Unit 731 Episode 1: Bacteria Factory

What happens when a Japanese army doctor becomes obsessed with biological warfare and builds one of the most secretive military operations of World War II?

In this episode of Torture: A Dark History, Kevin Young and Dan Hourigan travel to Imperial Japan and follow the rise of Shiro Ishii, the man who would become the driving force behind Unit 731.

We’ll follow Ishii from his early career in medicine to his work in occupied Manchuria, where he builds a massive secret facility at Pingfan under the innocent sounding name of the Epidemic Prevention and Water Supply Unit. Behind the walls, Unit 731 develops biological weapons and carries out attacks against Chinese communities during the Second Sino Japanese War.

We’ll look at the attacks on Ningbo, Changde, and during the Chekiang Campaign, as well as the horrifying consequences for the civilians caught in them.

But Unit 731 had an even darker secret.

Hidden inside Blocks 7 and 8 were the human experiments that would become some of the most infamous atrocities of World War II.

And that’s where we’ll leave things.

Because in Episode 2, we’re going inside.

And because this is Torture: A Dark History, Kevin and Dan bring their own dark and deeply uncomfortable humor to the story of Unit 731, Shiro Ishii, Imperial Japan, biological warfare, Japanese war crimes, Manchuria, and some of the darkest history of World War II.

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