Originally posted on May 4, 2019.
This chapter compares the Khabarovsk Trial with the Tokyo Trial, arguing that the Khabarovsk proceedings were not worthy of being called a real trial but were instead a political propaganda show.
It also criticizes NHK’s treatment of the defendants and their families, warns of Chinese anti-Japan propaganda surrounding Unit 731, and stresses the need to examine the audio tapes carefully in order to clarify the truth and prepare for a new phase of historical warfare.

2019-05-04
The most important thing is, based on a proper understanding of the essence of the Khabarovsk Trial, to examine in detail the contents of this audio tape, clarify the truth about Unit 731, and prepare for China’s new historical warfare.

The chapter posted on 2018-04-06 under the title “In its program, NHK repeatedly showed courtroom photographs of defendants such as Kiyoshi Kawashima and Tomio Karasawa as if they were ‘heinous criminals’” is now in goo’s real-time top ten in search count.
What follows is a continuation of the previous chapter.
Differences from the Tokyo Trial.
So how did the Khabarovsk Trial differ from the Tokyo Trial, though both were “war crimes” trials.
① What they had in common was that both were retaliatory trials by victors against the defeated.
② The Tokyo Trial was an international tribunal joined by Allied judges and prosecutors, whereas the Khabarovsk Trial was a purely Soviet domestic trial.
③ The Tokyo Trial was open to the world’s press, whereas the Khabarovsk Trial was open only to the Soviet press and Soviet citizens.
At the time, it attracted little global attention because it was seen, after all, as Soviet propaganda.
④ The Tokyo Trial took two and a half years, from May 1946 to November 1948, whereas the Khabarovsk Trial lasted only six days.
In other words, while the Tokyo Trial involved hearings conducted over time, the Khabarovsk Trial was a trial without anything worthy of being called deliberation.
⑤ In the Tokyo Trial, there were defense counsels for both the Allies and Japan, and there were even people such as the American serviceman Blakeney who gave splendid defenses and exchanged arguments with the judges and prosecutors, but in the Khabarovsk Trial, although Soviet defense counsels were assigned, they did not defend the accused.
According to Kazuo Mitomo, he was told before the trial that counsel would be appointed, but he declined because he did not think they would defend him seriously.
However, he wrote that he finally consented after persistent pressure, and that at the trial the counsel, “in the same tone as the prosecutor, branded the defendants as utterly heinous criminals, treated severe punishment as only natural, and declared that there was not even room for a defense.”
Kiyoshi Kawashima also wrote that he met his counsel only once beforehand, and that they did not talk about the trial.
From these facts, it is clear that the Khabarovsk Trial was propaganda unworthy of the name of a trial, and a political show.
That is why I call it a fake trial.
In its program, NHK repeatedly showed courtroom photographs of defendants such as Kiyoshi Kawashima and Tomio Karasawa as if they were “heinous criminals.”
It also showed the anguished expressions and heavy tone of Tomio Karasawa’s bereaved family members as they were made to listen to the tape of their father’s courtroom statement.
Are these not both serious human rights violations.
China has set up the “Exhibition Hall of the Japanese Army Unit 731 that Invaded China” in Pingfang, Harbin, where the Kwantung Army’s Epidemic Prevention and Water Supply Department had been located, and is conducting anti-Japan propaganda.
It is a well-known fact that China Central Television, CCTV, has a bureau inside NHK’s Shibuya Broadcasting Center.
If this audio tape is handed over to CCTV, it is obvious that it will be used for anti-Japan propaganda.
Just as with the Nanjing Incident, they will surely eventually launch propaganda about “300,000 victims of bacteriological warfare.”
The most important thing is, based on a proper understanding of the essence of the Khabarovsk Trial, to examine in detail the contents of this audio tape, clarify the truth about Unit 731, and prepare for China’s new historical warfare.
Needless to say, at that time researchers acting as “defense counsel” will be indispensable.
Titles and honorifics omitted in the text.