Japan's Biological Warfare Experiments in China - Unit 731

Category: Weapons of Mass Destruction

Janelle Norman and Taylor Thompson

During the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) and World War II, Japan established this covert biological warfare research and development unit of the Imperial Japanese Army that undertook lethal human experimentation. Japanese scientists performed tests on prisoners with plague, cholera, smallpox, botulism and other diseases. This research led to the development of the defoliation bacilli bomb and the flea bomb used to spread the bubonic plague. Some of these bombs were designed with ceramic (porcelain) shells, an idea proposed by Shiro Ishii in 1938. These bombs enabled Japanese soldiers to launch biological attacks, infecting agriculture, reservoirs, wells, and other areas with anthrax, plague-carrier fleas, typhoid, dysentery, cholera, and other deadly pathogens. In addition, infected food supplies and clothing were dropped by aeroplane into areas of China not occupied by Japanese forces during the wars.