Tokyo Nuremberg: Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. Tokyo International Tribunal

The Second World War is still largely a mystery. And it's not even about how and why it started. Questions will arise if you think about seemingly simple facts. Why in our country the victory over Germany is celebrated throughout the state, and the victory over Japan is celebrated only in the Far East? Why is this our VICTORY given little attention, if at all, in the central regions? Don't want to "disturb" the Japanese neighbors? So their attitude towards Russia is formed on the basis of directives from Washington, and not on the basis of Japan's national interests...

In the material of the permanent author of the resource Artem Yakovlevich Krivosheev, a topic almost forgotten today is raised. The German Nazis and their inhuman experiments on people in our country and around the world are remembered much better than the crimes of the Japanese military.

But there was not only the Tokyo trial, where the top was judged. There was also a trial of Japanese war criminals ... in Khabarovsk in 1949. On charges of preparing bacteriological warfare and developing biological weapons. Those who were caught were judged. Most of the Japanese involved in this project evacuated to Japan. (The unit was called Detachment 731). In 1946, the head of the unit, Ishii Shiro, handed over all the results of his work ... to the Americans. They continued their research.

The Japanese used as experimental subjects living people who, for various reasons, ended up in the gendarmerie of Harbin and other Chinese cities. This became known only thanks to the Red Army and the work of Soviet lawyers. Given that the results of the research fell into the hands of the Americans, they may continue to experiment on living people, who knows ... CIA prisons, Guantanamo ...

Tellingly, all the convicted Japanese were released under the 1956 amnesty. But this is so, to the understanding of the "Khrushchev thaw" ...

"Nuremberg" on the Amur: Khabarovsk trial of Japanese war criminals

Spring arrived almost a month ago. Nature wakes up after winter sleep. Without exaggeration, this is a great time. Our compatriots get out into nature more often, and the summer season will soon open. Right now, our Ministry of Health warns that ticks have awakened along with nature ... including encephalitic ones. And when traveling to the forest, you must take precautions: get vaccinated in the winter, dress appropriately and examine yourself after a visit to the country.

But how long ago did tick-borne encephalitis appear in our forests? Its first outbreaks were noted in the Far East in the mid-1930s. The soldiers got sick massively. A separate article deserves the courage of our biologists and virologists who discovered this terrible disease. Where did this virus come from? Until now, the reasons for the appearance of the virus in the Far Eastern taiga are a debatable issue ... According to one version, they are involved in the emergence of this virus ... Japanese military. There is no serious evidence for this. But why did this version appear?

In the early 1930s, the Japanese army occupied Manchuria. And by the mid-1930s, one of its most terrible units was created as part of the Kwantung Army. But first things first.

We all know what Victory Day, celebrated on May 9, means to us. Then we defeated the enemy going to destroy Russia as a subject of world politics. In fact, the whole of Europe gathered under the banner of Hitler (with rare exceptions). It cost the lives of more than 27 million of our compatriots. Almost everyone knows about the trial of Nazi criminals, held in Nuremberg in the autumn of 1945.

But, much less attention is now being paid to the Tokyo trial of Japanese war criminals, which took place from May 3, 1946 to November 12, 1948. We will celebrate its 70th anniversary in May this year. I hope to dedicate a separate article to it.

For now, I want to talk about the trial of Japanese war criminals, which took place ... from December 25 to December 30, 1949 in Khabarovsk. Why was it necessary to try the Japanese criminals more than a year after the Tokyo trial? Let's figure it out.

In December 1949, 12 former Japanese servicemen were tried in Khabarovsk for participation in the development and use of bacteriological weapons. Now few people remember this. Although in its significance it is not inferior to either Nuremberg or Tokyo. This was the only trial where the facts of the development and use of bacteriological weapons by the Japanese in combat operations were proven.

So, who and for what was tried at the trial? The most detailed information is contained in the book Materials of the Trial in the Case of Former Servicemen of the Japanese Army Accused of Preparing and Using Bacteriological Weapons, published in 1950 with a circulation of 50,000 copies. In addition, the fund of archival criminal cases of the Central Archive of the FSB of Russia stores criminal case No. N-20058 in 26 volumes. 12 Japanese servicemen are walking along it, who, in violation of the Geneva Protocol of 1925, were engaged in the development, creation and use of bacteriological weapons during the Second World War. The investigation was carried out by the operational-investigative group of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Investigation Department of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Khabarovsk Territory from October 22 to December 13, 1949. The criminal case contains handwritten testimonies and diaries of the accused (in Japanese and translated into Russian), testimonies of witnesses , acts of forensic medical examinations, protocols of interrogations, etc.. The trial was open and widely covered by the USSR media.

Let's look at the indictment:

“As established by the investigation, shortly after the capture of Manchuria on its territory, the Japanese General Staff and the War Ministry organized and incorporated into the Japanese Kwantung Army a bacteriological laboratory headed by a well-known ideologist of bacteriological warfare in Japan, later Lieutenant General of the Medical Service Ishii Shiro , in which research was carried out in the field of using bacteria of acute infectious diseases for conducting offensive bacteriological warfare.

According to the testimony of the accused former Major General of the Medical Service of the Japanese Army Kawashima Kiyoshi , the General Staff and the War Ministry of Japan, in accordance with the secret instructions of Emperor Hirohito, in 1935-1936, two top secret formations were already deployed in Manchuria, designed to prepare and conduct bacteriological warfare "

In 1941, these units were formalized as Detachment No. 731 and Detachment No. 100. The detachments were staffed by bacteriologists and other scientific and technical specialists. Detachment 731 alone had more than 3,000 employees.

The detachments had a developed infrastructure:

“... for the deployment of Detachment 731, in the area of ​​​​Pingfan station, located about 20 km from Harbin, by 1939 a large military camp was built with numerous laboratories and office buildings. Significant reserves of raw materials were created. A restricted area was created around the town in order to ensure the special secrecy of the work. The detachment had its own aviation unit, and at the Anda station - a special training ground.

Detachment No. 100 also had extensive premises, special equipment and land plots in the area of ​​​​the town of Mogaton, 10 km south of the city of Changchun " .

The detachments had a large branch network along the border with the USSR. The task of the branches was to prepare for the practical use of bacteriological weapons during offensive operations on the territory of the USSR. The detachment reported directly to the commander of the Kwantung grouping of the Japanese army. More details about the organization of laboratories, the structure of detachments can be found in the above book. More than one page is devoted to this issue. Here is just one quote:

“The materials of the preliminary investigation established that Department No. 1 [of Detachment 731 - approx. author] was specially engaged in the study and cultivation of pathogens for bacteriological warfare: plague, cholera, gas gangrene, anthrax, typhoid fever, paratyphoid and others, with a view to using them in bacteriological warfare.

In the process of these studies, experiments were carried out not only on animals, but also on living people, for which an internal prison was organized, designed for 300-400 people. .

What Japanese "scientists" did on living people in their "scientific research" deserves special attention. Numerous examples of atrocities are given in the minutes of the interrogation of the defendants in the "Materials of the Trial in the Case of Former Japanese Army Servicemen Accused of Preparing and Using Bacteriological Weapons." But even more “picturesquely” they remember what the Japanese themselves did, who escaped the court. To give just a few examples from the book "The Devil's Kitchen" by Morimura Seiichi, a popular Japanese writer who spoke with many former employees of Division 731:

""Lower beings" deprived of the right to be called people

"Logs" are prisoners who were in the "detachment 731". Among them were Russians, Chinese, Mongols, Koreans, captured by the gendarmerie or special services of the Kwantung Army (information, intelligence and counterintelligence agencies of the Japanese army operating in the occupied regions of China), or employees of the Hogoin (Shelter) camp located in Harbin.

