State crimes: Japanese military's forced recruitment of laborers

Editor's note: Zhou Yaxin, a special commentator on current affairs for CGTN, is an observer on international affairs. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

Shilu Iron Mine, located in Changjiang Li Autonomous County, Hainan Province, is known as Asia's premier high-grade iron ore deposit. Today, tourists would find it a scenic spot with lush greenery, clear rivers and steam trains. However, over 80 years ago, the land was brutally plundered by the Japanese army and stained with the blood and sweat of Chinese laborers.

Living hell for 'Hong Kong coolies'

During the war of aggression against China, with the aim of plundering Shilu Iron Mine’s resources, the Japanese army seized over 40,000 laborers from Shanghai, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Macao, Xiamen, and Hainan, among other places, through forced conscription, enticement and abduction. Among them were more than 20,000 "Hong Kong coolies" known for their origins from Hong Kong and Guangdong.

Suffering from starvation and with ragged clothing, each laborer was forced to work over 10 hours a day, sorting at least 8 tons of ore. The Japanese army showed utter disregard for their lives: slacking or attempting to escape would lead to brutal beating, live burial, burning, toxin injection or even public beheading. A survivor recalled dying coolies being thrown into fires, and those who tried to escape being dragged back. Over 30,000 laborers lost their lives due to extremely harsh conditions and torture. Records show that only about 100 people survived from a group of 484 Hong Kong coolies.

Shilu Iron Mine stands as proof of Japan's plunder of China's resources and enslavement of the Chinese people. It is also an example of the grave atrocities Japanese militarists inflicted on Asian peoples.

State-led systematic labor exploitation

To sustain its war machine so that "the war feeds itself," Japanese militarists launched a top-down, state-led systematic labor exploitation. Through deception, arrest, detention and forced conscription, it abducted a large number of young and middle-aged people, including students, workers, farmers and prisoners of war (POW), from China, the Korean Peninsula, Southeast Asia and other regions. They were sent either to Japan or occupied territories and forced into high-risk labor such as road construction, mining, land reclamation and military engineering under inhumane conditions.

Statistics show the Japanese army conscripted tens of millions of Chinese laborers, among whom 38,935 were sent to Japan following the outbreak of the Pacific War. During Japan's colonial rule over the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to 1945, millions of local residents became forced laborers, with some 780,000 sent overseas. Between 1942 and 1945, hundreds of thousands of Southeast Asian laborers and Allied POWs were conscripted to build the Burma and Sumatra railways.

The massive enslavement was a state crime with clear legal and institutional backing.

In China, Japan issued ordinances through the Manchukuo puppet regime and set up specialized agencies and local branches in occupied areas to enforce labor conscription via quota allocation and violence. After the Pacific War broke out, the Tojo Cabinet intensified plunder by establishing specialized bodies in North and East China.

On the Korean Peninsula, Japan issued the State General Mobilization Law and the National Conscription Order to gain full control over manpower, resources and funds of its colonies. The military was responsible for seizing and transporting laborers and the zaibatsu conglomerates recruiting them. Guidelines were also put in place to brutally suppress resistance.

In Southeast Asia, the Japanese army launched the kinro hoshi (unpaid labor service) campaign, under which ethnic Chinese aged between 14 and 40 in Malaya and the Philippines were forced into labor. A total of 4.1 million people, including natives, Dutch civilians and POWs in Indonesia, were conscripted.

Inhumane torture and massacres

Beyond long-time, intensive and excessive unpaid work, the laborers also suffered heinous torture and massacres by the Japanese army. Thai-Myanmar Railway: A Personal Memoir recorded some of those atrocities. A group of laborers was beaten over six missing during a headcount; a young man who resisted the humiliation of his father was shot dead on the spot.

At Datong Coal Mine in Shanxi, China, the Japanese army set up military and mine police, built bunkers, watchtowers and electrified barbed wire, and used barbaric means to suppress miners. On the Korean Peninsula, laborers were abused and killed for no reason. Those who tried to escape were dragged by a rope through the nose and executed. A Chinese folk ballad lamented, "Hell has eighteen levels, and beneath the very lowest lie the miners." Countless laborers died of exhaustion and torture; those who resisted were massacred and their remains wantonly discarded. Mass graves at the coal mines in Liaoyuan, Datong and Benxi are irrefutable evidence of Japan's war crimes.

Japan's evasion of responsibility condemned internationally

Shortly before the defeat in August 1945, the Japanese government secretly ordered the destruction of archives to cover up its crimes, laying the groundwork for historical denial and distortion. For decades, right-wing politicians have openly denied forced labor. In April 2021, the Japanese cabinet even decided it was "inappropriate" to use the term "forced conscription," and that textbooks should use "mobilization" instead.

The Japanese government also attempted to whitewash its past through the inscription of the Sites of Meiji Industrial Revolution on UNESCO's World Heritage List while covering up the fact regarding Korean forced laborers on Hashima Island and referring to the victims as those who "supported Japan's industrial development." Such moves have provoked strong international condemnation.

Surviving laborers and their families from China, the Republic of Korea and other countries have filed numerous lawsuits, demanding the Japanese government and corporations like Mitsui and Mitsubishi accept responsibility, apologize and provide compensation. Yet the Japanese government has consistently attempted to evade accountability. Only a handful of Japanese enterprises have reached settlements with victims.

Acknowledging history and repenting: The only path forward

This chapter of history, leaving a heinous stain on the moral conscience of humanity, shall not be distorted or erased. The forced recruitment of laborers, committed by Japanese militarists, is a crime against humanity. How can a country that refuses to recognize history and repent on its crimes call itself a "peace-loving nation," or be forgiven and trusted by the international community?

Remembering history is not to perpetuate hatred, but to draw lessons and forewarn the future. For Japan, only by squarely facing the past, engaging in deep soul-searching and fully redressing its war crimes can it walk out of the shadow, achieve genuine peace and reconciliation, and prevent the recurrence of such humanitarian disasters.

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