Comfort women were women and girls forced into a prostitution corps created by the Empire of Japan during

World War II.

The name "comfort women" is a translation of a Japanese name ianfu (). Ianfu is a euphemism for shfu () whose
meaning is "prostitute(s)".
Estimates vCary as to how many women were involved, with numbers ranging from as low as 20,000 from some Japanese
scholars to as high as 410,000 from some Chinese scholars, but the exact numbers are still being researched and debated.
Many of the women were from Korea, China, and the Philippines, although women
from Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Taiwan, Indonesia and other Japanese-occupied territories were used for military
"comfort stations". Stations were located in Japan, China, the Philippines, Indonesia, then Malaya, Thailand, Burma, New
Guinea,Hong Kong, Macau, and French Indochina.
According to testimony, young women from countries under Japanese Imperial control were abducted from their homes. In
many cases, women were also lured with promises of work in factories or restaurants. Once recruited, the women were
incarcerated in "comfort stations" in foreign lands.

Establishment of the Comfort Women System

Chinese and Malayan girls forcibly taken from Penang by the Japanese to work as 'comfort girls' for the troops

Studio portrait of Jan Ruff O'Herne, taken shortly before she, her mother and sisters, as well as thousands of other Dutch women and children were
interned by the Japanese Imperial Army in Ambarawa. Over the following months, O'Herne, along with six other Dutch women, were repeatedly
raped, day and night, by Japanese military personnel

Japanese military prostitution

Military correspondence of the Japanese Imperial Army shows that the aim of facilitating comfort stations was the prevention of
rape crimes committed by Japanese army personnel and thus preventing the rise of hostility among people in occupied areas.

Given the well-organized and open nature of prostitution in Japan, it was seen as logical that there should be organized
prostitution to serve the Japanese Armed Forces. The Japanese Army established the comfort stations to prevent venereal
diseases and rape by Japanese soldiers, to provide comfort to soldiers and head off espionage. The comfort stations were not
actual solutions to the first two problems, however. According to Japanese historian Yoshiaki Yoshimi, they aggravated the
problems. Yoshimi has asserted, "The Japanese Imperial Army feared most that the simmering discontentment of the soldiers
could explode into a riot and revolt. That is why it provided women."

Outline
The first "comfort station" was established in the Japanese concession in Shanghai in 1932. Earlier comfort women were
Japanese prostitutes who volunteered for such service. However, as Japan continued military expansion, the military found
itself short of Japanese volunteers, and turned to the local population to coerce women into serving in these stations. Many
women responded to calls for work as factory workers or nurses, and did not know that they were being pressed into sexual
slavery.
In the early stages of the war, Japanese authorities recruited prostitutes through conventional means. In urban areas,
conventional advertising through middlemen was used alongside kidnapping. Middlemen advertised in newspapers circulating
in Japan and the Japanese colonies of Korea, Taiwan,Manchukuo, and China. These sources soon dried up, especially from
Japan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs resisted further issuance of travel visas for Japanese prostitutes, feeling it tarnished the
image of the Japanese Empire. The military turned to acquiring comfort women outside mainland Japan, especially from Korea
and occupied China. Many women were tricked or defrauded into joining the military brothels.
The situation became worse as the war progressed. Under the strain of the war effort, the military became unable to provide
enough supplies to Japanese units; in response, the units made up the difference by demanding or looting supplies from the
locals. Along the front lines, especially in the countryside where middlemen were rare, the military often directly demanded that
local leaders procure women for the brothels. When the locals, especially Chinese, were considered hostile, Japanese soldiers
carried out the "Three Alls Policy", which included indiscriminately kidnapping and raping local civilians.
The United States Office of War Information report of interviews with 20 comfort women in Burma found that the girls were
induced by the offer of plenty of money, an opportunity to pay off family debts, easy work, and the prospect of a new life in a
new land, Singapore. On the basis of these false representations many girls enlisted for overseas duty and were rewarded with
an advance of a few hundred yen.

Late archives inquiries and trials

On April 17, 2007 Yoshiaki Yoshimi and Hirofumi Hayashi announced the discovery, in the archives of the Tokyo Trials, of seven
official documents suggesting that Imperial military forces, such as the Tokkeitai (Naval military police), forced women whose
fathers attacked the Kenpeitai (Army military police), to work in front line brothels in China, Indochina and Indonesia. These
documents were initially made public at the war crimes trial. In one of these, a lieutenant is quoted as confessing to having
organized a brothel and having used it himself. Another source refers to Tokkeitai members having arrested women on the
streets, and after enforced medical examinations, putting them in brothels.
On 12 May 2007 journalist Taichiro Kajimura announced the discovery of 30 Dutch government documents submitted to
the Tokyo tribunal as evidence of a forced mass prostitution incident in 1944 in Magelang.
The South Korean government designated Bae Jeong-ja as a pro-Japan collaborator (chinilpa) in September 2007 for
recruiting comfort women.

Number of comfort women

Lack of official documentation has made estimates of the total number of comfort women difficult, as vast amounts of material
pertaining to matters related to war crimes and the war responsibility of the nation's highest leaders were destroyed on the
orders of the Japanese government at the end of the war. Historians have arrived at various estimates by looking at surviving
documentation which indicate the ratio of the number of soldiers in a particular area to the number of women, as well as
looking at replacement rates of the women. Historian Yoshiaki Yoshimi, who conducted the first academic study on the topic
which brought the issue out into the open, estimated the number to be between 50,000 and 200,000.

Based on these estimates, most international media sources quote about 200,000 young women were recruited or kidnapped
by soldiers to serve in Japanese military brothels. The BBC quotes "200,000 to 300,000" and the International Commission of
Jurists quotes "estimates of historians of 100,000 to 200,000 women."

Country of origin
According to State University of New York at Buffalo professor Yoshiko Nozaki and other sources, the majority of the women
were from Korea and China. Chuo University professor Yoshiaki Yoshimi states there were about 2,000 centers where as many
as 200,000 Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Filipino, Taiwanese, Burmese, Indonesian, Dutch and Australian women were
interned. Ikuhiko Hata, a professor of Nihon University, estimated the number of women working in the licensed pleasure
quarter was fewer than 20,000 and that they were 40% Japanese, 20% Koreans, 10% Chinese, with others making up the
remaining 30%. According to Hata, the total number of government-regulated prostitutes in Japan was only 170,000 during
World War II. Others came from the Philippines, Taiwan, Dutch East Indies, and other Japanese-occupied countries and
regions. Some Dutch women, captured in Dutch colonies in Asia, were also forced into sexual slavery.
In further analysis of the Imperial Army medical records for venereal disease treatment from 1940, Yoshimi concluded that if the
percentages of women treated reflected the general makeup of the total comfort women population, Korean women comprised
51.8 percent, Chinese 36 percent and Japanese 12.2 percent.
A Dutch government study described how the Japanese military itself recruited women by force in the Dutch East Indies. It
concluded that among the 200 to 300 European women working in the Japanese military brothels, some 65 were forced into
prostitution. Others, faced with starvation in the refugee camps, agreed to offers of food and payment for work, the nature of
which was not completely revealed to them. To date, only one Japanese woman has published her testimony. This was done in
1971, when a former "comfort woman" forced to work for showa soldiers in Taiwan, published her memoirs under the
pseudonym of Suzuko Shirota.

