My informant refuses to name the ‘acquaintance’ who gave him this information but states that the acquaintance is a ‘former military physician, a Lt. Col (born in 1902), in Osaka, who had been a member of Unit 731.’ This former Lt. Col. also stated that he had recently met with Lt. Gen. Ishii, who boasted, ‘It is I who helped all you guys out and saved your skin!’

Of course, I have (for now) no way of knowing whether or not this information is true. However, if it is true, and I am aware it is a ‘big if’, it would certainly explain a lot.

To be very candid, sir, the politics of all this is beginning to weigh on me and I would be most grateful if you would tell me frankly and honestly (and in the utmost confidence) whether another section – G-2 or Scientific Intelligence, for example – are, to your knowledge, also engaged in any Jap BW investigation of their own and, if that is the case, whether they might have cut some kind of deal with the top Jap BW men (to the exclusion of the rest of us).

However, and whatever the truth of the matter, I remain very hopeful that my second report on Jap BW activities will be much more comprehensive than my first and that it will be completed and with you by the end of May, at the latest, as previously discussed.

Sincerely, Lt. Col. Murray Thompson.

*

My dearest Peggy
,

I am sorry I have worried you by my silence & lack of communication. However, I truly hope this letter finds you & the children all well (despite the worry I have no doubt put you through)
.

As (I hope) you were informed, I collapsed with a severe hemorrhage on March 10 & was diagnosed with TB. Since then I have been hospitalized here at St Luke’s International Hospital, Tokyo. It is embarrassing for a doctor to admit, but I realize now that I had ignored the warning signs as for some time I had been feeling very weak. However, I put this down to the stress of the job. I should not, however, have been so reckless in ignoring the fevers & coughs that had plagued me on & off since last September
.

I do now feel that I am on the mend (& the doctors agree), so please do not worry. I am resting & taking things easy (I have little choice in the matter as the nurses are very strict!)
.

I must admit, though, that I have been following the progress of the War Crimes Trial & it has done nothing for my mood!

A couple of days before my collapse I actually met with Morrow (who is one of our investigators in our prosecution) & I gave him all I had. I also told him in no uncertain terms that I believed that Ishii & his gang were guilty of serious war crimes (Ishii’s rank of lieutenant general also means he could be prosecuted as a Class ‘A’ war criminal). For starters, BW is outlawed by every civilized nation & furthermore Ishii carried out human experiments on both prisoners of war & civilians. The rest of his gang also committed enough crimes to be considered as ‘B’ & ‘C’ class war criminals. In our meeting, Morrow seemed very keen to go after Ishii & his subordinates & promised he would
.

Imagine my surprise & disappointment then to find that nowhere in the lists of the accused is there any mention of Ishii or any of his subordinates. As far as I am aware, the sole mention of BW to date occurred last week during the prosecution’s case about what the Japs did in Nanking. One of the assistant prosecutors (Sutton, I think his name was) suddenly stated in court that the Tama Detachment (which was the name for Ishii’s unit at Nanking) had taken Chinese civilians & American prisoners of war & used them for experiments (which we all know to be true). He said that the Japs had injected them with
toxic bacteria to see how their bodies reacted. Of course, this caused uproar in court & he was asked by the judges for more evidence, at which point Sutton said he did not anticipate introducing any additional evidence on the matter!

I refuse to believe that this will be all that is said on the matter, so I keep reading the newspapers every day in hope
.

Anyway, as you can imagine, I have had plenty of time to think & reflect on my many shortcomings, both professionally & personally, as a doctor & a soldier, & as a husband & a father. I realize now that I have failed every one & it is my sole aim now to put things right as soon as I am discharged from here
.

I can only apologize for all the anxiety & worry I have caused you but, hopefully, I am now on the road to recovery & will soon be well enough to travel & finally return home to you all
.

Until then, with all my love, Murray
.

*

Dear Colonel Worthley,

Sir, as you are no doubt aware, soon after my last letter to you (of February 25, 1946) I suffered a severe hemorrhage and was diagnosed with tuberculosis. As a result, I have been forced to remain here in Tokyo, hospitalized under doctor’s orders (and only doctor’s orders?) for the past year. My health has somewhat recovered now, but I am still unable to leave hospital and return either to my work or home to my family.

