The Body: A Guide for Occupants

by Bill Bryson

In a typical experiment, Chinese prisoners were tied to stakes at staggered distances from a shrapnel bomb.24 The bomb was detonated and scientists then walked among them, carefully noting the nature and extent of the prisoners’ injuries and how long it took them to die. Other prisoners were shot with flame throwers for similar purposes, or starved, frozen or poisoned. Some, for unfathomable reasons, were dissected while still conscious.25 Most of the victims were captured Chinese soldiers, but Unit 731 also experimented on selected Allied prisoners of war to make sure that toxins and nerve agents had the same effects on Westerners as on Asians. When pregnant women or young children were needed for experiments, they were randomly snatched from the streets of Harbin.26 Nobody knows how many people died in Unit 731, but one estimate has put the number as high as 250,000.