Comfort Woman : a Filipina's Story of Prostitution and Slavery Under ...

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Introduction
Many so-called karayuki-san (women travelers) of poor family background
had previously been sent from Nagasaki to various places
throughout the Asia—Pacifi c region where Japanese expatriates
resided. It is clear from Okamura’s private records that, at this stage,
the army intended to use professional Japanese prostitutes.
Although the Japanese set up a number of comfort stations in
Shanghai and in northeast China in the early 1930s, it was not until
1937, shortly after Japan embarked on full-scale war with China, that
the Japanese Imperial Forces adopted the military brothel system as a
general policy. The sudden increase in the number of Japanese military
brothels in China was closely related to atrocities that Japanese soldiers
committed during the Nanjing Massacre. In 1937, Japanese troops
fought a fi erce battle in Shanghai (the Second Shanghai Incident),
which lasted three months. Following that battle, Japan’s Central
China Area Army, led by General Matsui Iwane, advanced in early
November 1937 toward Nanjing. Members of this army committed
crimes such as looting, massacre, arson, and rape at various places
along the Yangtze River on their way to Nanjing.
They continued on their spree after entering the city, an incident
that has become known as the Nanjing Massacre. The leaders of the
Central China Area Army quickly recognized the seriousness of the
problem of mass rape committed by their soldiers. Thus, on December
11 they instructed the commanders of each military contingent to set
up military brothels in order to prevent further rapes. 4 As
a result, from early 1938, comfort stations were set up at almost all
places where Japanese troops were stationed outside the home islands.
A large number of Korean and Chinese women were mobilized as
“comfort women.”
After the outbreak of the Pacifi c War in December 1941, the
“comfort woman” system was expanded to other war zones and to
occupied territories in the vast Asia Pacifi c region. According to one
document prepared by the Ministry of War in September 1942, 400
comfort stations were operating at the time—100 in north China,
140 in central China, 40 in south China, 100 in Southeast Asia, 10
in the southwest Pacifi c, and 10 in southern Sakhalin. 5