THIS IS YOUR TORTURER

Dorothy Byrne arranges a meeting between

two Japanese war criminals and the Britons they brutalised

Tokyo ONE HAS certain expectations of a con- victed war criminal's behaviour on release. He should change his name and move to a new city, or even country, to start a new life. He should shun all publicity and live in horror of his past ever being exposed by the media or his former victims. At the very least, he should feel embarrassed. But not, apparently, if he is Japanese.

For a television programme on Japanese attitudes to what they did in the second world war, we contacted two of their war criminals convicted for maltreating POWs in camps on the River Kwai. Both had been given life sentences, but they served just 11 years because all Japanese war criminals were quietly released from prison during the 1950s.

To our surprise, they immediately agreed to see us. We then pressed our luck and suggested we bring with us two British POWs who remembered them from the camps. The war criminals said they would be delighted. We couldn't think why.

Jugi Tarumoto was a unit commander on the Kwai. The official assessor of his case described him as one of Japan's worst war criminals, and affidavits from more than 40 men bore this out at his trial.

`He said we would work till we died. He called us his white slaves.' Tarumoto often beat men who could not work from illness and fatigue.' He said to me, "I will finish this railway if it takes all your lives."' `When any of us appeared to tire, Tarumo- to would beat us. He would always hit us where we had an injury or sore.' He said to me, "I loathe and detest all English peo- ple and will make their bodies sleepers for my railway. I do not care if my men kill you all."' But the Tarumoto who greeted us 50 years later was consideration personified. He had clearly prospered since his release. He had invited us to film him at the Yasukuni war shrine in Tokyo where he was attending a reunion of his old platoon from the Burma-Siam railway. They met every year to 'console the souls' of the Japanese who had died in the war, he explained. Tarumoto was still very much their leader. The other men walked several paces behind him to the shrine. Shrine officials deferred to him.

The first engine to run on the Burma- Siam railway has been brought back to the shrine and the platoon always pose for a photo in front of it. One wonders what would happen if former Nazi concentra- tion-camp guards ever tried to gather together in front of their old haunt to pose for a photo.

Since his release, Tarumoto has claimed that the evidence against him at his trial was 'vague'. He has appeared on television alleging that he was picked at random. Why did he think he was prosecuted? we asked him. 'I can only think that the rea- son I was named was that I got on so well with the prisoners of war and that's why they remembered my name,' he told us.

So we introduced Tarumoto to Douglas Weir to refresh his memory. Weir was a young infantry lieutenant when he was taken prisoner by the Japanese and force- marched to the Kwai to build the railway. In England, he had told us how even 50 years on he could remember Tarumoto clearly. 'He called the tune and the tune was to use us as a machine to get work done regardless of how sick the men were.'

Weir had wondered whether he could bring himself to meet Tarumoto again. He knew that some former POWs might be against the idea of such a meeting. But he decided he had to confront the man. It was especially vital for the memory of all Miss Toby, you really have made yourself indispensable.' those men who died on the Kwai that the guilty should not be permitted to deny what they did.

Tarumoto began by telling Weir how pleased he was to see him. He was smiling and confident. But the mood changed when Weir told him, 'I am here to tell you for the sake of history that you are clearly identified as one of the leading lights in ill- treatment of prisoners on the railway.'

An astonished war criminal is a sight to behold. For years Tarumoto had got away with denying his crimes and it was obvious that he had not expected to be challenged. He asked Weir for concrete facts.

Weir told him, 'I saw the ill-treatment you ordered. And the details of the bully- ing are contained in the forty-five affidavits from soldiers all over Britain.' He then handed him extracts from the trial affi- davits, translated into Japanese for Taru- moto's convenience. Tarumoto read through them. 'I have no remembrance,' he said. He now began to deny he'd forced the men to work. 'I made efforts to get co- operation from POWs by persuasion.' But Weir muttered, 'Never, never!'

Then Tarumoto tried the war criminal's favourite excuse: 'It was only to accomplish my duty. I must obey the order.' But Weir would have none of this: 'You are trying to pass the responsibility to your seniors.'

Finally, Weir asked, 'Have you any mes- sage to give me to tell my former comrades when I go back to England.'

There was a long pause. Then Tarumoto, who had spoken in English up to this moment, said in Japanese, 'I don't remem- ber. But if what everyone says about what I did is true, then I accept there can never be sufficient apology for the misery and suf- fering we caused all of you. But we were very young.'

Weir replied, 'Thank you, Mr Tarumoto, for saying that. We were young too and there are a large number of us dead.'

