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You Don't Want to Know About the Girls? The ‘Comfort Women’, the Japanese Military and Allied Forces in the Asia-Pacific War
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 March 2025
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Angus McDougall, an Australian serviceman, was captured by the Japanese in the early stages of the Asia-Pacific War and sent to Changi prisoner of war camp. From there he, like over 40,000 others, was transported by rail to Banpong in Thailand on his way to work on the Thai-Burma Railway. The journey was gruelling. POWs were packed 28 or more to a truck in goods wagons. The trucks were far too small to carry such a number, the heat was intense, and food and water were scarce. Interviewed about his experiences many decades later, McDougall echoes other survivors in describing the journey as “hell”.
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References
Notes
1 Angus McDougall (Private, 2/20 Battalion and prisoner of the Japanese, 1941-1945), oral history interview, 18 July 1984, Australian War Memorial (hereafter AWM), S04083, reel 3.
2 McDougall 1984.
3 Frederick Alexander Arblaster (Australian NCO served as Japanese translator and interpreter in Australia, the Philippines, Indonesia and Japan, 1943-1947), oral history interview, 16 October 2003, Imperial War Museum (hereafter IWM), 25574, reel 6.
4 Norah Newbury Inge (British civilian missionary with Japanese civilian internees in Singapore and India, 1941-1946), oral history interview, 5 November 1984, IWM, 8636, reel 3; the story of Deoli, almost unknown in Britain, is an important and disturbing one. As Inge recounts, some twenty Japanese civilian detainees were killed by guards during a riot following Japan's surrender. Inge is highly critical of the camp commander for his handling of the crisis and for its disastrous outcome. It is unclear whether any of the former comfort women were involved in these events.
5 Hank Nelson, “The New Guinea Comfort Women, Japan and the Australian Connection: out of the Shadows”, The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 22 May 2007.
6 Yoshiaki Yoshimi (trans. Susan O'Brien), Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery in the Japanese Military During World War II, New York, Columbia University Press, 2000; Yoshiaki Yoshimi, “Government must admit ‘comfort women’ system was sexual slavery”, Asahi Shimbun / Asia and Japan Watch, 20 September 2013.
7 Taiwan Gun Shireikan, “Nampō Haken Tokōsha ni kansuru ken”, in 12 March 1942, in Josei no tame no Ajia Heiwa Kokumin Kikin ed., “Jūgun Ianfu” Kankei Shiryō Shūsei, vol. 2, Tokyo, Ryūsei Shosha, pp. 203-204
8 For example, ruling in the case of the former Busan (Korea) comfort women and forced labourers, Shimonoseki Branch of the Yamaguchi District Court, 27 April 1998 http://www.gwu.edu/~memory/data/judicial/comfortwomenjapan/pusan.html accessed 15 November 2014 (note that this ruling was overturned, but on issues related to right of the plaintiffs to sue the Japanese government, not on the facts of the case).
9 Harry Roque, “The Ongoing Search for Justice for Victims of the Japanese War Crimes in Mapanique, Philippines”, Oxford Human Rights Hub, 31 August 2013; Decision of the Republic of the Philippines Supreme Court, 28 April 2010.
10 Bart van Poelgeest, Gedwongen Prostitutie van Nederlandse Vrouwen in Voormalig Nederlands-Indië, report to the Second Chamber of the States General, 24 October 1994, p. 16, accessed 10 July 2014.
11 Yoshimi, Comfort Women; Yuki Tanaka, Japan's Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery and Prostitution during World War II and the US Occupation, London, Routledge, 2002; C. Sarah Soh, The Comfort Women: Sexual Violence and Postcolonial Memory in Korea and Japan, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2008; Nelson, “The New Guinea Comfort Women”.
12 Mary Louise Roberts, What Soldiers Do: Sex and the American GI in World War II France, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2013, p. 11.
13 Inge 1984
14 Leslie Theodore Lyall (British civilian missionary in China, 1929-1944), oral history interview 1986, IWM 9242, reel 3.
15 Eleanor May Clark (Burmese civilian during Japanese occupation of Burma, 1942-1945), oral history interview, 16 May 1995, IWM, 16671, reel 3.