Treatment of comfort women

Approximately three quarters of comfort women died, and most survivors were left infertile due to sexual trauma or sexually
transmitted disease. According to Japanese soldier Yasuji Kaneko. "The women cried out, but it didn't matter to us whether the
women lived or died. We were the emperor's soldiers. Whether in military brothels or in the villages, we raped without
reluctance." Beatings and physical torture were said to be common. Revisionist Japanese historian Ikuhiko Hata claims
Kaneko's testimony is false since he testified about the 1937 Nanjing Massacre but he was not in the Army until 1940.
Ten Dutch women were taken by force from prison camps in Java by officers of the Japanese Imperial Army to become forced
sex slaves in February 1944. They were systematically beaten and raped day and night in a so-called "Comfort Station". As a
victim of the incident, in 1990, Jan Ruff-O'Herne testified to a U.S. House of Representatives committee:
"Many stories have been told about the horrors, brutalities, suffering and starvation of Dutch women in Japanese
prison camps. But one story was never told, the most shameful story of the worst human rights abuse committed by
the Japanese during World War II: The story of the Comfort Women, the jugun ianfu, and how these women were
forcibly seized against their will, to provide sexual services for the Japanese Imperial Army. In the so-called Comfort
Station I was systematically beaten and raped day and night. Even the Japanese doctor raped me each time he
visited the brothel to examine us for venereal disease."
In their first morning at the brothel, photographs of Jan Ruff-O'Herne and the others were taken and placed on the veranda
which was used as a reception area for the Japanese personnel who would choose from these photographs. Over the
following four months the girls were raped and beaten day and night, with those who became pregnant forced to have
abortions. After four harrowing months, the girls were moved to a camp at Bogor, in West Java, where they were reunited
with their families. This camp was exclusively for women who had been put into military brothels, and the Japanese
warned the inmates that if anyone told what had happened to them, they and their family members would be killed. Several
months later the O'Hernes were transferred to a camp at Batavia, which was liberated on 15 August 1945.
The Japanese officers involved received some punishment by Japanese authorities at the end of the war. After the end of
the war, 11 Japanese officers were found guilty with one soldier being sentenced to death by the Batavia War Criminal
Court. The court decision found that the charges those who raped violated were the Army's order to hire only voluntary

women. Victims from East Timor testified they were forced into slavery even when they were not old enough to have
started menstruating. The court testimonies state that these prepubescent girls were repeatedly raped by Japanese
soldiers while those who refused to comply were executed.
Hank Nelson, emeritus professor at the Australian National University's Asia Pacific Research Division, has written about
the brothels run by the Japanese military in Rabaul, Papua New Guinea during WWII. He quotes from the diary of Gordon
Thomas, a POW in Rabaul. Thomas writes that the women working at the brothels most likely served 25 to 35 men a day
and that they were victims of the yellow slave trade.
Nelson also quotes from Kentaro Igusa, a Japanese naval surgeon who was stationed in Rabaul. Igusa wrote in his
memoirs that the women continued to work through infection and severe discomfort, though they cried and begged for
help.

History of the issue

The Allied Forces captured "comfort women" as well as Japanese soldiers, and issued a report on them. In 1944, a United
States Army interrogator reported that "a 'comfort girl' is nothing more than a prostitute or 'professional camp follower'
attached to the Japanese Army for the benefit of the soldiers." The report continues, "They lived well because their food
and material was not heavily rationed and they had plenty of money with which to purchase desired articles. They were
able to buy cloth, shoes, cigarettes, and cosmetics ... While in Burma they amused themselves by participating in sports
events with both officers and men, and attended picnics, entertainments, and social dinners. They had a phonograph and
in the towns they were allowed to go shopping." In South Korea, during and after the Korean War, separate "comfort
stations" were maintained for UN/U.S. and South Korean soldiers. The women were called "Western princesses" as well
as "comfort women" (wianbu).
There was no discussion of the comfort women issue when the last stations were closed after the Korean War. It did not
enter into discussions when diplomatic relations between Japan and South Korea were restored in 1965.
In 1973 a man named Kakou Senda wrote a book about the comfort women system but focused on Japanese participants.
His book has been widely criticized as distorting the facts by both Japanese and Korean historians. This was the first
postwar mention of the comfort women system and became an important source for 1990s activism on the issue.
In 1974 a South Korea film studio made an adult film called Chonggun Wianbu, "Women's Volunteer Corps", featuring
comfort women and Japanese soldiers. The first book written by a Korean on the subject of comfort women appeared in
1981. It was a plagarism of a 1976 Japanese book by the zainichi author Kim Il-Myeon.
In 1989, the testimony of Seiji Yoshida was translated into Korean. His book was debunked as fraudulent by both
Japanese and Korean journalists, but after its publication, a number of people came forward attesting to kidnapping by
Japanese soldiers. In 1996, Yoshida finally admitted his memoir was fictional.
Following multiple testimonies the Kono Statement of 1993 was issued claiming that coercion was involved. However, in
2007, the Japanese government made a cabinet decision, "No evidence was found that the Japanese army or the military
officials seized the women by force."

Apologies and compensation

Rangoon, Burma. August 8, 1945. A young ethnic Chinese woman who was in one of the Imperial Japanese Army's "comfort battalions" is
interviewed by an Allied officer.

In 1965, the Japanese government awarded $364 million to the Korean government for all war damages, including the
injury done to comfort women. In 1994, the Japanese government set up the Asian Women's Fund (AWF) to distribute
additional compensation to South Korea, the Philippines, Taiwan, the Netherlands, and Indonesia. Each survivor was
provided with a signed apology from the then prime minister Tomiichi Murayama, stating "As Prime Minister of Japan, I
thus extend anew my most sincere apologies and remorse to all the women who underwent immeasurable and painful
experiences and suffered incurable physical and psychological wounds as comfort women." However, many former
comfort women rejected the compensations because of pressure from a non-government organization known as the
Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan, or "Chongdaehyop", and because of media
pressure. Eventually, 11 former comfort women accepted funds from the AWF along with the signed apology, while 142
others received funds from the government of Korea. The fund was dissolved on March 31, 2007.
Three Korean women filed suit in Japan in December, 1991, around the time of the 50th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor
attack, demanding compensation for forced prostitution. In 1992, documents which had been stored since 1958 when they
were returned by United States troops and which indicated that the military had played a large role in operating what were
euphemistically called "comfort stations" were found in the library of Japan's Self-Defense Agency. The Japanese
Government admitted that the Japanese Army forced tens of thousands of Korean women to have sex with Japanese
soldiers during World War II. On January 14, 1992, Japanese Chief Government Spokesman Koichi Kato issued an official
apology saying "We cannot deny that the former Japanese army played a role" in abducting and detaining the "comfort
girls," and "We would like to express our apologies and contrition". Three days later on January 17, 1992 at a dinner given
by South Korean President Roh Tae Woo, the Japanese Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa told his host: "We Japanese
should first and foremost recall the truth of that tragic period when Japanese actions inflicted suffering and sorrow upon
your people. We should never forget our feelings of remorse over this. As Prime Minister of Japan, I would like to declare
anew my remorse at these deeds and tender my apology to the people of the Republic of Korea." and apologized again
the following day in a speech before South Korea's National Assembly. On April 28, 1998, the Japanese court ruled that
the Government must compensate the women and awarded them US$2,300 ($3,294 in 2013) each.
In 2007 the surviving sex slaves wanted an apology from the Japanese government. Shinz Abe, the prime minister at the
time, stated on March 1, 2007, that there was no evidence that the Japanese government had kept sex slaves, even
though the Japanese government had already admitted the use of brothels in 1993. On March 27 the Japanese parliament
issued an official apology.