Douglas Weir had achieved his aim of confronting Tarumoto with the truth. But he was not impressed with the apology. Tarumoto had failed to admit he remem- bered doing anything wrong. It was remarkably similar to the Japanese govern- ment's recent half-hearted apology which managed to achieve the apparently impos- sible — it didn't even mention the war.

Instead, it had a dig at Britain as a for- mer colonial power, saying there had been many instances of colonial rule and aggres- sion in modern times and expressing remorse for any committed by Japan. Yet even this grudging apology won the support of fewer than half the MPs in Japan's lower house.

Seisuke Okuno led the parliamentary campaign against an apology.When we met him he told us, 'I do not think that there is any necessity to apologise. I think it is non- sense that this matter is being judged on the issue of who was victorious in the war.

`This was a war of self-defence. At the same time, East Asia had previously been turned into a white man's colonial stamp- ing ground and we wanted to liberate these countries.'

Okuno also distorts the truth about his own war past. At first he told us that he had spent the war doing accounts in a Tokyo office. 'I worked in the Home Office creating an accounts system for the government. I used to receive forms and requests from different ministries for pro- cessing,' he said.

In fact, he spent part of the war in the Tokko Keisatsu, the notorious Japanese secret police. We put this to him and he answered with a smile, 'Yes, for eight months I was the head of department at the Kagoshima prefecture.'

There was no trace of embarrassment. Okuno, like many in the older generation, sees the convicted war criminals as victims: `I see the war crimes trials as the victors' revenge upon the defeated. I think there were war crimes committed by both parties but if asked which side had more commit- ted against them I would say Japan.'

Our second war criminal, Hiroshi Abe, at first seemed to symbolise everything about Japan's denial of guilt. Abe was sen- tenced to death, later commuted to life in prison, for his role on the Burma-Siam railway. He was in charge of the working parties at the worst POW camp on the Kwai. Of 1,600 men sent there, 1,200 died within three months.

The trial statements against Abe revealed how he forced the sick to work: `Lieutenant Abe would bring armed guards through the hospital huts and turn out by force the first two hundred men encoun- tered. Men were constantly beaten by engi- neers armed with whips made from strands of fencing wire.' Sick men had to be car- ried to work by their comrades.' Abe was utterly indifferent to human suffering.'

We met Abe at a large marble monument in Tokyo erected in memory of the war criminals executed by the Allies. Abe told us, 'It is a natural thing, as a human being, to pray for a peaceful resting place for them.' But it would be impossible to imag- ine a similar monument in Nuremberg.

Abe is also a member of a special associ- ation for convicted war criminals, called the Changi Society. 'It's just like a school- boys' reunion,' he said. 'It's an opportunity for the men who suffered together a long time ago in Changi prison and Outram Road prison to get together and support each other.'

Abe has denied in interviews since his release that he was the man responsible for deciding how many prisoners had to work at the Sonkurai camp. But when we met him it was soon clear that he'd begun to feel remorse for his role: 'I didn't run away from the army or commit suicide, so in that sense quite a lot of blame should fall on me.'

We had brought Jim Bradley to meet Abe. Bradley was awarded the MBE for his attempt to escape from the Kwai to bring news to the world of the atrocities going on there. He felt that 50 years on he was again on a journey to expose the truth.

Several times in the hands of the Japanese, Bradley nearly died. His weight fell to five stone at one point. In his camp, he was given the job of organising the daily burnings of the dead POWs. For many years, he couldn't talk about it. But he's always felt convinced that, for the sake of the next generation, there has to be reconciliation.

Bradley remembered Abe well: 'He was the man who drove us on all the time; he simply went to the hospital and literally drove people out. By his very acts, he was really killing his own labour force.' When we showed him some of the statements Abe had made since his release, including a claim that the POWs lost weight because they didn't like rice, he said, 'It's unbeliev- able. We who were there know the truth.' Although he was ill and in great pain, Bradley said he felt that it was his duty to travel to Japan to put Abe straight.

Abe also remembered Bradley. Bradley had been sentenced to death by the Japanese for his heroic attempted escape. But they were so impressed by his bravery that they commuted his sentence. Abe, who had also had his death sentence com- muted, has always felt that he and Bradley had something in common.

When the two men met, the effect was immediate. Abe burst into tears and bowed low to Bradley. 'I will never forget your suffering when you were burning and burying the bodies of your comrades,' he told him. Their meeting was very different to that between Weir and Tarumoto. The distraught Abe admitted that he was a war criminal. 'Three thousand men in your force died and I personally played a part in that. I must take a certain percentage of the blame, perhaps I must take a large percentage of the blame for it.'

Jim Bradley cried too and took Abe's hand. 'I said it would be hard to shake hands with you, but having spoken to you and knowing how you feel now I'm very glad to,' he said. Abe stroked his hand.