The gendarmerie and special services captured Soviet citizens who found themselves on Chinese territory, commanders and fighters of the Chinese Red Army (8th Army) (as the Japanese called the People's Liberation Army of China), captured during the fighting, and also arrested members of the anti-Japanese movement: Chinese journalists, scientists, workers, students and their families. All these prisoners were to be sent to a special prison of "detachment 731".

The logs didn't need human names. All prisoners of the detachment were given three-digit numbers, according to which they were distributed among operational research groups as material for experiments.

The groups were not interested in either the past of these people, or even their age.

In the gendarmerie, before being sent to the detachment, no matter how cruel interrogations they were subjected to, they were still people who had a language and who had to speak.

But from the time these people got into the detachment, they became just experimental material - "logs" - and none of them could get out of there alive.

"Logs" were also women - Russians, Chinese - captured on suspicion of anti-Japanese sentiments. The women were used mainly for the study of venereal diseases."

“The circulation of “logs” was very intense. On average, every two days, three new people became test subjects.

Later, the Khabarovsk trial in the case of former servicemen of the Japanese army, based on the testimony of the defendant Kawashima, will register in their documents that during the period from 1940 to 1945, "detachment 731" was "consumed" at least three thousand people. “In reality, this number was even higher,” the former members of the detachment unanimously testified.

"Satanic order

So, all the groups listed above, located on the second and third floors of the "ro" block, used the sectional room.

I already wrote that the "logs" were distributed by numbers as material for experiments between all groups of the detachment.

Why were the test subjects given to the property of each group?

When it was planned to obtain drugs from a living human body, it was necessary to know in advance exactly which group these drugs would become the property of.

According to the testimony of former employees of the detachment, the right to open a living person and experiment on him belonged to the group to which he was assigned. But when the autopsy and the experiment ended, the organs and body parts of the subject were distributed among all groups according to their applications.

All groups were informed about the planned experiment and autopsy in advance, and already at this stage orders were received from them: the small intestine and pancreas - to such and such a group, the brain receives such and such a group, such and such a group claims to have a heart. These were orders for body parts of a person who was to be dismembered alive.

Autopsies of living people in the detachment were carried out mainly with two goals.

Firstly, in order to obtain drugs to find out whether the heart of a person who has undergone an epidemic infection increases or remains unchanged? How does the color of the liver change? What processes occur in the body during each period of the course of the disease? The dissection of a living person was an ideal way to observe changes as they occur in living tissue.

Another purpose of the autopsies was to study the relationship between time and the changes that occurred in the internal organs after the “logs” were injected with various pharmaceuticals.

What processes will occur in the human body if air is introduced into the veins? That this entailed death was known. But the team members were interested in the processes that take place before the onset of convulsions.

After what time will death occur if the “log” is hung upside down? What changes occur at the same time in various parts of the body? Such experiments were also carried out: “logs” were placed in a large centrifuge and rotated at great speed until death occurred.

How will the human body react if urine or horse blood is injected into the kidneys? Experiments were carried out to replace human blood with the blood of monkeys or horses. It was found out how much blood can be pumped out of one "log". The blood was pumped out with a pump. Everything was literally squeezed out of a person.

What happens if a person's lungs are filled with a lot of smoke? What happens if smoke is replaced with poisonous gas? What changes will occur if poisonous gas or rotting tissue is introduced into the stomach of a living person? Such experiments, the very idea of ​​which is unnatural to a normal person and must be rejected as anti-human, were carried out with cold prudence in Detachment 731. Many hours of irradiation of a living person with X-rays were also carried out here in order to investigate their destructive effect on the liver. There were also experiments that were completely meaningless from the point of view of medicine.

Former team members say: “During the autopsy of a living person, civilians, who were mainly auxiliary personnel, worked directly with a scalpel. The leaders of the groups, who were well-known doctors and scientists at that time, distributed the preparations. They themselves took up the case only in those cases when certain "logs" were of particular interest. Usually they preferred not to get their hands dirty and entrusted everything to subordinates. The thought that the autopsy of a living person is a crime did not occur to them. Rather, on the contrary, in each group they were looking forward to which drug would arrive this time. ”

The “logs” were given general or local anesthesia, and after an hour they turned into “fresh, as if still life-preserving preparations.”

“In the detachment, not only “anti-Japanese elements” were subjected to an autopsy alive. A former employee of the detachment observed such a case.

One day in 1943, a Chinese boy was brought to the sectional section. According to the employees, he was not one of the "logs", he was simply kidnapped somewhere and brought to the detachment, but nothing was known for sure.

The boy was squatting in the corner of the sectional room, like a hunted animal, and around the operating table were more than ten members of the detachment in white coats, hands raised up ready for the operation. One of them briefly ordered the boy to lie down on the operating table.

The boy undressed as he was ordered and lay back on the table.

Immediately, a mask with chloroform was applied to his face. From that moment on, he did not know what was being done to his body.

When the anesthesia finally took effect, the whole body of the boy was wiped with alcohol. One of the experienced members of the Ta-nabe group, who were standing around the table, took a scalpel and approached the boy. He plunged a scalpel into his chest and made a Y-shaped incision. A white fat layer was exposed. In the place where the Kocher clamps were immediately applied, blood bubbles boiled up. The autopsy has begun.

A former employee of the detachment recalls: “He was still just a child, and he could not participate in any anti-Japanese movement. I only realized later that it was opened because they wanted to get the internal organs of a healthy boy.”

With dexterous trained hands, employees took out the internal organs from the boy’s body one by one: the stomach, liver, kidneys, pancreas, and intestines. They were dismantled and thrown into buckets standing right there, and from the buckets they were immediately transferred to glass vessels filled with formalin, which were closed with lids.

The scalpel gleamed, blood bubbles burst. One of the civilians, skillfully wielding a tool, quickly devastated the lower half of the boy's body. The removed organs in the formalin solution still continued to contract.

“Look! Yes, they are still alive! someone said.

After the internal organs were taken out, only the boy's head remained intact. Small, short-cropped head. One of the members of Minato's group fixed it on the operating table. Then he made an incision with a scalpel from ear to nose. When the skin was removed from the head, the saw was used. A triangular hole was made in the skull, the brain was exposed. A detachment officer took it with his hand and quickly lowered it into a vessel with formalin. What remained on the operating table was something resembling the body of a boy - a devastated body and limbs.

The opening is over.

"Take it away!"

One by one, the officers standing at the ready carried away the vessels with formalin, in which the organs were located. Not the slightest regret about the violent death of the boy!

It wasn't even an execution. Just delivering meat to the table of the devil's kitchen."

From these revelations, the blood runs cold. And this is only a small fraction of the "activities" that the Japanese launched. Materials of the Khabarovsk trial cite facts of the actual use of bacteriological weapons against Chinese troops and Soviet troops at Khalkhin Gol:

“Tests of bacteriological agents were carried out not only in laboratories and at test sites, but also in the field, in the so-called. "expeditions". The first "expedition" was carried out as early as 1939 on the Khalkhin-Gol River, when pathogenic bacteria were poured into the river during the retreat of the Japanese army. The second "expedition" was sent in July-August 1942 to the Three Rivers region (North Khingan Province of China) and lasted 25 days. In the course of the “expedition”, bacteriological agents were tested near the city of Hailar, near the Terbur River, 60–80 km from its confluence with the Argun River bordering the USSR.

The archival criminal file contains information about other examples of the use of bacteriological agents and weapons. Thus, in 1940, in the Nimbo area (south of Shanghai), Detachment 731 dropped air bombs filled with plague germs from aircraft at the location of Chinese troops and on the local population. At the same time, reservoirs, wells and other water sources were being contaminated.

As a result, an epidemic spread in the cities of Jinhua, Yiezhou, Yushan, and the Chinese authorities attracted significant anti-epidemic forces to eliminate it. In the 8th PLA, a special instruction was issued on measures to combat the plague.