Controversies
Japanese historian and Nihon University professor, Ikuhiko Hata estimates the number of comfort women to be more likely
between 10,000 and 20,000. Hata writes that none of the comfort women were forcibly recruited.
Some Japanese politicians have argued that the former comfort women's testimony is inconsistent and unreliable, making
it invalid. Mayor of Osaka and co-leader of the nationalist Japan Restoration Party, Tru Hashimoto, while initially
maintaining that "there is no evidence that people called comfort women were taken away by violence or threat by

the [Japanese] military", he later modified his position asserting that they became comfort women "against their will", still
justifying their role during World War II as "necessary", so that soldiers could "have a rest".
A comic book, Neo Gomanism Manifesto Special - On Taiwan by Japanese author Yoshinori Kobayashi, depicts kimonoclad women lining up to sign up for duty before a Japanese soldier. Kobayashi's book contains an interview with Taiwanese
industrialist Shi Wen-long who stated that no women were forced to serve, and that they worked in more hygienic
conditions compared to regular prostitutes because the use of condoms was mandatory.
There was a controversy involving NHK in early 2001. What was supposed to be coverage of the Women's International
War Crimes Tribunal on Japan's Military Sexual Slavery was heavily edited to reflect revisionist views.

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Health-related issues
In the aftermath of the war, the women recalled bouts of physical and mental abuses that they had experienced while
working in military brothels. In the Rorschach test, the women showed distorted perceptions, difficulty in managing
emotional reactions and internalized anger. A 2011 clinical study found that comfort women are more prone to showing
symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), even 60 years after the end of the war.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comfort_women
The past is never dead. Its not even past.

(William Faulkner, Requiem for a Nun)

Raping women seems to be a normal byproduct of wars. During World War II, the Japanese military even set up a system for sex
slavery: Tens of thousands of comfort women in Asia were forced into prostitution at military brothels. In addition, many girls
were abused sexually in railroad wagons, factory warehouses or night after night at home. Most of these women have suffered
physical and emotional consequences ever since. Photographer Jan Banning and writer Hilde Janssen visited Indonesian women
who during the war were victims of forced sexual labor. In this exhibition, 18 of them break the persistent taboo against speaking
out on the issue, thereby painting a gripping picture of this hidden history.
Film director Frank van Osch followed Jan and Hilde to Indonesia to create a documentary about their search for comfort
women. The documentary, Because We Were Beautiful, is available in Dutch with English subtitles from VanOsch Film Produkties
at www.vofprodukties.tv
Hilde Janssen (b. 1959) is a journalist and anthropologist. For the past 15 years, she has lived and worked in Asia. From her base
in Jakarta, Janssen traveled the Indonesian archipelago for two years searching for comfort women.
April 2010.
FOR THE PHOTO BOOK, go here.
Book and exhibition have been made possible with financial support from the Mondriaan Foundation and the V-Fonds. Additional
support for the publication was provided by the Fonds BKVB, Foundation Sem Presser and the NLPVF.
Links:
Hilde Janssen, Shame and Innocence
Clare Hewitts Blog If Not Now

Rosa Henson
Maria Rosa Luna Henson or "Lola Rosa" (Grandma Rosa) (1927- 1997) was the first Filipina to tell the world of her story as
a comfort woman for the Imperial Japanese Army during World War II.

Her story
In 1992, when Henson was 65, she decided it was time to tell the world about her experience during the Japanese occupation
of the Philippines in World War II. Until 1992, only two people had known of her secret, her late mother and her dead husband.
After coming out publicly with her story, Lola Rosa decided to write about her war-time experience. The result was the
book, Comfort Woman: A Slave of Destiny.
In Comfort Woman: A Slave of Destiny, Lola Rosa provided an achingly straightforward voice to the erstwhile silent and
invisible existence of Filipino comfort women. Almost 200 Filipino women soon followed Rosas example as they decided to
reveal themselves and their personal stories for the first timenot only to the world, but to their families as well. Other victims,
including those from Korea and China, joined the Filipino women to file a class action lawsuit against
the Japanese government. Together, they demanded justice in the form of a formal apology from the Japanese government;
the inclusion of all the war-time atrocities committed by the Japanese into Japans school history books; and monetary
reparations to compensate for all the abuses and violence committed against the women.
However, the Japanese government denied legal responsibility and refused to pay the victims. Later, responding to the growing
pressure of continued protests and appeals by the survivors and their supporters, Japan finally set up the Asian Womens Fund

(AWF) in 1995 to collect money from private Japanese citizens, and offered them to the victims as atonement payments.
Henson died of a heart attack in 1997, a year after her autobiography was published, and after she decided to accept the
money from the AWF.

See also

Timeline of Philippine history

Walterina Markova

References

Comfort Woman: Slave of Destiny, Maria Rosa Luna Henson: Woman of Courage, KASAMA Vol. 11 No. 3, Solidarity
Philippines Australia Network, Cpcabrisbane.org, JulyAugustSeptember 1997 and Philippine Center for Investigative
Journalism, Manila, retrieved on: 10 June 2007

Maria Rosa Luna Henson (1927 - 1997), Ateneo Library of Women's Writings (ALIWW), Ateneo de Manila University,
Philippines and Rizal.Lib.Admu.edu.ph, retrieved on: 10 June 2007

Comfort Women Slam Japan Apology, Newsbits Vol. 9.8, Reuter and MIT.edu, retrieved on: 10 June 2007
Goguingco, Leonor, Arts and Mind, Opinion/Editorial, Manila Bulletin and Manila Bulletin Online/MB.com.ph, 2001,
retrieved on: 10 June 2007

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Henson

Maria Rosa Luna Henson: Woman of Courage

KASAMA Vol. 11 No. 3 / JulyAugustSeptember 1997 / Solidarity Philippines Australia Network

MANILA - Maria Rosa Luna Henson died of a heart attack at the Pasay City hospital on the rain-swept night of
August 18, 1997. She was 69.
Mrs. Henson burst into the national consciousness in 1992, when she broke half-a-century's silence to talk
about her ordeal as a "comfort woman" in a World War II rape camp. Her example inspired other women to come
out with their own stories, belying earlier claims that the Japanese forces did not set up "comfort stations" in the
Philippines as they did in Korea, Taiwan and Indonesia.
Lola Rosa was an outspoken, intelligent and courageous woman who overcame great odds to become a
champion of justice for the most secret and silent victims of World War II. Her widely read autobiography, Comfort
Woman: Slave of Destiny, published by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism in 1996, is a touchingly
honest account of her life and times and is the only autobiography ever written by any of the over 200,000 sex
slaves kept by the Japanese in Asia. Comfort Woman is a finalist in this year's National Book Award for Best
Biography.
Lola Rosa wrote Comfort Woman in her own unsteady hand, on ruled pad paper, using the English she had
learned in school. The effort took over a year and entailed a great deal of painful recollection of a life that has seen
epic suffering. In Comfort Woman, Lola Rosa wrote of her own mother's rape by the wealthy landlord who was to
become her father. She recalled growing up as the hidden, illegitimate daughter of a young mother who could
barely read or write. But the young Rosa managed to do well in a Catholic school in Pasay City, and was in seventh
grade when the war broke out.
Her ordeal began when she was raped by Japanese soldiers while gathering firewood in what is now Fort
Bonifacio. Fearful for her safety, her mother brought her to a village in Pampanga, where Lola Rosa joined the
Hukbalahap guerrillas, gathering food and medicine for them, and acting as a courier for messages. While
transporting a cartload of guns, she was stopped by a Japanese sentry who forcibly took her to a hospital in