To the best of my ability, and it has not been easy, I have tried to keep abreast of developments in the BW investigation, through the occasional report in newspapers and the (even more) occasional visit from colleagues. However, and I hope you will forgive the abrupt and rude comments of a sick man, I cannot help but feel a strong sense of disappointment and frustration.

It would seem to me (from here, at least) that none of the information I gathered and passed on to you in my last letter, nor any of the
information I gave to Lt. Col. Thomas H. Morrow and the IPS, has been acted upon, particularly in regard to Lt. Gen. Ishii. I would go so far as to say that (from Day One) no one seems to have taken me seriously (or anyone from Camp Detrick, for that matter). I know we are the new kids on the block, so to speak, but they have no respect for us or our work. I cannot help but feel that this is because we are essentially civilians and are in no way connected with the old-line Chemical Corps (and its old-boy network).

If one was prone to paranoia – and this city and this Occupation, these Japs and our own men, certainly do nothing to discourage such feelings – then one might even think that my sudden illness and enforced removal from the investigation are viewed in the Dai-Ichi Building as providential intervention. There are days when, I admit, I feel very much like a pawn that has simply been swept off the board when the game was not going the way some people upstairs might have desired it to go.

However, the IMTFE is still in session and so there is still time to act upon the information I gathered and passed on to you (and to the IPS) and to bring Ishii and his subordinates to justice. My only regret is that my health problems (and the doctors) prevent me from personally ensuring that this is done. Hence this rather rude and abrupt letter, which I hope you will forgive but understand and, more importantly, act upon.

Finally, I would like to state for the record that as soon as my health permits I am most eager to resume my work in what I hope is the ongoing investigation into the Jap BW program, in whatever capacity you deem fit.

Sincerely, Lt. Col. Murray Thompson.

*

Dear Peggy
,

As you can see from the above address, & as you probably already know through other channels, I am still confined on doctor’s orders (& quite possibly on MacArthur’s orders, too) to this hospital. They say my illness has taken a turn for the worse, but I do not believe them. I now believe they may even be experimenting on me, for they seem incapable of curing my illness, only prolonging it
.

So the days turn into weeks, the weeks into months, the months into years, & I cannot tell you how much I miss you, Peggy, & how much I miss
the children (who doubtless do not even remember me). I also cannot tell you how much I want to leave this bed, this hospital, this city, & this country! But I know that even if I can leave this bed & this hospital, I will not be able to leave this city & this country until I have corrected all the mistakes I know I have made, until I have righted all those wrongs
.

For as I lie here, hour after hour, day after day, with nothing but time on my hands, I cannot help but go over & over, again & again, all the events that have left me here, that have STRANDED me here so very far from you & all I hold dear. Particularly, I cannot help but go over & over all the choices & mistakes I have made. Peggy, I go back, again & again, over & over so many things
.

Do you remember the balloons, Peggy? I see now that was where it all started for me, with those balloons, for that was when they first came for me, those men who never knock, who never introduce themselves, those men who came that day in November 1944, who told me of Jap germ warfare attacks on the Chinese in Manchuria. They’ve killed a lot of people, they said, they’ve poisoned wells, poisoned reservoirs. So we knew. Even then, back in 1944, we knew, I knew. Then they told me of the strange balloon that had been found in Butte, Montana, thirty feet in diameter, ninety-one feet round, & made of rice paper, told me of ten other strange balloons that had been found, & told me to come to Washington
.

Do you remember how excited I was, Peggy? How I stood in that circle around those balloons, that circle of military & scientific experts, how I told them these strange balloons had obviously come from Japan, that prevailing winds could easily carry balloons from Japan to the US mainland? How I warned them that if any of these balloons contained Japanese B-encephalitis, then we were in real trouble because mosquitoes are the best vectors of Japanese B-encephalitis & we have plenty of mosquitoes here in the States? How I warned them that our population had no defenses against B-encephalitis, that we had no experience of the disease so we were totally vulnerable, that four out of every five people who contracted B-encephalitis would die? Of course, I didn’t stop there, did I? I told them it was equally possible that the Japs could have contaminated the balloons with anthrax, that anthrax is a tough bug, sturdy & cheap to produce, that we knew the Japs had already used it in China. I warned them back then that the Japs could splatter the west & southwest of Canada & the United States, that they could contaminate the pastures & the forests, kill all the cows & sheep, all the horses & pigs, plus a considerable number of human beings. I also told them there would be widespread panic & hysteria, so
they placed rigid censorship on all radio & press reports of the finding of any balloons
.