New allegations of wartime cannibalism in PNG

[wagyl]

I'm of conflicting viewpoints, as to whether the claims can be relied upon, and if true, whether anything is served by raising them, but also whether anything is served by continuing to suppress them... I also have doubts about the name Oagawa Waichi and whether this is an accurate record.

Commandos' horrific end kept secret

Two Australian soldiers, whose bodies were found in a dump, were likely victims of war crimes.

When officials found human remains in an old Japanese medical dump in Papua New Guinea this year, they may have done more than locate two missing World War II commandos.

Instead, they may have unlocked a Pandora's box involving continuing censorship and the failure to punish those involved in some of the worst war crimes perpetrated on Australian soldiers in the Pacific War.

...

Previously secret documents from Government archives reveal the two were subjected to a ghastly death at the hands of Japanese who were never brought to justice - facts kept from the dead men's families.

The two young soldiers were thought to have been horrifically dissected while still alive and their organs served up in a ritual dinner to Japanese soldiers or souvenired.

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[Coligny]

The two young soldiers were thought to have been horrifically dissected while still alive and their organs served up in a ritual dinner to Japanese soldiers or souvenired.

Written like the best tabloid weaselling...

[wagyl]

I agree that the particular claims highlighted by Coligny seem to be based more on the contemporary propaganda style reports of what the Yellow Peril would do to our plucky lads, and also as reported through the cultural storytelling style of the inhabitants of a region with a history of cannibalism. But then we have Unit 731... I really don't know what to think.

[Coligny]

Only if you put value (albeit negative one) on the article...

It's just a piece of garbage pseudo reporting, without any proof of disproof (aint that word not gunna exist, then be my bad) of potential act of cannibalism...

[Tsuru]

I don't know, I clearly remember reading about some other, smaller and more uninhabitable Pacific outposts of the great co-prosperity sphere where the supplies ran so low that the soldiers started cutting off bits of POWs to eat, the specimen in question kept alive for as long as possible to keep the meat fresh...

So there's that, I suppose.

[matsuki]

That local (and nutty Japanese) make me think there be some truth behind the cannibalism but the whole "ritual dinner" is pure bullshit.

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

I don't think there's any doubt about cannibalism having occurred among Imperial Japanese Army soldiers in New Guinea during World War II (it's extremely well-documented in Japanese and English) and not denied. I do, however, have serious doubts about it being ritualized. I suspect it was engaged in with great reluctance, sheer desperation and tremendous shame.

[Midwinter]

That local (and nutty Japanese) make me think there be some truth behind the cannibalism but the whole "ritual dinner" is pure bullshit.

Not too sure about that. This is the same culture that can take upwards of 30 minutes to pour a cup of green tea.

[Samurai_Jerk]

That local (and nutty Japanese) make me think there be some truth behind the cannibalism but the whole "ritual dinner" is pure bullshit.

Not too sure about that. This is the same culture that can take upwards of 30 minutes to pour a cup of green tea.

I'm not saying it's impossible it was ritualized but the motivation was starvation pure and simple.

[matsuki]

Japanese ritualizing weird shit is not hard to swallow (see what I did there?) but like SJ is saying, this wasn't a fetish thing in the comfort of civilization. It was festering and rotting away in the jungle.