Jap soldier's confession

Japan Times reports,

A former medic in the Imperial Japanese Navy says he carried out vivisection on about 30 prisoners, including women and children, in the Philippines during World War II.

It is the first time anyone in the wartime military has admitted that experiments were conducted on human beings in the Philippines, said Keiichi Tsuneishi, a professor of science history at Kanagawa University.

It's not that easy to come out in the open for serious and sensational matters such as this. His reason for telling the truth? His conscience could no longer take an act that he was forced to do at that time.

"The souls of those who died would not be soothed if the story remained buried," he said.

And it is not soothing either for the Filipinos of today to hear such horrible acts. This is something quite difficult to accept, no matter how true it is/was. I can't even quite imagine how the whole process of vivisection was done on alive people. Sorry, it makes me throw up.

Sometimes, some truths are better kept hidden. Truth hurts, and this particular confession hurts me deeply. If there is such thing as emotional vivisection, that exactly is what I feel right now.

To my Japanese friends out there, let me assure you that this news doesn't affect my views of Japanese society TODAY because today's generation is entirely different from before. Just let me vent on this though, coz I really feel sorry for the victims.

Given this testimony, what should we do then?

"We should not let this horrible thing happen again," Makino said. "I want to tell the truth about war to as many people as possible. If I'm given the opportunity, I'll continue to testify in atonement."

Yeah, that's right.