China Discovers World War II Bunker Run by Japan's Infamous Unit 731
- Istimewa
VIVA – Archaeologists in China have uncovered a secret underground bunker used by Japanese scientists to conduct horrific experiments on human subjects during World War II.
The horror bunker discovered near the city of Anda in Heilongjiang province, northeast China, was used by the Japanese army's infamous Unit 731 during Japan's occupation of China from 1931 to 1945.
Built by the Japanese in 1941 and running until Japan's surrender at the end of World War II, the lab was Unit 731's largest research site, but its exact location was lost until now.
Unit 731 began in 1931 as a Japanese-run public health unit, but it quickly expanded its research to include grotesque biological and chemical warfare experiments using Chinese, Korean, Russian, and American captives as test subjects.
Researchers at the Heilongjiang Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology have partially excavated the U-shaped structure, which is about 33 meters long and 21 meters wide.
There are interconnected rooms and branching tunnels. Archaeologists have not gone any further, so the use of each room is not yet known in detail.
However, researchers have categorized some rooms as laboratories, observation and operation rooms, holding cells, barracks, garages, baths, dining rooms, and wells.
Bunker
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After Japan surrendered in September 1945, the United States (US) covered up evidence of the horrific experiments. The US secretly granted Unit 731's leaders immunity from prosecution for war crimes in exchange for their research.
Much of this information was later taken to Fort Detrick in Maryland, the center of the US Cold War biological weapons program between 1943 and 1969.
Archaeologists stated that they will continue to excavate the site, gathering more details about each room in the monstrous bunker structure.
"This discovery highlights how horrific Unit 731 was and its impact on global efforts to prevent biological warfare," Chinese scientists said.
It is estimated that around 12,000 men, women, and children were killed in Unit 731's sadistic experiments. They were used to test grenades, bacterial bombs, flamethrowers, and chemical weapons. Many prisoners were used as objects of horrific research.
Plague-infected fleas bred in Unit 731 laboratories were also dropped by low-flying aircraft over Chinese cities. The resulting plague caused hundreds of thousands of deaths.
