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New documents have surfaced showing the Japanese military was directly involved in the administration of “comfort women” and comfort houses in war zones.
The National Institute of Korean History (NIKH) revealed four documents on Aug. 11 that had been found at the US National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) as part of a project to collect and compile data on Japanese military comfort women and war crimes.

Cover of Southeast Asia Translation and Interrogation Center (SEATIC) Psychological Warfare Bulletin No. 182. Provided by National Institute of Korean History.

The first of the documents was Southeast Asia Translation and Interrogation Center Psychological Warfare Bulletin No. 182, published during World War II on July 6, 1945, by the US military.

“The [Japanese] army established licensed public comfort houses immediately after occupation in an effort to combat rape,” the document read (p. 16). On p. 18, the document claimed that some Japanese soldiers had raped young girls in villages.

While four pages of the bulletin had previously been released in a collection of data on comfort women published by Japan’s Asian Women’s Fund, the remaining 42 pages were newly discovered by NIKH.

Page 16 of SEATIC Psychological Warfare Bulletin No. 182

The second set of documents were three reports from the interrogation of Japanese prisoners of war by the Allied Translator and Interpreter Section (ATIS). According to report No. 91, Japanese soldiers captured in Papua New Guinea said comfort houses had been “under army supervision.” In report No. 470, Japanese soldiers captured in Malang, Indonesia, claimed that seven comfort houses have been set up under military jurisdiction, with some 150 women employed there from Korea, Japan, and Indonesia. In report No. 652, Japanese POWs in the Philippines said Japanese military surgeons had conducted weekly examinations of the women to prevent sexually transmitted diseases.

The Japanese government has previously maintained that comfort women and comfort houses were administered by civilians rather than the military, although various documents discovered over the years have suggested direct Japanese military involvement.

“These materials confirm [the military’s] direct involvement all the more clearly and will serve as a basis for demanding legal responsibility and an official apology from the Japanese government,” NIKH said. The institute plans to begin publishing the materials it has assembled in sourcebook form later this year.

provided on Aug. 11 by NIKH. “The [Japanese] army established licensed public comfort houses immediately after occupation in an effort to combat rape

By Choi Won-hyung, staff reporter

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