Detachment 731 carried out another operation in the summer of 1941 in Central China: over the city of Changde (near Dongting Lake) bombs were dropped from an aircraft filled with fleas infected with plague bacteria. The purpose of the operation was to spread the plague, incapacitate Chinese troops and disrupt communications. According to the head of the 2nd department of Detachment 731, Colonel Soth, the operation was "very effective": an epidemic of plague broke out among the Chinese. The following testimony about this operation was preserved in the materials of the archival investigative file: “This operation was led by the head of the 2nd department, Colonel Oota. By order of General Ishii, 30 bacteriologists were assigned from the employees of the 1st and 2nd departments, and technical personnel were attached to them, which in total amounted to a detachment of about 100 people. When the expedition returned from Central China, Oota told me that over the city of Changde, near Dongting Lake, the expedition dropped fleas infected with plague from airplanes. This was done in order to disrupt the communications of the Chinese troops, an important point of which was Changde.

Operations to use bacteriological agents in the Changde area were very effective, and a plague epidemic was caused among the Chinese. The technique for transporting fleas to their place of application was that they were kept in special tanks filled with rice husks, where they could exist without harm. The rice hulls also contributed to the uniform dispersion of fleas when they were dropped from the aircraft, which provided a large coverage area. ” .

About other "expeditions" and how bombs stuffed with pathogens were tested on people, those who wish can familiarize themselves. The activities of this "scientific unit" ended in August 1945, when the Red Army liberated Manchuria from Japanese troops in less than a month. It was then that the scale of the activities deployed by the Japanese was revealed. The main backbone of the detachment, led by Ishii Shiro was able to evacuate to Japan, taking with him the results of "scientific" works and inhuman experiments. Only a few fell into Soviet captivity.

So, why did the trial take place only in December 1949 in Khabarovsk? And did not become an integral part of the Tokyo process? And the reason for this is the policy of our "allies". The fact is that among the prisoners of war who fell into Soviet captivity as part of the Kwantung Army were Japanese military leaders who had previously fought against the Allied forces in the Pacific, and whom they accused of a number of war crimes. The Americans asked them to extradite:

Thus, on August 24, 1947, Vyshinsky informed Colonel-General I. Serov, First Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR, that the Allies were insisting on the extradition of Generals Kitazawa Sadajiro and Takumi Hiroshi. Lieutenant General S. Kitazawa was appointed commander of the 123rd Infantry Division of the 4th Army in Manchuria only on January 25, 1945, and before that he was the chief of staff of the steamship transport of the Japanese army in Singapore. The British accused him of mistreating British and Allied prisoners of war while transporting them from Southeast Asia to Japan, causing many to die of starvation and disease.

Major General Takumi Hiroshi, commander of a special brigade (called the "Takumi Brigade" and in 1942 part of the 5th Division in Malaya) was accused of massacring Chinese in Johor.

The Soviet side agreed to fulfill the request-requirement of the former allies, but subject to their benevolent attitude towards its wishes. On September 5, 1947, S. Kruglov informed A. Vyshinsky that "the Soviet government agrees to transfer Kitazawa and Takumi, subject to the transfer of Ishii and Ota" .

On May 3, 1946, the International Military Tribunal for the Far East began its work in Tokyo. This was the second trial of the main war criminals responsible for starting World War II. The first international trial - over German war criminals - began on November 20, 1945 in Nuremberg.

Now the hour of retribution has struck for the Japanese aggressors. The militarists, who dreamed of establishing world domination with their partners in the Axis at the cost of capturing foreign territories, the death and enslavement of other peoples, and who imagined themselves to be bearers of the highest spiritual values, appeared: before the court of peoples.

The demand for the trial of Japanese war criminals was formulated in the Potsdam Declaration on Japan's unconditional surrender. Paragraph 10 of this declaration read: "We do not seek to enslave the Japanese as a race or destroy them as a nation, however, severe justice must be carried out against all war criminals, including those who committed atrocities against our prisoners of war."

The powers that signed the Potsdam Declaration and acceded to it considered the just punishment of Japanese war criminals as an important condition for lasting peace and the democratization of Japan's state and political system. They declared: “For all eternity, the power and influence of those. who deceived the Japanese people and involved them in the path of world domination, for we believe that peace, security and justice are impossible until irresponsible militarism is expelled from the world.”

Thus, the Potsdam Declaration laid the foundation for the creation of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. By signing the act of unconditional surrender on September 2, 1945, Japan fully accepted the terms of the declaration and pledged that "the Japanese government and its successors will honor the terms of the Potsdam Declaration."

An important milestone on the path to the administration of justice against Japanese war criminals was the Moscow Conference of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the USSR, the USA and Great Britain, held on December 16-26, 1945, at which it was decided to entrust the implementation of all measures necessary for the implementation of the conditions of surrender, occupation and control over Japan, and consequently concerning the punishment of Japanese war criminals, to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers in Japan. China also joined this decision.

However, neither the Potsdam Declaration, nor the act of Japan's unconditional surrender, nor the decisions of the Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers worked out specific forms for the administration of justice. These forms were determined in the course of diplomatic negotiations between nine interested states - the USSR, the USA, Great Britain, China, France, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the Netherlands, which reached an agreement on the establishment of an International Military Tribunal. Representatives of these states became its members. Subsequently, India and the Philippines joined the agreement.

On January 19, 1946, the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Japan, MacArthur, issued an order to organize an International Military Tribunal for the Far East and approved its charter. The task of the tribunal was to organize "a fair and speedy trial and punishment of the main war criminals in the Far East."

The Charter of the Tokyo Tribunal incorporated the most important provisions of the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal. However, unlike the latter, it did not comply with the principle of parity, that is, the equal participation of countries in the organization and conduct of the process. If in Nuremberg the members of the tribunal elected the presiding officer by mutual agreement, the main prosecutors distributed the duties of maintaining the prosecution also by agreement, and the process was conducted in four languages ​​(according to the number of countries participating in the court), then in Tokyo everything was different.

The charter was drafted by American lawyers in accordance with the rules of Anglo-Saxon procedure, and some very important issues of the trial were not provided for either by the charter or by the rules of procedure. Questions that arose in the course of the judicial procedure were resolved as if the case was being considered in an English or American court.

Supreme Commander MacArthur was given extremely broad powers. He appointed the chairman, the chief prosecutor, the members of the tribunal from the representatives proposed by the states that signed the act of surrender, as well as India and the Philippines. He had the right to mitigate or somehow change the sentence, but not to increase the punishment. The official languages ​​of the process were only Japanese and English. The Americans sought to emphasize that they had priority in defeating Japan, and they took key positions in the Tokyo process.

The progressive world community and the people of Japan, who became the first victim of the militarists, welcomed the news of the trial with approval. The idea of ​​punishing war criminals was popular among the Japanese. At rallies organized by the Communist Party and left-wing organizations in Japan, extensive lists of those responsible for starting the war were drawn up.

On May 3, 1946, the first meeting of the International Tribunal took place in the building of the former War Ministry. The members of the tribunal were: from the USSR - a member of the military collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR, General I.M. Great Britain - Member of the Supreme Court W. Patrick, France - Prosecutor 1st class A. Bernard, Australia - Chief Justice of Queensland W. Webb, Holland - Member of the Court of Utrecht, Professor of Utrecht University B. Rolling, India - Professor of the University R. Pal, from Canada - a member of the Supreme Court S. McDougall, from New Zealand - a member of the Supreme Court E. Northcroft, from the Philippines - a member of the Supreme Court D. Jaranilla. The Australian Judge Webb was appointed President of the International Tribunal, the American Judge J. Keenap was appointed the Chief Prosecutor (aka the US Prosecutor).