Angeles City which had been turned into a garrison. There, at the age of 14, her life as a comfort woman began.
For nine months until her rescue by Huk guerrillas, scores of Japanese soldiers raped her everyday.
Lola Rosa told no one but her mother of what had been done to her. Not even the man she later married knew;
her children found out only after she had come out into the open in 1992. Abandoned by her husband, she raised
three children on her own, working as a laundrywoman, and later as a sweeper in a cigarette factory. She did not go
mad only through faith and the sheer effort of will, she said. She also vowed to remember. To her dying day, Lola
Rosa had a prodigious memory for dates and events. She once said that for her, remembering was the best
revenge.
Lola Rosa's story is one of survival rather than victimhood. In the five years since she went public with her
secret, she fought hard for justice for comfort women, joining marches, appearing in Congress, even filing a lawsuit
in a Tokyo court. She was independent and outspoken. She also had the courage to break away from the NGOs
working on her behalf. When she disagreed with their policies and methods of work, she just opted out. She was
the first to accept unofficial compensation from the Japanese, although she was adamant in the belief that they
owed her official indemnity as well.
Lola Rosa was buried in the saya with autumn-leaf design that she had made herself and wore to her booklaunching last year at the historic Fort Santiago. "Autumn leaves, like me," she said then, with the quiet, selfdeprecating humor of a woman who had survived so much so bravely, so triumphantly.
Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism

Comfort Woman: Slave of Destiny

Publisher: Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, 905 Horizon
Condo, Meralco Avenue, Pasig, Metro Manila. Fax# 0011 632 633 5887

Book Review: "Of Pain, Courage and Survival" by Emere Distor, Kasama Vol.10 No.4 Oct/Dec 1996

Further Reading: "Update: Comfort Women", Kasama Vol.11 No.1 Jan/March 1997

"Japanese Comfort Women: One Womans Story" by Anthony Brown, Kasama Vol.9 No.4 June/Aug 1995
the account of Felicidad de Los Reyes.

Japanese Comfort Women: One Woman's Story

The account of Felicidad de Los Reyes
By Anthony Brown
KASAMA Vol. 9 No. 4 / June-July-August 1995 / Solidarity Philippines Australia Network
FROM 1928 until the end of World War II, about 200,000 Asian women were forcibly drafted into sexual
servitude by the Japanese Imperial Army.
These women, many in their teens, were often either tricked by offers of legitimate employment or abducted by
Japanese soldiers and forced into so-called comfort houses. There they were forced to sexually please their
captors, sometimes several at a time up to several times a day. To resist, invited beatings, torture and even death.
According to the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, a Swiss-based international women's
rights organisation, they generally received little or no medical treatment even if they were injured in the process of
rape and torture or became pregnant or infected with venereal disease.
Towards the end of the War, thousands were executed to conceal the existence of the comfort houses. In the
Philippines, a human rights group has documented the cases of three survivors who bear the marks of where the
Japanese tried to behead them.

About 60,000 comfort women survived the War and approximately one thousand are alive today, the youngest
of whom is in her sixties. After decades of hiding what happened, they are now finding the courage to come out and
tell their stories.
In the Philippines in 1993, about 150 women came forward when the Task Force on Filipino Comfort Women
asked in a series of popular radio programs for comfort women to contact it.
One of these was Felicidad de Los Reyes. This is her story:
Felicidad was born on November 22, 1928 in Masbate, Philippines.
One day in 1943 three truckloads of Japanese soldiers from the garrison compound at the back of her school
visited Felicidad's class. Her Japanese teacher had organised the students to perform songs and dances for the
visiting soldiers. The Japanese army often introduced Japanese civilian teachers into schools in its conquered
territories.
Felicidad, then only 14, was made to sing. The following day her teacher told the class that the soldiers were
so impressed with the students' performance that they wanted to reward them. Felicidad was identified as one who
was to be given an award and later that day two soldiers arrived to fetch her. They told her that she would be given
the gift at the garrison. Thinking that there might be other students there, Felicidad went along. But when she got
there, she did not see any of her school friends. Instead the only other women she saw were doing the soldiers'
cooking and laundry.
She became worried. She asked to leave. The two guards refused. Instead they took her to a small room in
the compound and pushed her in. They told her that her gift was coming.
A few hours later five Japanese soldiers arrived. Three of them were in uniform and two in civilian clothes. One
of them jumped onto her catching her by the arms and forcing her down onto the ground. When she struggled,
another punched her in the face while another grabbed her legs and held them apart. Then they took it in turns to
rape her.
Felicidad had no knowledge about sex. She did not even have her menstruation. So she did not understand
what they were doing to her. She begged them to stop. But they just laughed and whenever she struggled or
screamed, they would punch and kick her.
Confused and frightened and tired and in pain, she drifted in and out of consciousness. That night three more
soldiers came and repeatedly raped her. For the next three days a succession of soldiers abused her.
The continual raping and beatings finally took their toll and on the third day she fell ill. Her body and mind
could take it no more. But even though she was obviously sick, the abuse continued. Not even her fever drew pity
from her rapists.
Finally on the morning of the fourth day, a Filipino interpreter working for the Japanese visited her. She told
him she was very sick and wanted to go home to recover. Feeling sympathy for her, he let her out of the compound.
When she arrived home, her parents who had no idea where she was, cried after learning what had
happened. Just the year before an older sister had been taken by the Japanese. She died in a comfort house.
Fearing the soldiers would come looking for her, her father hid her in a nearby village. She stayed there for
about a year until the American army arrived.
After the War, Felicidad returned to her home town. But her experiences at the hands of the Japanese soldiers
had left deep psychological scars. She found it hard to socialise and could not face going back to school. She felt
dirty. She dared not tell anyone outside her parents. She was afraid of how others would view her if they knew the
truth. So she buried it inside.

When she was 25 she moved to Manila where she met her husband. Before marrying, Felicidad decided she
could not conceal her experiences from the man she was going to marry, so she told him.
They were married in 1956 and had six children and 15 grandchildren. But outside her husband, she told no
one else for almost 37 years.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: ANTHONY BROWN is an Irish-born journalist based in Brisbane. Anthony has written
several articles on Filipino women's issues for KASAMA. His most recent book "The Boys from Ballymore" is
published by Penguin Books Australia Ltd.
IN late June 1995, Felicidad de los Reyes and Nelia Sancho visited Brisbane as part of a national speaking
tour entitled Women's Human Rights: Eliminating Violence Against Women in the Home and on the Battlefield.
Organised by the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, the tour was funded by a grant from the
Office of the Status of Women.
The tour aimed to galvanise public interest and raise public awareness about gender-specific violence in the
Asia and Pacific regions, in the belief that breaking the silence is a preliminary for ending the violence against
women in the family and in war.
The final event of the Brisbane visit, a public meeting at the Miscellaneous Worker's Union Building in Spring
Hill, enabled Felicidad and Nelia to tell their stories to the local communities, show slides, and raise public
awareness about the cause of Filipino "comfort women", the activities of Lila Pilipina, and the issues which still
need to be addressed. After an opening by Mary Crawford, MP, Nelia and Felicidad - as always during the tourspoke powerfully and sensitively about the issues to a hushed audience.
Chris Henderson, WILPF Brisbane

Surviving comfort women throughout Asia are now demanding justice from the Japanese Government for what
happened to them.
They allege the Japanese Government during the War not only knew what its soldiers were up to, but that the
system of sexual slavery was official government policy.
They argue that the authorities systematically planned, ordered, conscripted, established the army brothels and
encouraged the abductions of women in countries occupied by the Japanese Imperial Army.
Besides seeking compensation and prosecutions of those responsible, they want the Japanese Government to
admit its guilt. To date the Japanese Government has refused all their demands.
ARTICLES ABOUT "COMFORT WOMEN" IN KASAMA

