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2013 May 15 - 21 TOP3 [HISTORY]

Only Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany had ‘comfort women’ system: modern historian

Countries which had systematically engaged in founding and maintaining a so-called “comfort women” system during WWII were only Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany, said Hayashi Hiroshi, professor of contemporary history at Kanto Gakuin University.

He refuted an allegation Osaka City Mayor Hashimoto Toru, a co-leader of the Japan Restoration Party, made the other day. Hashimoto on May 13 stunned news reporters when he asserted, “Examining the history at that time, I found that various counties had also utilized some sort of what are called the comfort women system, apart from Japan.”

The professor pointed out that Hashimoto employed the logic that right-wing forces have long used, which is that “comfort women are the same as prostitutes.”

The following is an interview published in Akahata on May 17 with the professor:

As another JRP co-leader Ishihara Shintaro said, “Prostitution always exists with the military” (May 14), they are both trying to cover up Japan’s crimes by using as an excuse the Japanese Army had not been any different from other nations’ forces in this regard.

The war wrecked economic havoc throughout the world and deprived many people of sufficient food. In order to survive, some women hang around soldiers because only the military had access to food and various goods. It is unfortunately true that selling and buying sex happened on many battlefields, and that army surgeons sometimes gave the women checkups for sexually transmitted diseases. However, this is totally different from the exclusively organized comfort women system.

The Imperial Japanese Army fully administered the comfort women system from the planning of comfort stations to the selection of/orders with/funding for brokers, the abduction and collection of women, the transport of women, the management of comfort stations, and the supply of buildings, materials, and goods. The Imperial Army calculated the number of women needed based on its headcount of soldiers before building the stations and carted off the women to overseas locations using military transport. The Nazi German armed forces and the Schutzstaffel (SS) also had a sex slavery system similar to Japan, placing it under the control of military authorities.

The Japanese Imperial Army often collected women on its own. It sometimes violently abducted women in China and Southeast Asia. Not only victims but also many Japanese soldiers gave testimonies on this.

Hashimoto suggested that the U.S. commander in Okinawa allow U.S. servicemen to make use of legalized sexual services and was refused. As the U.S. Department of Defense states, the U.S. forces do not officially authorize prostitution. In WWII, the U.S. military already had that principle in place. Some rank-and-file personnel violated the principle, but when the use of brothels by soldiers was discovered, the facilities became off limits. The U.S. official policy was entirely different from what the Japanese Army did.

Hashimoto also claimed that the South Korean Army also had a comfort women system during the Korean War. However, many of the South Korean military leaders at that time had been members of the former Japanese Army. In short, the South Korean system originated from the Japanese military comfort women system.

If Hashimoto continues to insist that there are also other counties that had a system similar to that implemented by Japan, he should make sure he can provide the evidence.