Each country participating in the tribunal has identified more lawyers as additional prosecutors. From the USSR, the prosecution was represented by: Corresponding Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences S. A. Golupsky, State Councilors of Justice A. N. Vasiliev and L. N. Smirnov. From China, the additional prosecutor was the chief prosecutor of the Shanghai Supreme Court, Xiang Zhe-zhun, from Great Britain, the former member of parliament, lawyer A. Comins-Carr (deputy chief prosecutor), from France, the chief prosecutor in the jury of the department of the Seine and Marne, R. Oneto, from Australia - member of the Supreme Court of the State of Queenslapd, A. Mansfield, from the Netherlands - member of the Special Court in The Hague V. Bergerhof-Mulder, from Canada - Deputy Chief of the Military Judicial Department of the Canadian Army, Brigadier General G. Nolan, from New Zealand - Prosecutor of the Supreme Court General R. Quilyam, from the Philippines - a member of the Philippine Congress, Major P. Lopez, from India - G. Menon.

The defense was represented by 79 Japanese and 25 American lawyers. The participation of American defense lawyers in the trial was motivated by the incompetence of Japanese lawyers in Anglo-Saxon judicial procedure. If at the Nuremberg trials each defendant had one defender, then in Tokyo - three or four.

28 people who developed and carried out the policy of aggression were brought to justice. Most of the defendants were professional soldiers with close ties to the zai batsu and court circles. Each defendant in 1928-1945. (the period covered by the prosecution) held various leadership positions, actively participating in the involvement of Japan in the war.

But not all the perpetrators ended up in the dock. Representatives of the major Japanese monopolies that financed and directed the aggressors were not brought to justice, although the Soviet prosecution insisted on this. This was explained primarily by the fact that the trials against the monopolies compromised the capitalist system too much and could result in a trial against imperialism, which gives rise to wars of conquest. Bourgeois politicians could not allow such a thing. Nevertheless, the facts concerning the role of the monopolies in unleashing the war were so eloquent that bourgeois jurists did not dare to keep silent about them. In the verdict of the court, representatives of monopoly capital appear repeatedly, but facelessly: "industrialists", "zaibatsu", "bankers".

The Prime Ministers of Japan of different years K. Koiso, X. Tojo, K. Hiranuma, K. Hirota, Vice Prime Minister N. Hoshino, Ministers of War S. Araki, S. Itagaki, D. Minami, S. Hata, Vice Minister of War H. Kimura, Naval Ministers O. Nagano, S. Shimada, Naval Vice Minister T. Oka, Commander of Japanese Forces in Central China I. Matsui, Chiefs of the Bureau of Military Affairs of the Ministry of War A. Muto, K. Sato, member of the Supreme Military Council K. Doihara, chief of the general staff of the army I. Umozu, foreign ministers I. Matsuoka, M. Shigemitsu, S. Togo, diplomats H. Oshima, T. Shiratori. Minister of Finance O. Kaya, organizer of the fascist youth movement K. Hashimoto, ideologist of Japanese fascism S. Okawa, Lord Privy Seal K. Kido, Chairman of the Planning Committee under the Cabinet of Ministers T. Suzuki.

The defendants were charged with conspiracy with Germany and Italy to "ensure the domination of the aggressive countries over the rest of the world and its exploitation by these countries." Using every means, the defendants “intentioned and actually planned, prepared, launched and waged aggressive wars,” the indictment stated, “against the United States of America, the Republic of China, the British Commonwealth of Nations and Northern Ireland, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, Australia, Canada, The French Republic, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, New Zealand, India, the Philippines and other peace-loving peoples in violation of international law, treaties, obligations and assurances ... in violation of the laws and customs of war ... ".

55 indictments were put forward, divided into three groups: a) "Crimes against peace", which included the preparation and unleashing of aggressive wars that violated international law; b) “Murders”, where the defendants were charged with the murder of servicemen and civilians when unleashing illegal hostilities and other murders in violation of the generally accepted laws and customs of war (execution of prisoners of war, massacres of the civilian population); c) "War crimes and crimes against humanity", implying inhumane treatment of prisoners of war and civilian internees.

When asked whether the defendants plead guilty, they all answered in the negative. On June 3, the prosecution proceeded to present evidence of the defendants' guilt, which included oral and written testimonies of witnesses and defendants, documentary and physical evidence. Significant difficulties arose with documentary evidence. If the German criminals did not have time to destroy the originals of the most important documents and they fell into the hands of the allies, then in Japan almost all the documentation that could expose the militarists in committing crimes was destroyed.

The verdict of the tribunal repeatedly mentions these actions aimed at covering up the atrocities. The following is an extract from the verdict relating to the documentation for the "Atrocities" section.

“When it became apparent that Japan would be forced to surrender, organized measures were taken to burn or otherwise destroy all documents and other evidence regarding the mistreatment of prisoners of war and civilian internees. On August 14, 1945, the Japanese Minister of War ordered all army headquarters to immediately destroy all secret documents by burning. On the same day, the chief of the gendarmerie sent instructions to the various gendarmerie departments detailing methods for effective destruction by burning a large number of documents. On August 20, 1945, the Chief of the Prisoner of War Camp Division (Prisoner of War Administrative Division of the Bureau of Military Affairs) sent a circular telegram to the Chief of Staff of the Japanese Army in Taiwan on August 20, 1945, in which he stated: “With documents that may be unfavorable to us if they fall into the hands of the enemy, should be treated in the same way as secret documents, and on use they should be destroyed. This telegram was sent to the Japanese Army in Korea, the Kwantung Army, the Army in North China, Hong Kong, Borneo, Thailand, Malaya and Java. It was in this telegram that the head of the prisoner of war camps department made the following statement: “Personnel who mistreated prisoners of war and civilian internees or who are treated with great displeasure are therefore allowed to immediately move to another place or hide without a trace.”

However, a thorough search for documents, as well as the involvement of top secret Japanese-German correspondence, which was at the disposal of the intelligence agencies of the allied states, helped to prepare convincing evidence that exposed and sufficiently fully revealed the criminal activities of the defendants. The prosecution provided extensive evidence of the preparation of Japanese public opinion for war: the education of young people in the spirit of the so-called "samurai traditions", the dissemination of ideas about the superiority of the "Yamato race" over other nations, its mission, which consisted in implementing the principle of "Hakko Ichiu" (creation of a colonial empire under rule of Japan). It was proved that pro-fascist political organizations were planted in the country, terrorist acts were committed against political figures objectionable to the militarists.

The prosecution presented to the tribunal numerous documents proving the intensity of Japan's military preparations: the constant increase in the size of the army, the creation of the institution of total war, the introduction of the law on general mobilization, the restructuring of industry in accordance with the needs of the war.

Japan's first aggressive act was the capture of Manchuria. Until 1928, the prosecution noted, Japan had achieved significant influence in that country, and after G. Tanaka's cabinet came to power, Manchuria was occupied and a puppet government was created in it. In subsequent years, aggression in China continued. In the occupied territories, the Japanese authorities pursued a policy of terror and repression.

Prosecutor Xiang Zhe-zhun, who presented evidence on Japanese atrocities in China, noted that murders and mass exterminations, torture, violence, and robberies took place in the occupied regions of China throughout the entire period, from 1937 to 1945. After the fall of Nanjing, when the Chinese troops ceased resistance and the city was completely under the control of the Japanese army of General Matsui, a wild orgy of violence and crime began. It lasted, without abating, for more than forty days. “The high command and the Japanese government have been made aware of these atrocities constantly committed by the Japanese soldiers. Despite frequent notices and protests, the atrocities continued. It was the Japanese system of warfare."