Of Pain, Courage and Survival

Maria Rosa Luna Henson: Woman of courage

Filipina "Comfort Women", letter from WILPF

KASAMA Vol. 10 No. 4 / October-November-December 1996 / Solidarity Philippines

Australia Network

Of Pain, Courage and Survival

Book Review by Emere Distor
The life of Maria Rosa Henson or "Lola Rosa" classically depicts the cruelty of poverty and powerlessness.
Yet, amidst the sadness of it all, Lola Rosa breaths courage. In her autobiography, Lola Rosa, survivor of Japanese
war atrocity, leads the readers to visit her life through the book with her own illustrations and vivid descriptions of
people and events long gone. Her story begins as the daughter of the landlords illiterate mistress, Julia. Rosas
mother, Julia, is the eldest of the children who began her working life as Don Pepe Hensons housemaid, despite
her protestations. The seeming kindness of the
landlord to help Julias family was not without
motive.
A man whose words were command, a
man who frequented the nearby church like his
toilet, Don Pepe, promised Julias family he
would recognise the child as his own provided
they take her to Pasay to give birth. Don Pepe
gave his name to Rosa and kept his promise.
Growing up without a father around confused
Rosa about her background which later on was
discovered by her classmates and teachers. In
a period when children born out of wedlock
were extremely isolated, Rosa learned early in
life to meet challenges and taunts head on and
survive. Her only consolation then was to meet
her father, not in the big house where his family
lived, but, secretly inside his rice granary.
When war was declared on 5 December 1941, Rosa was 14 years old. Her mothers family all fled to Bulacan
to escape the Japanese troops landing in Manila. While gathering wood, Rosa was snatched by three Japanese
soldiers and raped. She survived the incident because a farmer brought her home to recover. Two years after, an
even more unfortunate incident happened to Rosa while she was passing a Japanese checkpoint with members of
the guerilla movement. Thinking that the ammunition hidden in the sacks of grain would be discovered, Rosa
silently returned to the checkpoint guard who by that time waved to her companions to proceed. Rosa was captured
and become a comfort woman for nine harrowing months.
In telling details, Rosa describes the brutal and inhumane treatment of comfort women: "At two, the soldiers
came. My work began, and I lay down as one by one the soldiers raped me. Everyday, anywhere from 12 to over
20 soldiers assaulted me. There were times when there were as many as 30; they came to the garrison in
truckloads." The cruelty towards Rosa and the other girls was unending especially in times when the soldiers were
not satisfied after raping them. "Once there was a soldier who was in such a hurry to come that he ejaculated even
before he had entered me. He was very angry and he grabbed my hand and forced me to fondle his genitals.
Another soldier was waiting for his turn outside the room and started banging on the wall. The man had no choice
but to leave, but before going out, he hit my breast and pulled my hair."
However, violence and humiliation were everyday occurrences in the garrison for comfort women. Not even
captivity nor bouts of malaria dampened the spirit of Rosa to survive, more so to help the resistance against the
Japanese. Overhearing Japanese officers planning to burn her village of Pampang to flush out members and
supporters of HUKBALAHAP, Rosa risked her life to inform a passing villager. "I was in luck that day because the

guards took us downstairs so we could have some sunshine. The field fronted the street, but the Japanese had
fenced it off with barbed wire so no one could escape. I walked close to the street and saw an old man pass by. His
face looked familiar to me, and I knew he lived in our barrio." There was not a single soul in the village when the
troops arrived. The officer readily suspected Rosa who was in the same room during their planning. She was
dragged to the garrison, tied and beaten senselessly.
When the Japanese Imperial Army withdrew its troops from the Philippines, Rosa was freed from the garrison
and only regained consciousness after two months. Her recovery was as traumatic as her ordeal. "My mother
nursed me back to health, spoon-feeding me as if I were a baby. I could neither stand nor walk. I crawled like an
infant. I could not focus my eyes well, and everything I saw was blurred." After a remarkable recovery at the age of
18, Rosa met Domingo who later become her husband and father to two daughters. In another twist of fate,
Domingo just disappeared one day without a word. It was not until nearly a year when she discovered her
husbands location in a jungle with the HMB, an armed group fighting the governments army for land
redistribution. The pain of discovery was made more unbearable for two different reasons Rosa was abducted
while buying medicine for their very ill daughter and kept for days by Domingos men, and secondly, Domingo
already had a new woman.
If one were an ordinary mortal, there is more probability that youd loose your sanity halfway if you were in Lola
Rosas shoes, or wooden clogs for that matter. She started life painfully, with only faith in God and love for her
mother in her heart. She was stripped of her dignity as a Japanese comfort woman. She was betrayed by her
husband who hid under the shield of the resistance movement. She single-handedly raised her family. She
mourned, she struggled, she survived.
Lola Rosa started writing her autobiography in 1995, two years after she came out in public to protest against
Japanese war atrocities. Her manuscript has already been translated in Japanese by Yuki Shiga-Fugime, a
professor of contemporary history at Kyoto University.
Coming out in public as a comfort woman was a most courageous thing to do. Many people are sympathetic
but some are sneering and even suspicious. In April 1993, along with other surviving comfort women from the
Philippines and other countries, she filed a lawsuit in the Tokyo District Court demanding compensation from the
Japanese government. During the visit of the Japanese Prime Minister to the Philippines in 1994, Tomiichi
Murayama brought out the idea of a Womens Centre as a form of compensation. Until now, the Japanese
government insists that compensation was already given in the form of reparations to the Philippines government
after WW II.

KASAMA Vol. 13 No. 1 / January-February-March 1999 / Solidarity Philippines Australia Network

Filipina "Comfort Women"

The following letter was sent by the Women's International League for Peace and
Freedom (Australia) to the Chief Judge of the Tokyo District Court about his judgement in
October last year against the claims of the Filipina "comfort women". Reprinted from the
Qld. WILPF newsletter, February '99
Dear Mr Ichikawa,
Re: Your Judgement on the Case of Filipino "Comfort Women" and Japan's Military Sexual Slavery During
World War II
We write in reference to your recent judgement in the Tokyo District Court concerning compensation for fortysix Filipino "comfort women" who are survivors of Japan's military sexual slavery during World War II.

We understand that your ruling did not allow the plaintiffs to present testimony of their sexual enslavement
experiences. We further understand that your judgement did not recommend the Japanese Government to take any
measures to assist these brave women to heal the wounds from their war-time ordeals.
We are informed that your judgement was in part based on the view that there is no international law
recognising individual victims' claims against an occupying state for compensation for harm which that state's
military forces inflict on them. We also understand that your judgement assumed that no customary international
law exists which requires the state whose members commit such a crime against humanity to pay compensation.
We regard this decision on your part as failing to take account of recent developments in international law
regarding gender crimes in war and the particular application of international law in the field of sexual violence and
sexual slavery under armed conflict situations.
We regard your decision as an abdication of the responsibility which the Japanese legal system has to
contribute to ensuring that such crimes against humanity are prevented in the future. A judgement such as this one
of yours amounts to tacit legal encouragement of policies of organised rape in war as quasi-legitimate tools of an
occupying force against the citizens of another state.
We therefore regard this failure on your part and on the part of the Japanese legal system as a lost opportunity
to work towards the prevention of further sexual violence in armed conflict situations and the protection of the
human rights in armed conflict situations of women and children.
Finally, we are pleased to note that the Filipino "comfort women" have decided to appeal to the Higher Court. It
is our sincere hope that there they will be treated more justly.
Yours sincerely,
Cathy Picone and Nikki Mortier,
National Coordinators,
Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (Australia).

'Comfort women' wary of Japanese troops in Philippines

By Ronron Calunsod, Kyodo News
Posted at 11/21/2013 8:40 PM | Updated as of 11/21/2013 8:41 PM
TACLOBAN CITY, Philippines - A group of Filipino women who were sex slaves for the then Imperial Japanese Army during World War II
expressed fear at the arrival Thursday of Japanese troops to help with emergency relief operations on the typhoon-hit island Leyte in the
central Philippines.
Pointedly noting their demand for justice for the crimes committed against them seven decades ago remains unsettled, they also expressed
fear the abuse they went through may be repeated on the present generation of Filipino women in Leyte.
Richilda Extremadura, executive director of Lila Pilipina, told Kyodo News by telephone that while they appreciate the kindness of Japan for
sympathizing with the victims of supertyphoon Haiyan, the "comfort women" do not welcome the presence of the Japanese troops and their
ships.
"We are allergic to them. We all know the Japanese government still owes our lolas (ageing sex slaves). As victims of wartime sexual slavery,
the lolas find the presence of Japanese troops a threat to their emotions, and to the present generation, who might experience the abuses
again," Extremadura said.