Two days later, Bradley and Weir went to the Commonwealth war graves ceme- tery in Yokohama. In an extraordinary gesture, they took Abe with them. The

`Don't mind me – statistically, I don't exist.'

three men laid their wreaths together. Bradley told us, 'I am convinced he is truly sorry for what happened and admits that he had a part to play in the terrible condi- tions under which we worked.'

In the lead up to V.1 Day (which the Japanese government would prefer us to call VP — or Victory in the Pacific - Day), there has been a great debate about reconciliation. Douglas Weir is sure where he stands on the issue: 'I believe in recon- ciliation, it's got to come, but you must have the truth.'

Abe himself told us, 'It is vital that the Japanese government should give a full and proper apology for Japan's conduct of the war. But before they can think about apol- ogising to other countries the Japanese people will have to acknowledge to them- selves their responsibility.'

The older generation, which includes most of Japan's politicians, is a long way from doing that. We concluded that they would never change. The grudging apology they have made was only to please their Asian trading partners. They won't ever give a true apology because they still don't accept that they did anything wrong. And for this the Allies must take some responsi- bility, for, when the war ended, they never forced Japan to face its guilt.

At first, thousands of suspected war criminals were rounded up and trials were held. Hundreds of thousands of others were purged from their posts. But then the Allies' priorities changed. The fight against communism took precedence over justice.

Most of the purged men were allowed to return to public life. The war crimes trials

were halted and thousands of men awaiting trial — to this day nobody is sure how many — were released.

Kurt Steiner, a United States Army interrogator told us, The authorities made up their mind not to have any further war crimes programme because it annoyed Japanese leaders whom we wanted to tie to us in the Cold War. People got off without being tried although they might well have been convicted if brought to court.'

Pat Spooner, who was in command of the British war crimes investigations set up in South-East Asia after the war, told us, 'I didn't know until quite recently that despite all our efforts these men were released and an amnesty declared. I find it unbelievable, I get incandescent about it, absolutely horrified. I think of all the peo- ple who investigated their crimes. I think of all their victims who gave evidence against them. They felt an effort was being made. They would be horrified to know.'

The fact is, however, that in 1951 Britain signed a treaty with Japan guaranteeing that she would not carry out any further prosecutions of alleged war criminals. What a contrast to our attitude towards German war criminals today. We are told that they must be pursued to the ends of the earth and even to their deathbeds so that evil will never be seen to prevail and the values of our civilisation will be pre- served.

In Japan, all the convicted were quietly released by the end of the 1950s. The sus- pected war criminals were not pursued. Instead, many of these men were wel- comed back to public life. Nobusuke Kishi, who had been held as a suspected class A war criminal, became prime minister and attended Winston Churchill's funeral. Old- nod Kaya, who had been sentenced to life for his war crimes in 1948, was released in 1955 and went on to become the minister of justice.

One suspected class A war criminal even thought he had a good chance of winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Ryoichi Sasakawa, who died last week, has been welcomed by the great and the good of the western world — the Pope, United States presi- dents and film stars. He was presented with a major award by the World Health Organisation. In his bid for popularity, he even financed reconciliation visits between British men who served in Burma and their Japanese counterparts.

Sasakawa never expressed any remorse for what he did in the war but the world accepted him because he had lots of money. What sort of message did that give to Japan?

Japan has tried to bring its own children up believing they are a nation of victims. The majority of schoolchildren are, at some point, taken to Hiroshima, which has been turned into a shrine to Japanese vic- timisation. Only last year, after a very long campaign, did the Hiroshima museum add a new section entitled: 'Why Hiroshima was bombed'. Yet Japanese children are frighteningly ignorant of other war events.

We arranged for Douglas Weir and Jim Bradley to give a talk to a class of 17-year- olds. The former POWs asked how many of the children knew about the maltreat- ment of prisoners on the Burma-Siam rail- way. Only two had ever heard of it. Weir and Bradley put that right, detailing the cruelty they had suffered. It had a pro- found effect on the class. Child after child stood up and expressed shame at being Japanese. One girl said, 'Now that I've found out about what happened, I want to be taught properly about it all.' Another said, 'I don't want anything like this ever to happen again.'

Weir and Bradley thought their visit to the school was the most important thing they did in Japan — more important than denouncing Tarumoto's lies or getting Abe to admit his guilt. Jim Bradley said, 'I think that visit to the school is what this whole trip was about.' Deeply depressed by the attitude of the older generation, these frail British victims of Japanese war crimes must pin their hopes for true recon- ciliation on the grandchildren of their ene- mies.

Dorothy Byrne's film, Tokyo Encounter, is broadcast on ITV on Thursday, 25 July.