Customer Reviews

Ships from Hell: Japanese War Crimes on the High Seas

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This book describes the inhumane and sometimes macabre treatment of Allied prisoners of war by their Japanese captors. The first part of the book describes the feared "Hell Ships". These were massively overcrowded freighters that the Japanese used to transport POWs. Most of the time, the POWs were packed in so tightly that they were unable to lay down. Very little food or water was given to them, and their latrine amounted to a trough hanging over the side of the ship. Aside from facing the constant beatings from the Japanese, these men also lived in fear of Allied submarine attack. Indeed, many of the POWs died as a result of an Allied torpedo striking their Hell Ship. The Japanese did very little to assist the prisoners in case the ship needed to be abandoned. Most of the time, they were locked in their holds to drown as the ship sank.

Japanese submarines and commerce raiders also played a role in the high seas atrocities. Many Japanese submarine captains would surface their sub after sinking an enemy vessel and machine gun the survivors in the water.

The chapters dealing with biological warfare and "comfort women" are particularly disturbing. The Japanese would use Allied POWs as human "guinea pigs" for "medical" experiments. As noted in the book, the Japanese would allow the POWs very little clothing and as they proceeded into colder cilmates, they would see how the POWs bodies would react. Many of them died from exposure to the cold. Others were thrown into the sea for "survival tests", while others were subjected to various vaccine tests.

The "comfort women" were mostly young Korean women, about 12 to 20 years old, who were subjected to forced prostitution. These women were lured in by false promises from the Japanese commander, placed aboard a ship, and sent to the front lines for the Japanese sailors and soldiers. Many went mad, most contacted various diseases, and many died.

The fact that amazes me is how to this day the Japanese can still deny so much of these atrocities. Much of the history from this time period is not mentioned at all by the Japanese. Hopefully one day they will realize their earlier wrongdoings and apologize for them.

I felt this was a good, albeit short, analysis of some of the atrocities committed by the Japanese. I found the reading hard at some points due to all of the Japanese terms that the author chose to use, but overall, the book gives a good introduction to some of the crimes committed by the Japanese.

This is a well researched and written book about the hell ships of WWII.

Lots of small details about the Japanese and their terrible treament of our GI's during the war.

It explains how the Japs arrived at their decision concerning the hellships.

They should have students in both high school and college read this book....true stories about WWII.