In pursuit of the goal of crushing the will of the Chinese people to resist, the Japanese promoted the production of drugs. The funds received from their implementation went to finance military expansion. When raising the question of economic aggression in China, the prosecution stated that Japan had taken possession of "almost all the valuable minerals and raw materials of Manchuria and China."

Having occupied Indochina, strategically important and rich in raw materials, after the surrender of France, the Japanese aggressors launched preparations for the seizure of the countries of the South Seas.

On December 7, 1941, Japan fell on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor in the Hawaiian Islands, and then on American and British possessions in the Pacific. An attack on the Dutch Indies also followed. Based on the factual material, it was shown that, although Holland was the first to declare war on Japan, the aggression was committed by the latter.

The document, titled "Preliminary plan for the policy towards the southern regions" with the note "extremely secret," said that in the first stage of Japan's aggression in the southern regions, the task was to seize French Indo-China, the Dutch Indies. East Indies, British Burma and the British colonies in the Strait of Malacca, including Singapore. Already in January 1941, an order was given for a special occupation currency for the Dutch Indies, the first issue of which was made in March.

The Soviet Prosecution presented evidence under the section "Aggression of Japan against the USSR." Prosecutor S. A. Golunsky noted that the aggression against the Soviet Union cannot be understood and evaluated in isolation from the historical background on which it developed. Therefore, he dwelled on the events connected with the Japanese intervention in the Far East in 1918-1922. The prosecutor emphasized that, although the Japanese did not manage to seize Soviet territory at that time, "the dream of this continued to live among the Japanese military and Japanese imperialist politicians until very recently and motivated a number of their aggressive actions ...". Golunsky also recalled the treacherous attack on Port Arthur, comparing it with the attack on Pearl Harbor: “The same surprise attack without declaring war under the guise of negotiations taking place at that time. This is not a coincidence, but this is the method of the Japanese aggressive policy, this is the Japanese military doctrine, on which entire generations of Japanese officers were trained.

Describing the internal policy of Germany, Italy and Japan, Golunsky noted the main features inherent in the regimes of these countries: terror and the preaching of nationalism.

The Soviet representative divided the period covered by the accusation into four logical parts (stages), pointing out that the goals of aggression always remained unchanged, but specific features are characteristic of each period of time. Thus, at the first stage (from 1928 to the autumn of 1931), Japan's desire to win a foothold for an attack on the USSR was revealed. The main task at the second stage (from the autumn of 1931 to 1936) was the transformation of Manchuria into a military foothold and the conclusion of a military-political alliance with Germany against the USSR, and later Italy joined it. During the third stage (from 1937 to the start of the war in Europe), the three powers continued to converge, expressed in the conclusion of a tripartite pact, which finally formalized their aggressive conspiracy against other states. At the last stage (from the autumn of 1939 until the surrender of Japan), the militarists, confident in the victory of Germany, waited for the right moment to attack the USSR, and after its defeat they tried to avoid unconditional surrender.

Based on a large number of documents, Soviet lawyers revealed the anti-Soviet orientation of Japan's aggressive policy and gave a deep analysis of its aggressive nature. The prosecution presented strong evidence of the guilt of the defendants, traced the role of each in the formation and implementation of the aggressive course followed by Japan. Of the accused, perhaps the main figure in the trial was the leader of the Japanese militarists, the former Prime Minister Tojo, whose fascist views left no doubt. Holding the posts of Chief of Staff of the Kwantung Army in 1937, Minister of War in 1940, Prime Minister from December 1941 to July 1944, he played an important role in turning Japan into a hotbed of tension in the Far East, and then in unleashing a war against other states. Tojo continued to defend his views in court, without repenting of anything.

Among the defendants was one of the oldest statesmen, former Prime Minister Hiranuma, who enjoyed great influence in the ruling circles of Japan. The conductor of fascist views, who led one of the most influential fascist organizations (“Kokuhonsha”), he was directly responsible for unleashing a war against China, the USA, the British Commonwealth of Nations, for aggressive actions against the MPR and the USSR in 1939. The defendants belonged to the ruling circles of Japan , and their names, as proved by the prosecution, were most closely associated with various stages of Japanese aggression. The prosecution presented its evidence for 160 days.

On February 24, 1947, the defense began to present evidence. A great influence on her behavior, as well as on the entire course of the work of the tribunal, had a change in the international situation. There were times of the Cold War, when the United States in its policy moved away from cooperation with the USSR, which led to a deterioration in US-Soviet relations. For the capitalist countries, Germany and Japan no longer posed a danger, while the strengthening of the positions of the Soviet Union, the increase in its authority, democratic transformations in the countries of Central and South-Eastern Europe, many of which embarked on the path of socialist development, the growth of the national liberation movement in the colonies caused great concern and concern of the US leadership.

Many statesmen and military leaders of the United States already saw Japan as an ally in the future struggle against the USSR and sought to turn it into an instrument of anti-Soviet, anti-communist policy. However, at that time they were forced to reckon with objective conditions: not much time had passed since the end of the war, and a sharp turn from the ideals for which progressive people of the whole world fought and expected, to the policy of international reaction was not easy.

Characteristic in this regard is the opinion of MacArthur, who had great opportunities to influence the course of the process. “The Potsdam Declaration,” he wrote in his memoirs, “also contained a purge clause requiring that all Japanese who were actively involved in militaristic and ultra-nationalist activities before the war be removed from public service and stripped of all political influence. I strongly doubted the wisdom of this measure, as it led to the removal from service of many capable administrators who would be difficult to replace in the building of a new Japan. I started the purge with minimal violence, but that was the only issue that had support from the Japanese people."

During the Tokyo trial, the defense, taking advantage of the aggravation of the international situation and the intensification of reactionary sentiments in the ruling circles of the capitalist countries, tried by all means to justify the defendants. American lawyers, who were considered assistants to the Japanese, but actually led them, were very active. Immediately after the filing of the indictment, the defense petitioned for its annulment, and when the tribunal rejected this application, the defense requested that the counts of the indictment be annulled or that certain defendants be excluded from the indictment.

In an effort to discredit the tasks facing the tribunal, the defense throughout the process questioned the jurisdiction of the tribunal. In the opening speech of the defense, Japanese lawyer I. Kiose stated that “neither in 1928 nor after that there were such principles of international law that imposed personal responsibility for political actions on persons acting on behalf of the state exercising its rights to sovereignty” . In a speech by the Japanese lawyer K. Takayanagi, an attempt was made to challenge the competence of the tribunal to try Japanese war criminals on the grounds that the tribunal consists of representatives of the victorious powers. The Tribunal rejected this part of the speech.

Subsequently, wanting to save his defendants from punishment for crimes committed, in many respects similar to those of Hitler, the same Takayanagi, explaining the motives for the crimes committed by German and Japanese military personnel, cynically stated: “This type of action can only be a reflection of national or racial characteristics. Crimes, no less than the greatest works of art, can express the characteristic features that reflect the mores of the race ... ”According to the lawyer, the defendants embodied the characteristic features of the“ Yamato race ”and the“ Nordic race ”, which could not compromise them. Rather, on the contrary, protection came from the special high properties of these races, which placed them "beyond good and evil."

The defense did not stop at the grossest distortions of reality. In particular, the already mentioned Kiose stated that the prosecution misunderstood the term “new order in East Asia”, which, it turns out, meant “respect for the independence of each country, it never included the ideas of conquering the world and had nothing to do with restricting individual freedom. ". The defender denied both the aggressiveness of Japan's foreign policy and its responsibility for the outbreak of hostilities in July 1937, shamelessly asserting that China was guilty of unleashing hostilities, while Japan, on the contrary, adhered to a peaceful policy.

