“I Ordered My Men to Use a Prisoner for Bayonet Practice”

An elderly Japanese veteran’s recollection of how he ordered his men to use a Chinese prisoner as a target for bayonet drill, reasoning that the soldiers needed to develop some “backbone,” is proving highly controversial online.
The 90-year-old man, a resident of Wakayama prefecture, recounts how he served in the Imperial Japanese Army and was dispatched to Jiangxi in southern China in 1941, aged 20.
The men forced Chinese to provide them food, but he recalls doubts – “We were taught that this was a holy war to save the people of China, but I wondered if this was really right.” He was not told of the laws of war.
He experienced bitter fighting on the frontlines, and recalls that when not fighting he spent his time being beaten and whipped by superiors.
By 1943 he was a corporal, and in command of 5 conscripts himself. He tells how, in order to put some backbone into his men, he ordered them to bayonet a Chinese prisoner – a man in his mid twenties.
His hands were tied and the corporal ordered his men to charge the man one by one with fixed bayonets, each running 10m and then stabbing him in the chest. The prisoner  screamed as he realised what his captors were about to do, but the soldiers had soon killed him.
After returning home he did not speak of the incident, though his recollection of the events never faded – “I did an inhuman thing.”
“My ignorance [of international law] caused me to give that order. We lost our reason in that kill or be killed world back then.”
Despite speaking about his war experiences repeatedly, only in 2010 did he reveal he ordered the murder – “If we don’t tell people, I fear the world may again descend into war.”


Man some things just screwed up, that picture ain't in color what time did they live in :3
Taken from sankaku complex probaly one of the best sites around