Men Behind the Sun - Unit 731

Описание: This is based on real events. Many scenes in this film are described in the book: Unit 731 Testimony: Japan's Wartime Human Experimentation Program by Hal Gold.
“Men Behind the Sun” in Full HD-and English.

Unit 731 (Japanese: 731 部隊, Hepburn: Nana-san-ichi Butai), also known as Detachment 731, the 731 Regiment, the Manshū Detachment, the Kamo Detachment, the Ishii Unit, the Ishii Detachment, or the Ishii Company, was a covert biological and chemical warfare research and development unit of the Imperial Japanese Army. It undertook lethal human experimentation during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945), which was part of World War II. The unit was responsible for some of the most notorious war crimes carried out by Imperial Japan. Based in the Pingfang district of Harbin in the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo (now Northeast China), Unit 731 had active branch offices throughout China and Southeast Asia.

The unit was officially known as the Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department of the Kwantung Army (関東軍防疫給水部本部, Kantōgun Bōeki Kyūsuibu Honbu). Originally established under the Kenpeitai military police of the Empire of Japan, Unit 731 was taken over by General Shirō Ishii, a combat medic officer in the Kwantung Army, and commanded by him until the end of the war. The facility itself was built in 1935 to replace the Zhongma Fortress and expand Ishii's and his team's capabilities. The programme received generous support from the Japanese government until the end of the war in 1945. Unit 731 and the other units of the Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department were facilities for the production, testing, deployment and storage of biological weapons. They routinely conducted experiments on human beings (referred to internally as Maruta or 'logs'). Additionally, biological weapons were tested in the field on Chinese cities and towns. It is estimated that up to half a million people were killed by Unit 731 and its related programmes.

In 2002, Changde in China, the site of a plague flea bombing, held an 'International Symposium on the Crimes of Bacteriological Warfare', which estimated that around 580,000 people were killed by the Imperial Japanese Army's germ warfare and human experimentation. However, the American historian Sheldon H. Harris states that over 200,000 people died. In addition to Chinese casualties, 1,700 Japanese troops in Zhejiang during the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Campaign were killed by their own biological weapons when they attempted to unleash a biological agent, indicating serious issues with distribution. At least 3,000 men, women and children — at least 600 of whom were provided by the Kempeitai each year — were subjected to experimentation conducted by Unit 731 at Pingfang camp alone. This figure does not include victims from other medical experimentation sites, such as Unit 100. According to A. S. Wells, most of the victims were Chinese, with a smaller proportion being Russian, Ukrainian, British, Mongolian and Korean. There may also have been a small number of European, American, Indian, Australian and New Zealand prisoners of war. Harris documented that the victims were generally political dissidents, communist sympathisers, ordinary criminals, impoverished civilians and the mentally handicapped. The author Seiichi Morimura estimates that almost 70% of victims who died at Pingfang were Chinese (including both military personnel and civilians), while close to 30% were Russian.