In an attempt to play on anti-communist sentiment, many lawyers argued that Japan did not wage the war for aggressive purposes, but for the sake of protecting against communism, and "the Japanese were rightfully afraid of the spread of communism, whose penetration into Asia led to a violation of peace and order." The criminal acts of the Japanese militarists in China were also explained by "reasonable and justified fear of the spread of world communism." Even the pact concluded by Germany, Japan and Italy was called not aggressive, but defensive and directed against the spread of communism in Europe and Asia. The speeches of some lawyers were frankly defiant. Defender O. Cunningham, whose documents were not accepted due to their unreliability, accused the tribunal of "unwilling to adhere to ... the current US political line."

Advocates A. Lazarus, B. Blackney and others denied the anti-Soviet orientation of Japan's foreign policy. They called Japan's aggression near Lake Khasan and on the Khalkhin Gol River ordinary border incidents, and they called the detailed plans for an attack on the USSR, as well as aggressive actions in Manchuria, Korea and the Pacific Ocean, defensive. Representing black as white, the defense tried to portray Japan's aggressive course as "peaceful" and "fair", and through the efforts of lawyers Tojo, Kido and Shigemitsu were elevated to the rank of "fighters for peace".

Witnesses for the defense were repeatedly convicted of lying, which was even recorded in the verdict of the tribunal. They "gave long-winded ambiguous and evasive answers that only aroused distrust." Many of the defense's speeches "failed to achieve their purpose, because the argument was based on the testimony of witnesses, whom the tribunal did not consider worthy of credibility, since they were not sincere."

Lawyers for Japanese war criminals deliberately dragged out the Tokyo Trial with discussions of irrelevant issues, the reading out of lengthy documents, and repeated requests for adjournments. Almost every evidence of the accusation aroused unfounded objections. The following figures testify to the bad faith of the defense. Of the 2,316 documents submitted by her, the Tribunal did not accept 714, or 30 per cent, while of the 2,810 documents submitted by the prosecution, 76, or less than 3 per cent, were rejected. The protection phase lasted over ten and a half months.

In the closing speech, the prosecution summed up the two-year proceedings and criticized the position of the defense. Chief Prosecutor Keenan, refuting one of the main arguments of the defendants, that their aggressive actions were dictated by self-defence, said: “We agree that the right to self-defense under international law is reserved for every state equally, as every citizen enjoys this right under domestic law. law. However, in this case, we believe that it has been clearly proven that the Japanese invasion of China... political domination, economic exploitation, and massive atrocities all constitute aggression of the most sinister nature... These defendants can no longer successfully justify their actions in military operations launched on December 8, 1941 in the Pacific against the Western powers. In the same way, the evidence shows that the ruling clique of Japan pursued an aggressive policy against the USSR, committed acts of aggression and for a number of years prepared an aggressive war on a large scale against the Soviet Union.

In a response speech, the defense again discussed general legal issues, trying to prove the impunity of waging an aggressive war, the inadmissibility of ex post facto liability, and the incompetence of the tribunal. The lawyers for the defendants again resorted to undignified methods, reading previously rejected documents, indulging themselves in offensive attacks against the states represented in the tribunal, and propagating the criminal views of the defendants.

On November 4, 1948, the tribunal began pronouncing the verdict, the reading of which continued until November 12. The verdict once again confirmed the competence of the tribunal to try the main Japanese criminals. One of the arguments of the defense was rejected that, having agreed to accept the act of surrender, the Japanese government allegedly did not understand the inevitability of bringing to justice those responsible for unleashing the war, and therefore they cannot be tried.

The Tribunal considered it established that “the Japanese government, before signing the instrument of surrender, considered the matter and that the members of the government who advised accepting the terms of surrender foresaw that those who were held responsible for the war would be put on trial. As early as August 10, 1945, three weeks before the signing of the act of surrender, the emperor told the defendant Kido: “I cannot bear the thought ... that those responsible for the war will be punished ... but I believe that now the time has come when the unbearable will have to be endured.”

The verdict recognized that throughout the entire period under review, Japan's foreign and domestic policy was aimed at preparing and unleashing aggressive wars. From year to year, in all spheres of society, the role of the military increased, the cult of cruelty was planted. The country was intensively preparing for war. Having entered into a military-political alliance with the fascist countries, Japan hatched plans to seize East and Southeast Asia, the countries of the Pacific basin, as well as the territories of the Soviet Union - Siberia and Primorye.

Japan's actions in China, falsely called "incidents," are a war of aggression that began on September 18, 1931, and ended with the surrender of Japan. The first stage of the war, which was preceded by a powerful propaganda campaign under the slogan "Manchuria is Japan's lifeline," began with the invasion of Manchuria and the province of Rehe. The verdict noted that this was a planned attack prepared by officers of the General Staff and the Kwantung Army.

Mapchukuo was established by the Kwantung Army and its economy was under Japanese control. Manchuria was assigned the role of a workshop for the production of military materials. “Japan,” according to the defendant Hoshino, “took from Manchuria everything that could be taken.”

The verdict recognized as proven the fact that Japan was waging a war of aggression against the United States, the British Commonwealth of Nations, the Netherlands and France. The untenability of the thesis of self-defence and the assertion that Japan is in a hopeless situation in connection with the restriction of trade was once again emphasized. The measures taken by some of the Western Powers to restrict Japanese trade were a fully justified policy to induce Japan to abandon the aggressive course which she had long followed and which she was determined to follow.

A special place in Japan's military plans was occupied by aggression against the Soviet Union with the aim of seizing its territory in the Far East. It was one of the main elements of Japanese national policy. In this light, the capture of Manchuria was regarded not simply as a stage in the conquest of China, but as a means of providing a springboard for offensive military operations against the USSR. Plans of the Japanese General Staff for 1939 and 1941 provided for the concentration of large forces in Eastern Manchuria to capture the cities of Voroshilov, Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, Blagoveshchensk, Kuibyshevka, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Nikolaevsk-on-Amur, Komsomolsk-on-Amur, Sovetskaya Gavan and the northern part of Sakhalin Island.

The verdict noted the insincerity shown by Japan in concluding a neutrality pact with the USSR, disguised as which, she hoped to facilitate the implementation of the attack.

The pact also served as a cover for helping Germany. By deploying a large group of troops in Manchuria, Japan pinned down significant forces of the Soviet Army in the east, while heavy fighting was fought in the west. She supplied Germany with information about the military potential of the Soviet Union, obstructed Soviet shipping, delayed ships without any reason, and in some cases sank them.

All the defendants, with the exception of Matsui, were found guilty of crimes against peace, that is, of conspiring to establish military, maritime, political and economic dominion "over East Asia, the Pacific and Indian Oceans and all the countries and islands located therein. or bordering on them...”, by unleashing aggressive wars. Each defendant, depending on participation, was found guilty of unleashing a war against a particular state.

The verdict mentions numerous cases of crimes committed by the Japanese military against humanity, violation of elementary laws and customs of war. Massacres, "death marches" where prisoners of war, including the sick, were forced to walk long distances in conditions that even well-trained troops could not endure, forced labor in the tropical heat without protection from the sun, a complete lack of shelter and medicine, leading to thousands deaths from disease, beatings and torture of all kinds in order to extract information or confessions, and even cannibalism - all these are only a part of the atrocities, evidence of which was presented to the tribunal.

These actions of the most cruel and inhuman nature were practiced in the Japanese army and clearly testified to this moral character. The Japanese were especially cruel to the Chinese prisoners. For a long time, the tribunal has received evidence of atrocities committed in the same pattern on all fronts. There was no doubt that they were of an organized nature and were carried out according to orders from above. The captured diaries of Japanese soldiers also confirmed the existence of such orders.

Almost half of the accused: Doihara, Itagaki, Kimura, Koiso, Matsui, Muto, Shigemitsu, Tojo, Hata, Hirota were charged with counts of inhumane treatment of prisoners of war and civilian internees.