"It's all the more sensitive for the lolas because Leyte is historical. In fact, many of our members are from Leyte, and (many) have all died
without getting justice," she said.
Japan is sending around 1,180 personnel from its Self-Defense Forces to the Philippines to provide medical support, quarantine and
transport relief supplies in areas badly hit by Haiyan on Nov. 8.
The transport vessel Osumi and escort vessel Ise, carrying about 700 military personnel and a medical team, are to arrive near Leyte on
Friday, along with the supply vessel Towada.
The ships will be used as the team's main base for relief operations.
Japan also sent a C-130 cargo plane that has been transporting people and supplies over the past few days. It will send helicopters and
other transport aircraft.
"Yes, we need medicines and the humanitarian aid of Japan, but are the Japanese soldiers really needed for the rehabilitation?" Extremadura
asked. "We might have a different reaction if justice had been given already to the comfort women. Or, we would not have been alarmed if
they only sent civilians like members of JICA (Japan International Cooperation Agency)."
An estimated 1,000 Filipino women were sexually abused by the Japanese military during World War II.
More than 130 of them remain living and continue to demand an official apology and compensation from the Japanese government.
The Japanese presence on Leyte was high during its occupation of the Philippines in the 1940s that culminated during the war with the return
of the U.S. forces led by Gen. Douglas McArthur.
During the December 2004 earthquake tragedy on the Indonesian island of Sumatra and around the Indian Ocean, Japan sent 925 troops to
extend assistance.
Haiyan has left more than 4,000 people killed so far and massive destruction in many central Philippine provinces.

http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/nation/regions/11/21/13/comfort-women-wary-japanese-troopsphilippines

Filipino comfort women demand apology from Japan during PM Abe's visit
By: PNA/Xinhua
July 27, 2013 9:31 PM Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

InterAksyon.com
The online news portal of TV5
MANILA - A group of Philippine comfort women during World War II held a protest rally outside Malacanang Palace Saturday as
President Benigno Aquino III was holding talks with visiting Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
They belong to the Lila Pilipina, an organization comprising nearly 200 wartime sex slaves, 73 of whom have died, with others
aged above 80.
They held high placards which read: "Justice to comfort women," "Never again to another generation of comfort women," "We
want justice, not ships," urging President Aquino to convey their demand of apology to the Japanese government in his
meeting with Abe.
Lila Pilipina Executive Director Rechilda Extremadura said "Japan never apologized for abusing Filipino women during World
War II by using the comfort women system. In fact, Prime Minister Abe is also set to reverse the Kono statement of apology but
was only forced to take a U-turn after an international backlash."

Another member named Villarma said "The trauma is immeasurable, and that experience remains fresh in my memory." Now,
she added, Japan is involved in talks with the Philippine government for military basing privileges. So what's next, a new
generation of comfort women?"
"We demand justice for the comfort women and denounce any expansion of Philippine-Japan-U.S. military cooperation, which
will breed the next generation of comfort women," she concluded.

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/67330/filipino-comfort-women-demand-apology-from-japanduring-pm-abes-visit

Philippine comfort women still waiting for justice

By Iris C. Gonzales | Published on June 21, 2013 by Iris Gonzales
In a sleepy farming village in Bulacan, some 30 kilometres away from Manila, the Philippine capital, the
sound of mens footsteps shattered the silence of dawn.
Even before the roosters woke up and the first light of morning crawled through the moons shadow,
Japanese soldiers stormed the usually quiet village, burned and tore down tattered huts and farmers
homes as they searched for guerrillas.
It was 23 November 1944, the height of the Second World War. Isabelita Vinuya (right) was 13 years old at
the time. Now, she is 81, wrinkled and tired. On some mornings, she can barely stand up because of
recurring back pain. She forgets many things but she will never forget that fateful day.
She remembers it all the wailing of women and children running for their lives as soldiers burned their
homes. In her inner minds eye, she can still see the clouds of smoke and soot. She can hear vividly the
screams of men brothers, fathers, uncles as soldiers tied them up in the nearby school and burned
them to death.
The Japanese soldiers then gathered the young girls like Vinuya, locked them in a dark, two-storey red
house, tortured them and took turns raping them through the night.

Vinuya is one of roughly 250,000 Asian women victims of

sexual crimes during the Second World War. She heads the group Malaya Lolas, whose members were
gang-raped on that fateful day in what is now known as Bahay na Pula or The Red House (right), which
stands to this day in San Ildefenso, Bulacan.
Vinuya, known as Lola Lita in her village, remembers the atrocities of war every single day. But she
remembers it especially these days because of a recent comment by Japanese mayor who said that sex
slaves served a necessary role during the war, particularly to provide relief to Japanese troops.

For soldiers who risked their lives in circumstances where bullets are flying around like rain and wind, if
you want them to get some rest a comfort women system was necessary. Thats clear to anyone, said
Toru Hashimoto, mayor of Osaka, Japan.
Hashimotos words angered Vinuya and the rest of the women who suffered in the hands of Japanese
soldiers.
Such a statement is unbecoming of a public official. Japan cannot rewrite history by justifying such
wrongful acts and thus exonerate its crimes against women, Lila Pilipina said in a statement.
Lila Pilipina is a group of comfort women survivors founded in 1992. Together with the Malaya Lolas, the
two groups have a combined membership of more than 200 women.
Hashimotos statements leave a stark reminder to the women survivors that justice remains elusive to
them.
Vinuya said their group continues to demand a public apology from Japan and legal compensation for the
atrocities committed during World War Two.
Her group is also appealing to the Aquino administration to form a government body or assign an agency
to look into their plight. She says many of them are old and sick and in need of maintenance medicines.
Human rights lawyer Harry Roque, who represents Malaya Lolas, said there have been apologies from
Japanese officials in the past but there has been no recognition that the atrocities were war crimes.
They have to apologize for that state policy because so far there has been no admission, Roque said in
an interview.
In the meantime, women survivors like Vinuya continue to hope for justice.
Vinuya lives in a quiet bungalow, shared with her husband and their children and grandchildren, at the
end of a dirt road lined on both sides with hectares and hectares of rice fields.
It is a peaceful village where children can roam the streets freely.
Men and women enjoy quiet afternoons watching soap operas on television while the elderly, like Lola
Lita, while away their time chewing betel nut.
But the silence of the village cannot conceal the anger.
I no longer cry about what happened. I am angry. I am still very angry, says Vinuya, her voice shaking in
rage, her eyes squinting in frustration.
Yet she continues to hope for justice and promises to fight so that the next generations of women,
including her children and grandchildren, do not suffer the same thing.
She excuses herself and sits with her husband by the veranda; they smile and hold hands as they watch
their grandchildren play in the warm afternoon of May.
- See more at: http://newint.org/blog/majority/2013/06/21/philippine-comfort-womenjustice/#sthash.ESipn5WE.dpuf

http://newint.org/blog/majority/2013/06/21/philippine-comfort-women-justice/

Testimony II Maria Rosa Henson (Philippines)

Maria Rosa L. Henson was born in Pasay City on 5 December 1927. She was the extramarital daughter of a bid landowner
and his housemaid. When she was 14 years old, the Pacific War broke out and the Philippines were occupied by the
Japanese. In February 1942 she was first raped by Japanese soldiers. While she went to fetch firewood with her uncles and
neighbors for her family, she was caught and raped by three Japanese, one of whom seemed to be an officer.. After two
weeks she was again raped by the same Japanese officer, while fetching firewood. She felt a strong anger toward the
Japanese military, and joined the HUKBALAHAP, an anti-Japanese guerilla group. A year passed. In April 1943 she was
arrested by Japanese at a check point in the suburbs of Angeles and taken to the garrison. There she was forced to be a
comfort woman. She spent the next nine months of her life in this way. In January 1944 she was saved by guerillas. After
Japan's capitulation, she married with a soldier of the Philippines army. She had two daughters, but her husband joined the
communist army and died. She worked as a charwoman or a factory worker. In 1992 she decided to come out after hearing
the radio program. She was the first Philippine woman who spoke out about her own distress. In 1996 she was one of the
three women who became first recipients of the AWF project. Maria Rosa Henson passed away on 18 August 1997.