16 AWM photographic collection, item 120083 (photographer K. B. Davis).
17 Francis McGuire (British NCO served with Malaya Command Signals in Singapore, Malaya, 1942; POW in Changi POW Camp, Singapore, Malaya, on Burma-Thailand Railway and Ube POW Camp, Japan, 1942-1945), oral history interview, 1 November 1982, IWM, 6374, reel 2.
18 Geoffrey Pharaoh Adams (British officer with Royal Army Service Corps in Singapore, Malaya, 1941-1942; POW in Changi and Sime Road POW Camps, on the Burma-Thailand Railway, in Fukuoka 17 POW Camp, Omuta, Japan and Hoten POW Camp, Manchuria, 1942-1945), oral history interview 1 March 1982, IWM, 6042, reel 6.
19 John Allan Legh Barratt, His Majesty's Service, 1939-1945, Manningtree, Status, 1983, p. 22.
20 Thomas Robert John Coles (British airman, served with RAF off Singapore and in Java, 1942; POW in Java, the Moluccas and the Celebes, Dutch East Indies, 1942-1945), oral history interview, 21 May 1996, IWM, 16660, reel 2.
21 For example, the British based Abolition Project defines a “slave” as “a human being classed as property and who is forced to work for nothing”.
22 Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery, the Slave Trade, and Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery, Adopted by a Conference of Plenipotentiaries convened by Economic and Social Council resolution 608(XXI) of 30 April 1956, and done at Geneva on 7 September 1956; Entry into force: 30 April 1957.
23 This testimony is summarised in two documents: Amenities in the Japanese Armed Forces, research report no. 120, produced by the Allied Interpreter and Translator Section, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, in Josei no tame no Ajia Heiwa Kokumin Kikin ed., “Jūgun Ianfu” Kankei Shiryō Shūsei, vol. 5, Tokyo, Ryūsei Shosha, pp. 151-153; and United States Office of War Information, Psychological Warfare Team Attached to US Army Forces India Burma Theatre, “Japanese Prisoner of War Interrogation Report No. 49”, APO 689, in “Jūgun Ianfu” Kankei Shiryō Shūsei, vol. 5, p. 203-209.
24 A widely circulated paper by former banker and passionate historical nationalist Ogata Yoshiaki, for example, cites “Japanese Prisoner of War Interrogation Report No. 49” as proving that “ the monthly take of the [comfort] women was approximately 1,500 yen, and they kept between 40 to 50 percent of this. In other words, their ‘take home’ income was an extremely high wage of 750 yen per month”; see Ogata Yoshiaki, “The Truth about the Question of ‘Comfort Women’”, p. 2. This statement, much guoted as demonstrating that “comfort women” were merely “well-paid prostitutes”, reflects a very inattentive reading of the Kitamura interrogation material. Interrogation Report No. 49 does include a statement that “in an average month a girl would gross about fifteen hundred yen. She turned over seven hundred and fifty to the ‘master’” (p. 205, emphasis added). But cross-referencing this with the more detailed Amenities in the Japanese Forces, it soon becomes clear that this is a mistake. The sentence should read (as it does in the latter document): “the maximum gross takings of a girl were around 1500 yen per month, and the minimum around 300 yen per month” (p. 152, emphasis added). Because Amenities in the Japanese Forces provides details of the numbers of soldiers who visited the brothel and the amount they paid, it is easy to calculate likely average earnings. On the basis of this information, it is clear it would have been extraordinarily difficult for any one person to make gross earnings of 1500 yen in a month, and that the average was actually close to the 300 yen “minimum”.
25 Amenities in the Japanese Armed Forces, p. 151.
26 “Japanese Prisoner of War Interrogation Report No. 49”, p. 203.
27 Calculated from Amenities in the Japanese Armed Forces, p.152.
28 Amenities in the Japanese Armed Forces, p.152.
29 Amenities in the Japanese Armed Forces, p.152.
30 South-East Asia Translation and Interrogation Center, Psychological Warfare Bulletin no. 182, 1945, in Josei no tame no Ajia Heiwa Kokumin Kikin ed., “Jūgun Ianfu” Kankei Shiryō Shūsei, vol. 5, Tokyo, Ryūsei Shosha, (http://www.awf.or.jp/pdf/0051_5.pdf), p. 38.