However, the verdict was not free from some contradictions and inaccuracies. Citing facts that testified to the existence of close military-political ties between Germany and Japan, the verdict considered the existence of a common conspiracy of Japan and Germany against peace to be unproven. While acknowledging the military as the main culprits of the war, the verdict clearly underestimated the importance of government officials and did not at all show the sinister role of monopolies. In other words, there was no deep analysis of the causes that led to the war. But this does not detract from the enormous historical significance of the verdict.

The guilt of the defendants was so obvious and heavy that all attempts to justify them were unsuccessful. Fearing the justified wrath of the peoples, reactionary circles in the United States did not dare to come forward openly with the rehabilitation of the main Japanese war criminals. The verdict was handed down to 25 defendants. Matsuoka and Nagano died before his pronouncement. Okawa was declared insane.

The Tribunal sentenced Doihara, Itagaki, Kimura, Matsui, Tojo, Muto and Hirota to death by hanging, while the other defendants were sentenced to various prison terms. Summing up the results of the trial, the Izvestia newspaper wrote on November 28, 1948: “The merit of the tribunal is that, despite the numerous attempts of lawyers and other defenders of the main Japanese criminals, despite the tricks of even some members of the tribunal, it delivered a fair and severe verdict ... Throughout the trial, the main Japanese war criminals had many defenders who held prominent positions in the United States. It is possible that these defenders will make the last attempt to alleviate the fate of the convicts.”

And so it happened. On November 22, 1948, MacArthur confirmed the verdict. However, instead of carrying it out, he accepted appeals from the convicts Hirota and Doihara to send them to the US Supreme Court, and postponed the execution of all the convicts. Subsequently, Kido, Oka, Sato, Shimada and Togo also filed appeals. The US Supreme Court accepted them for consideration.

The behavior of MacArthur, who abused his powers, and the illegal intervention of the US Supreme Court aroused the indignation of the entire progressive public. Under pressure from world public opinion, the US government opposed the decision of the Supreme Court to hear the appeals of Japanese major war criminals. On December 23, 1948, the sentence was carried out.

The most important outcome of the Tokyo process was the recognition that aggression is the most serious international crime, and those responsible for its unleashing are subject to severe punishment. It is difficult to overestimate the special significance of this thesis, since it was fixed despite the changed foreign policy situation and the intensification of the Cold War, despite the fact that the conclusions of the Nuremberg Tribunal provoked a stormy protest from the entire reactionary camp and by the time the verdict was announced in Tokyo had already generated numerous literature that tried to discredit Nuremberg trial and undermine public confidence in it. Its flow increased after the publication of the verdict in Tokyo. The apologists of imperialism raise the most vicious and sharp objections precisely to the decisions of the courts on recognizing the preparation and waging of an aggressive war as a crime.

The Tokyo process declared and put into practice those legal principles that were included in modern international law and were subsequently approved by the UN as the establishment of international criminal law, providing for responsibility for crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The crimes of the Nazis during the Second World War are well known. We know much less about the crimes of their allies - the Japanese. Although they behaved in the occupied territories a little better than the Nazis, and in terms of robbery they could generally give a hundred points ahead.

The Japanese are lucky to some extent. It is, of course, the Americans dropped atomic bombs on them. But the Americans became sole proprietors in post-war Japan, the country was not divided into occupation zones, like Germany.

The owner of the island after the war was the commander-in-chief of the occupying forces, General Douglas MacArthur, a man of extremely conservative views, moreover, not without presidential ambitions. By his order, on January 19, 1946, the International Military Tribunal for the Far East was formed. According to the same order, arrests of those suspected of committing war crimes were carried out. A total of 29 people were detained - mostly members of the Cabinet of Ministers of General Hideki Tojo. Supreme Commander MacArthur was given extremely broad powers. He appointed the chairman, the chief prosecutor, the members of the tribunal from the representatives proposed by the states that signed the act of surrender, as well as India and the Philippines. He had the right to mitigate or somehow change the sentence, but not to increase the punishment. The official languages ​​of the process were only Japanese and English. The Americans sought to emphasize that they had priority in defeating Japan, and they took key positions in the Tokyo process.

Nevertheless, MacArthur made a bet on the constitutional monarchy and Emperor Hirohito, believing that only whitewashing the emperor could prevent Japan from slipping into communism. After all, China was already in front of his eyes, where the communists were winning the civil war. Better than a monarchy. After all, as MacArthur's employees assured, "experience shows that democracy can never take place in Japan."

But there was one problem. In 1945, the US Congress voted unanimously to bring Hirohito to court-martial. In the minds of Americans, the emperor was no different from characters like Hitler or Mussolini. Polls showed that 70% of Americans demanded the death penalty for him.

The Emperor had to be whitewashed. Improve his image. But gradually. So that he doesn't get off the hook and think too much of himself. As a warning, MacArthur executed two Japanese generals in the Philippines. Combined, so to speak, the pleasant with the useful. On the one hand, the generals were close to the imperial family. Hirohito was reminded that he himself was not insured against anything. On the other hand, at the beginning of the war, these generals pretty much patted MacArthur, who led the defense of the Philippines. Now MacArthur has found a way to get even.

The rest of the war criminals were given to understand what they wanted from them - to protect Hirohito and blame everything on the "militarist clique". Say, the emperor could not do anything, knew nothing and always wanted peace.

* * *

Some people didn't get the hint. For example, Prince Konoe, who during the war several times came up with peace initiatives. This, of course, is commendable, but now the prince began to come up with other - more inappropriate - initiatives. He blamed Hirohito. The Americans, without thinking twice, put him on the list of war criminals. Without waiting for his arrest, Konoe committed suicide.

Others were more understanding. In general, I must say, the Japanese behaved very worthily. The Germans at the Nuremberg trials blamed each other, and all together - on Hitler. And the Japanese, even if he is a scoundrel and a war criminal, still remembers the samurai bushido code and honors his emperor.

Let's say the prime minister of the war years, General Tojo, wanted to shoot himself. But he shot himself unsuccessfully - not completely. Still, the Japanese should commit suicide with a sword, not a pistol. The general was cured to be put in the dock. The Minister of the Navy was sent to the hospital, who conveyed to Tojo the desire of the Americans: they say, take all the blame on yourself. “Everything will be done,” the general replied. “For this I continue to live, despite my shame.”

True, at the trial, Tojo made a mistake. "No Japanese subject," he said, "can act against the will of the emperor." How so? After all, he had to prove that the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor just against the will of the emperor.

At the next meeting, Tojo corrected himself: "The Emperor, though reluctantly, only expressed his agreement with the decision already taken." As planned, Tojo was recognized as a major war criminal and hanged.

Starting with Hirohito, the Americans decided to rehabilitate other members of the imperial family. In particular, the Emperor's uncle, Prince Asaka. In 1937, he perpetrated the massacre in Nanjing - an unprecedented brutal massacre of civilians in the then capital of China. According to some reports, the Japanese killed up to half a million people. Thousands of women were subjected to gang violence, men were killed with bladed weapons so as not to waste cartridges.

The commander of the Japanese units in this region, General Matsui, had nothing to do with the Nanjing massacre. He had a complication of tuberculosis, he did not get out of bed at all, although he managed to give the order "to ensure discipline in the city." However, Prince Asaka gave a different order: "We will teach our Chinese brothers a lesson so that they will never forget it."

At the trial, General Matsui, defending the emperor's uncle, took full responsibility. They hung him. And Prince Asaka, in honor and respect, lived to be 93 years old. Emperor Hirohito lived a little less - 87. The Japanese recognized him as "the man of the century."