I was forced to stay at the hospital which they have made as a garrison. I met six women in the garrison after
two or three days in the place. The Japanese soldiers were forcing me to have sex with several of their
colleagues. Sometimes 12 soldiers would force me to have sex with them and then they would allow me to rest
for a while, then about 12 soldiers would have sex with me again.
There was no rest, they had sex with me every minute. That's why we were very tired. They would allow you to
rest only when all of them have already finished. Maybe, because we were seven women in the garrison, there
were a fewer number of soldiers for each one of us.
But then, due to my tender age, it was a painful experience for me. I stayed for three months in that place after
which I was brought to a rice mill also here in Angeles. It was nighttime when we were fetched to be
transferred. When I arrived in the rice mill, the same experience happened to us. Sometimes in the morning and
sometimes in the evening... not only 20 times. At times, we would be brought to some quarters or houses of the
Japanese. I remembered the Pamintuan Historical House. We were brought there several times. You cannot say
no as they will definitely kill you. During the mornings, you have a guard. You are free to roam around the
garrison, but you cannot get out. I could not even talk to my fellow women two of whom I believed were
Chinese. The others I thought were also from Pampanga. But then, we were not allowed to talk to each other.
"Lila-Pilipina, Inc. Summary of narration. Ma. Rosa Henson, 69 years old, Pampanga", Data prepared:
September 1992.
Many have asked me whether I am still angry with the Japanese. Maybe it helped that I have faith. I had

Maria Rosa Henson, Comfort Woman: Slave of Destiny. Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism. Manila,
1996, p. 152.

http://www.awf.or.jp/e3/oralhistory-00.html#philippine

Who were the Comfort Women?-Who were the Comfort Women?

The so-called "wartime comfort women" were those who were taken to former Japanese military installations, such
as comfort stations, for a certain period during wartime in the past and forced to provide sexual services to officers
and soldiers.
Authors who wrote about these women in the postwar Japan called them "jugun ianfu (comfort women joining the
army)". And when the Japanese government first faced the issue of these women, it adopted this term, "jugun
ianfu," and the AWF, when it started in 1995, it used this term as well. But in historical wartime documents we only
find the term "ianfu (comfort women)". Therefore, we now always use this term "ianfu (comfort women)".
Who were the Comfort Women?-The Establishment of Comfort Stations

The comfort stations were first established at the request of the Japanese military authorities, as part of war efforts
in China. According to military documents, private agents first opened brothels for officers and men stationed in
Manchuria, around the time of the Manchurian Incident in 1931. Then term "ianfu(comfort women)" was not yet
used and the attitude of the military itself was inactive.
When the war spread to Shanghai after the First Shanghai Incident in 1932, the first comfort station was
established for a Japanese naval brigade posted there. The number of comfort stations increased rapidly after the
Sino-Japanese war broke out in 1937.
It was apparently Yasuji Okamura, at that time the Vice Chief of Staff of the Shanghai
Expeditionary Force, who first promoted the establishment of comfort stations for the
Japanese army.
There were apparently a number of reasons for establishing them: Japanese military
personnel had raped Chinese civilian women in occupied areas on numerous occasions,
and the military hoped to prevent a worsening of anti-Japanese feelings on the part of the
Chinese people; there was a need to prevent the spread of venereal diseases among officers and men, as otherwise
military effectiveness would be reduced; and it was also feared that contact with Chinese civilian women could
result in the leaking of military secrets.

Okamura Yasuji taisho shiryo I: senjo kaisohen, Tokyo, 1970, pp. 302-303.
There were not ianfus (comfort women) in former years of military campaigns. To speak frankly, I am an initiator of
the comfort women project. As in 1932 during the Shanghai Incident some acts of rape were committed by Japanese
military personnel, I, Vice Chief of Staff of the Shanghai Expeditionary Force, following the example of the Japanese
naval brigade, asked the governor of Nagasaki prefecture to send comfort women women groups. As a result, rape
crimes totally disappeared, which made me very happy.
At present each army corps was accompanied by a comfort women group, as if the latter constitutes a detachment of
its quarter-master corps. But rape acts did not disappear in the Sixth Division, even though it was accompanied by a
comfort women group.

Who were the Comfort Women?-Women Were Collected

Thus, comfort stations were established as a result of decisions made in those days at the expeditionary military
headquarters. When the stations were constructed, the military would often designate certain people as business
agents and commission them to bring women from Japan.

Letter of request sent by the Chief of Police at the Shanghai Consulate-General to the Chief of Nagasaki Marine
Police (dated 21 December 1937), Shiryoshusei,Vol.I, pp.33-38
On the request to support women traveling to provide comfort to the Imperial military men. The relevant
organizations carefully considered ways to provide comfort to the officers and men as the Imperial Army marched
to the front. And it was agreed during meetings of representatives of the Military Attache Bureau at this Consulate
and the Military Police to establish military comfort stations (in actual fact, brothels) at various locations on the
front, as part of the installations there."
Tasks
The Consulate
a) Permission of Doing Business
b) Identification of Comfort Women and Contracts to do business
c) Procedures of Entrance into China
d) Handing over those people to the Military Police
The Military Police
a) Transfer of business proprietors and women to places of services
b) Protection of business proprietors and women
The Military Attache Bureau
a) Preparation of Places and Houses for the Services
b) Health Control and Examination of Sexual Diseases

In early 1938, agents canvassed in different parts of Japan, hoping to employ 3,000 women to serve in the Imperial
Army's comfort stations in Shanghai. Their efforts were criticized by the police in different parts of Japan, who
equated the agents' efforts with kidnapping unsuspecting women and said that they were tarnishing the honor of the
Imperial Army.

The reaction of the Director of the Police Bureau of the Home Ministry was to issue a memorandum on 23 February
1938, stipulating that all recruited women had already to be involved in prostitution in Japan, be at least 21 years of
age, and obtain permission from their parent or guardians to go overseas. On 4 March the same year, the Adjutant of
the Ministry of War issued a notice with the following instructions.

