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AFTER VIOLENCE: 3R, RECONSTRUCTION, RECONCILIATION ...

AFTER VIOLENCE: 3R, RECONSTRUCTION, RECONCILIATION ...

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division came from, and got 20 volumes of diaries, documented in<br />

The Nanking Massacre in the Imperial Army Soldiers' Diaries./43/<br />

Actor-oriented guilt-attribution was focused on Lt General<br />

Iwame Matsui, commander in central China. He was in Nanking only<br />

3 days, found guilty by the Tokyo Tribunal and hanged, on Prince<br />

Asaka, Emperor Hirohito's uncle, and by implication on the Emperor<br />

himself. Much evidence pointed in that direction, but the<br />

Imperial family was given immunity by the US Occupation forces in<br />

exchange for the data from the infamous Unit 731 for biological<br />

and chemical warfare, examining the impact of B&C agents by<br />

vivisection (autopsy on live humans, their bodies being known as<br />

marutas, preserved as evidence of how, for instance, anthrax<br />

worked). The head was General Shiro Ishii, directly responsible<br />

to the Emperor. The Dutch judge on the Tokyo Tribunal, Bert V A<br />

R”ling, declared that the US should be ashamed of itself for<br />

having entered such a deal.<br />

Young and Yin give voice to three analysts in an effort to<br />

understand the motivation behind the massacre:<br />

H. J. Timberley, Manchester Guardian correspondent in 1938:<br />

"to strike terror into the heart of the Chinese people in the hope<br />

that thereby the latter would be cowed into submission".<br />

David Bergamini, historian: /but they had/ "no longer any<br />

hope of it unseating Chiang Kai-Shek".<br />

Edward Behr, historian: "a war of punishment".<br />

Rational hypotheses, verifiable through memoirs, letters, etc.<br />

But to this actor-oriented approach should be added a focus<br />

on structure and culture. Emperor Meiji declared once that the<br />

37

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