In view of the fact that the Soviet Union had nothing to incriminate Japan, our country was looking for at least some reason to accuse. So, the accuser from the USSR A.N. Vasiliev made a special emphasis on the fact that “the main Japanese war criminals committed their crimes together with their accomplices from the Hitlerite clique and that imperialist Japan should share the responsibility of Nazi Germany for all the atrocities committed by it ...”.

On November 4, 1948, the tribunal proceeded to pronounce the verdict, the reading of which continued until November 12. The verdict once again confirmed the competence of the tribunal to try the main Japanese criminals. One of the arguments of the defense was rejected that, having agreed to accept the act of surrender, the Japanese government allegedly did not understand the inevitability of bringing to justice those responsible for unleashing the war, and therefore they cannot be tried.

Of course, during the process, no one mentioned the barbaric bombing of the peaceful Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with nuclear bombs. But this action after only a few years was recognized by the whole world as a truly inhuman act.

And democracy in Japan somehow took place. Mysterious country, what can I say.

There were 29 defendants at the Tokyo Trial. Yosuke Matsuoka (Foreign Minister) and Admiral Osami Nagano died during their trial of natural causes. Shumei Okawa (philosopher, ideologue of Japanese militarism) suffered a nervous breakdown during the trial and began to show signs of mental illness. He was excluded from the number of defendants. Fumimaro Konoe (Prime Minister of Japan in 1937-1939 and 1940-1941) committed suicide on the eve of his arrest by taking poison. Seven defendants were sentenced to death by hanging. They were hanged on December 23, 1948 in the courtyard of the Sugamo Prison in Tokyo. 16 defendants were sentenced to life imprisonment. Three (Koiso, Shiratori and Umezu) died in prison, the remaining 13 were pardoned in 1955. Shigenori Togo (Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister for Greater East Asia) was sentenced to 20 years in prison - he died in prison in 1949. Mamoru Shigemitsu, the ambassador to the USSR, was sentenced to 7 years in prison. In 1950, he was pardoned, he subsequently became Minister of Foreign Affairs again.

Gleb Stashkov

Trial of major Japanese war criminals who committed crimes against the peace, humanity, laws and customs of war. The International Military Tribunal for the trial of the main Japanese war criminals met in Tokyo from ... ... Law Dictionary

Tokyo process- (Tokyo trials), the trial of Jap. military criminals after World War II. In May 1946, Nov. 1948 27 higher Japanese leaders appeared before the international. tribunal on charges of decomp. crimes ranging from murders and atrocities to accountability… … The World History

TOKYO PROCESS Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

TOKYO PROCESS- TOKYO PROCESS, the trial of major Japanese war criminals, took place in Tokyo on 3.5. 1946 11/12/1948 at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. Expansionist plans and aggressive ones were exposed at the Tokyo process ... ... Russian history

Tokyo process- the trial of the main Japanese war criminals, which took place in Tokyo on May 3, 1946, on November 12, 1948 at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. Expansionist designs, aggressive aspirations were exposed at the Tokyo trials ... ... Political science. Vocabulary.

Tokyo process- the trial of the main Japanese war criminals, which took place in Tokyo from May 3, 1946 to November 12, 1948 at the International Military Tribunal (See International Military Tribunal) for the Far East. The demand for a trial of ... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Tokyo process- the trial of the main Japanese war criminals, which took place in Tokyo on May 3, 1946 November 12, 1948 at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. Expansionist designs and aggressive aspirations were exposed at the Tokyo Trials... encyclopedic Dictionary

TOKYO PROCESS- the trial of the main Japanese war criminals who committed crimes against peace, humanity, against the laws and customs of war. The International Military Tribunal for the trial of the main Japanese war criminals met in ... ... Encyclopedic Dictionary of Economics and Law

TOKYO PROCESS- - an international trial that took place from May 3, 1946 to November 12, 1948 in Tokyo in the case of the crimes of former Japanese prime ministers Tojo, Hira numa, Hirota and Koiso, foreign ministers Matsuoka, Shagemyatsu, military ... ... Soviet legal dictionary

TOKYO PROCESS- The trial of the main Japanese. military criminals, held in Tokyo from May 3, 1946 to November 12, 1948 in the International. military tribunal for the Far East (established on January 19, 1946 on the basis of an agreement between the rights of the USSR, USA, Great Britain, China, ... ... Soviet historical encyclopedia

Books

• Russia and Japan: a sword on the scales. Unknown and Forgotten Pages of Russian-Japanese Relations (1929-1948), Vasily Molodyakov. Russian-Japanese relations in the thirties and forties of the last century are usually depicted as a continuous nightmare, the leitmotif of which is a song about insidious samurai crossing the border near the river under ...

On which the criminals who took possession of Germany and turned it into a weapon for committing the most terrible crimes were tried. This trial was the first, since before that there were no cases in legal practice of trial of political figures who committed military aggression against other countries. It was the Nuremberg Trials. A few months later, a similar trial of Japanese war criminals took place in Tokyo.

Nuremberg

The Nuremberg and Tokyo trials of war criminals were carried out not on ordinary participants in hostilities from among the rank and file or officers, but on the most loyal assistants of A. Hitler. They were judged for starting the most significant and large-scale war, thereby involving many countries in it.

The basis of the first process was the agreement concluded between the allied states. As a result, the International Military Tribunal was formed. His goal was to bring justice to the top Nazis.

The duration of the Nuremberg trials was almost a whole year. On September 30, 1946, the tribunal began announcing the verdict, which was completed only the next day. Almost all the defendants who fell under the tribunal were sentenced to the highest limit of punishment - death. Individuals are still lucky, they were sentenced to life imprisonment. Such associations such as the SS and SD, the Gestapo and the highest ranks of the Nazi Party of Germany were classified as criminal, and their members received severe punishment.

A total of 12 people were sentenced to death, including Rosenberg, Ribbentrop, Goering, Keitel, Kaltenbrunner and others.

Tokyo

The Tokyo War Crimes Trial, like the Nuremberg Trial, brought justice to World War II criminals, but in the capital of Japan. It began on May 3, 1946, and its duration was an order of magnitude longer than the tribunal in Germany. The Tokyo trial lasted more than two years and ended on November 12, 1948.

The International Military Tribunal for the Far East has sentenced to death seven of the biggest war criminals, including the Minister of War, the Prime Minister and the highest-ranking generals of the Land of the Rising Sun. For other criminals, the Tokyo Trial brought various prison terms, sixteen of which were life sentences.

Among the charges brought against the defendants were such as preparing for war, unleashing a war, participating in it, the destruction of civilians, prisoners, and many other serious criminal offenses.

Significance of the trials in Nuremberg and Tokyo

The Tokyo trial, like the Nuremberg trial, was of tremendous historical significance. Both tribunals recognized and established that the war of aggression that Nazi Germany had begun was of the worst kind.

In addition, education has become the source and basis for certain legal norms used in international law. The statutes of both tribunals themselves, as well as the sentences that they passed, were subsequently approved by the UN, and, consequently, the principles of these documents, in accordance with which punishment was carried out and the elements of serious crimes were established, became generally recognized norms in the field of international law.

Consequences of processes

It was thanks to the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials that such important ones as the General Perceptible Significance were subsequently prepared, they also had on various international pacts, including the Resolution on combating and conventions on the protection of cultural property in military clashes, as well as many other significant documents.

In 1968, the UN Convention was adopted, according to which the statute of limitations does not apply to war criminals. Such a document was needed in connection with the frequent inclinations to stop the persecution of individual Nazi criminals.

Conclusion

The international and historical significance of the trials that took place after the Second World War in the cities of Nuremberg and Tokyo can hardly be overestimated. During these trials, it was noted that they would go down in history. The material and information obtained as a result of their conduct will be so significant that later historians will turn to these results in order to find the truth. At the same time, the trials of the forties will become a kind of warning for politicians and leaders of all states of the world.