31 William “Tug” Wilson (British NCO, served with 16th Assault Regt, Royal Artillery in India and Burma, 1941-1945), oral history interview, 14 February 2000, IWM, 20125, reel 4.
32 Ian Britain ed., The Donald Friend Diaries: Chronicles and Confessions of an Australian Artist, Melbourne, Text Publishing, 2010, p. 146.
33 AWM art collection, item ART23229..
34 Arthur Francis Freer (British trooper and NCO, served with 3rd Carabiniers in India and Burma, 1943-1945), oral history interview, 24 September 1999, IWM, 19822, reel 6.
35 Anon (British officer served with 7th Bn, 10th Baluch Regt in India and Burma, 1941-1946), oral history interview, 1999, Imperial War Museum, 19807, reel 11.
36 David Smiley, Irregular Regular, Wilby, Michael Russell Publishing Ltd., 1994, p. 167.
37 South East Asia Command Film Unit, “Japanese Prisoners of War at Penwegon, 30 July 1945, (cameraman: J. Abbott), IWM, JFU 284; and South East Asia Command Film Unit, ”Japanese Prisoners of War at Penwegon, 30 July 1945, (cameraman: J. A. Hewit), IWM, JFU 285.
38 George Mailer-Howat, “Extract from George Mailer-Howat's Memoirs (1942-45)”, n.d., unpublished, IWM, Documents.22637, p. 15.
39 See Joe Royle (British NCO, served as cameraman with No 9 Army Film and Photographic Unit in Far East, 1945-1947), oral history interview, 17 July 1999, IWM, 19654, reel 3.
40 “Evacuation Japanese civilians, Manila”, 13 October 1945, (cameraman: Roy Driver), AWM F01352.
41 Francis Stanley Terry (cook; minesweeper HMAS Mercedes and corvette HMAS Warrnambool; Australian western approaches and northern and eastern waters; 1941-1946), oral history interview, 27 July 1995, AWM, S01794.
42 Jack Israel Caplan (British signalman served with Royal Corps of Signals in Singapore, Malaya, 1942; POW in Changi POW Camp, Singapore, Malaya, on Burma-Thailand Railway and Saigon POW Camp, French Indo-China, 1942-1945), oral history interview 11 May 1981, IWM, 4884, reel 5.
43 Arthur Hudson (British air photographer, served as armourer with 605 Sqdn, RAF in GB and Dutch East Indies, 1939-1942; POW in Java and Sumatra, Dutch East Indies and in Japan, 1942-1945), oral history interview, 16 March 1994, IWM, 13923, reel 4.
44 Yuki Tanaka, Japan's Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery and Prostitution during World War II and the US Occupation, London, Routledge, 2002, p. 86.
45 Katherine Moon, Sex among Allies: Military Prositution in US-Korea Relations, New York, Columbia University Press, 1997.
46 Smiley, Irregular Regular, pp. 160-161.
47 William John Hiscox (British driver served with 170th Independent Mortar Battery, Royal Artillery and 120th Light Anti-Aircraft Battery, Royal Artillery in Korea, 1951-1952), oral history interview, 29 April 2006, IWM, 28764, reel 6.
48 Harold Neil Desmond Pullen, (British civilian officer, served with 1 Bn Royal Norfolk Regt in Korea, 1951-1952), oral history interview, 7 May 1998, IWM, 18018, reel 4.
49 Tanaka, Japan's Comfort Women; Moon, Sex Among Allies.
50 Gordon Douglas Turner (British civilian pacifist in GB, 1938-1944; served with Friends Ambulance Unit in China, 1944-1947), oral history interview, 24 June 1984, IWM, 9338, reel 11.
51 Anthony Curwen, (British civilian conscientious objector served with Friends Ambulance Unit in GB, Syria and China, 1943-1951; aid worker in China, 1951-1954), oral history interview, 18 May 1987, IWM, 9810, reel 7.
52 Hyūga Nichinichi Shinbun, 4 August 1954
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