The stipulation that the women must be at least 21 was made because the International Convention for the
Suppression of Traffic in Women and Children, which Japan had ratified, prohibited the prostitution of minors. As
the number of comfort stations increased rapidly, the Home Ministry and the Army Ministry found themselves
increasingly involved in the issue. A document compiled within the Police Bureau of the Ministry of Home Affairs,
dated 4 November 1938, contains a request that agents be designated in different prefectures to recruit 400 women:
100 from Osaka Prefecture, 50 from Kyoto Prefecture, 100 from Hyogo Prefecture, 100 from Fukuoka Prefecture,
and 50 from Yamaguchi Prefecture. The recruitment, which was to be carried out in a top-secret fashion, was in
response to a request from two men: (i) Arifumi Kumon, who was a Major in the army's aviation squad and a staff
officer in the Furusho's Army of the South China Expeditionary Force, and (ii) the head of the Enlistment Division
of the Army Ministry. Their request was: "Please help... sending,,, about 400 women for the purpose of prostitution...
at comfort stations of the Southern China Expeditionary Force."
If recruitment of women from Japan homeland was carried out in above way, how were women collected in Taiwan
and Korea. According to research by Zhu Delan, after the Japanese navy occupying the island of Hainan sent a
request, in 1939, to the naval office in Taiwan, the office asked Taiwan Takushoku Co., Ltd., to become involved.
The company committed to promote Japanese state policy, constructed comfort station buildings on Hainan, chose
agents, and gave them money. The agents, who were Japanese, then took women in their employ to Hainan. These
women were destined to become comfort women, and were "at least 21 years old and already involved in
prostitution." In this case, it would appear that the rules in effect in Japan were also applied when recruiting in
Taiwan, although whether they were always followed is unknown. Because in ratifying the International Convention
for the Suppression of Traffic in Women and Children in 1925, the Japanese government excluded the colonies from
its application.
Who were the Comfort Women?-The Pacific War and Spreading Comfort Station

After the Pacific War broke out on 8 December 1941, Japan attacked Singapore, the Philippines, Burma and the East
Indies (Indonesia). The military occupation swept south, spreading comfort stations with it. As the occupation
widened, it appeared that there was a definite change in the way women were recruited for the comfort stations in
the new southern territories. A 14 January 1942 reply from the Minister of Foreign Affairs contained the following
sentence: "Because it would not be advisable to issue passports to such types of people going abroad, they should be
issued military certificates and transported on ships commissioned by the military." It appeared that the transport of
comfort women to those territories came to be under the control of the Japanese military without any intervention of
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Home Ministry, and the police.

Sometime between the end of February and the beginning of March 1942, the commander of the Taiwan Army
received a message from the Southern Army General Command requesting "50 native comfort women, or as close to
that number as possible, to be sent" to Borneo. The commander ordered the military police to conduct a survey and
choose three agents. The three agents recruited the women and took them to Borneo.

We can assume that the Southern Army General Command also requested that the Headquarters of the Korea Army
send Korean women. According to documents compiled by the U.S. military, the Japanese military headquarters in
Seoul contacted agents in May 1942, asking the possibility of recruiting women for "comfort services" in Burma.
The agents agreed to do so. The military designated certain agents and apparently had them recruit women. After the
recruitment, 703 Korean women were sent in a transport to Burma.
In another document we find that a Korean couple, operating a restaurant in Seoul, were contacted by the military
police headquarters. They agreed to take on the job of gathering women and girls and recruited 20 Koreans. With the
payment of 300-1000 yen in the currency of that time to their parents, the couple believed that they bought these
girls and that they became the couple's own property. This could be considered as the advance payment by which
these girls were bound. According to information given by the women and girls, at the time of recruitment, twelve of
the twenty recruits were under 21 years of age one was 17, three were 18, seven were 19, one was 20, and eight
were 23 or older. If this information is correct, it would seem to be clear that the conditions stipulated by the Police
Bureau, Home Ministry in 1938 for recruitment in Japan were ignored.
It appears that the women and girls were not clearly told they would be required to serve as comfort women.

United States Office of War Information, Psychological Warfare Team "Japanese Prisoner of War
Interrogation Report", No. 49, Shiryoshusei, Vol.V, pp.203.
The nature of this 'service' was not specified, but it was assumed to be work connected with visiting
the wounded in hospitals, rolling bandages, and generally making the soldiers happy. The inducement
used by those agents was plenty of money, an opportunity to pay off the family debts, easy work, and
the prospect of a new life in a new land - Singapore. On the basis of those false representations many
girls enlisted for overseas duty and were rewarded with an advance of a few hundred yen.

In such cases the agents tricked them, basically recruiting them against their will.
Thus, gathering from the above cited materials, during the Pacific War period, the recruitment of comfort women
from Korea and Taiwan was carried down in the following way. On the request of the Southern Army General
Command the Korea Army and the Taiwan Army assumed the responsibility of choosing business managers through
military police and sending women collected by those managers on military transports to Southeast Asia occupied by
the Japanese military. Of course, recruitment of comfort women from Japan was also continued in former way in this
period.
Further, in such places as Philippines and Indonesia, native women were made to be comfort women. Research by
Professor Aiko Kurasawa shows that the recruitment of comfort women in Indonesia was often done through the
heads of residential districts or neighborhood groups. The general pattern seems to have been that village officials
would receive a request from the occupying forces, and would act on the request. It was recognized that it was not
uncommon for women to be taken against their will.
It is well known that in Indonesia some Dutch women internees were taken to comfort stations. According to Dutch
government's report, one third, or one fifth of them were coerced into becoming comfort women. The case at
Semarang was tried in a war crime tribunal and a Japanese officer was executed.
When many comfort women worked in comfort stations managed by private managers and set up in city areas and

During the war, Koreans were told that they were now Japanese. This was to persuade them to place money in deposit
garrison sites, it is recognized that in rural areas many of the native women were raped and abducted to Japanese
accounts. They deposited 110 billion yen, and the money was all lost at the end of the war. Now they are demanding that the
garrisons buildings and were raped continuously there for a certain period of time. Those victims who suffered most
money be returned. They say, "Give us back Korea's wealth, the wealth Japanese bureaucrats held on to during 36 years of
from
formidable violence can be also redeemed as anothr comfort women who were forced to provide sexual
rule." They say Koreans were drafted by Japan during the war and taken from Korea to work, and those who worked well
services
men. InofPhillipines,
especially,
violence
women
was frequent.
were usedto
as officers
soldiers, and
and 576,000
those soldiers
are now dead.
There against
are claims
that 142,000
Korean comfort women are
dead, killed by the Japanese military's sexual abuses. Now they are demanding pensions for a total of 900,000 victims. At
Number
of Comfort
Comfort Women
first, 5 billion
dollars wasStations
claimed asand
compensation,
but the sum has been whittled down and now they say they are willing to
settle for 300 million dollars.

Comfort Stations spread all over Asia. In a report of the head of Reward Section of the War Ministry dated
September 3, 1942, we can read such passage: "Comfort facilities for officers and men were constructed in following
way; North China 100, Central China 140, South China 40, South Asia 100, South Sea 10, Sakhalin 10. 400 in total."
According to an article published in the report of the AWF documentation committee, in basin of Yantze River, there
were comfort stations in following cities. Shanghai about 10, Hangzhou 4, Zenjiang 8, Changczhou 1, Yanzhou 1,
Danyang 1, Nanjing about 20, Wuhu 6, Jiujiang 22, Nanchang 11, Hankou 20, Gedian 2, Huarongzen 2, Yingshan 1,
Yichang 2, 125 in total. To this sum we can add one of Suzhou and two of Anqing according to another material.
From this, at least, enumeration of comfort stations in cities, we can already estimate that there were almost as many
comfort stations as that in the 1942 estimate of the War Ministry.
The same article estimated on the basis of individual sources that there were 30 comfort stations in Philippines, over
50 in Burma, and over 40 in Indonesia, for a total of over 120 in these three countries. In the South Sea area at
Rabaul of Solomon Islands there were 6 naval comfort stations and more army comfort stations, in sum 20.
Though in the 1942 estimate of the War Ministry comfort stations in Okinawa were not mentioned, later many
comfort stations were constructed. A scholar estimates that there were over 130 comfort stations in Okinawa.
No survey has been done to determine accurately how many women were taken to the comfort stations of the former
Japanese military, what proportion of them were from Korea, or how many did not return from the battlefields.
First of all, there are no documents with comprehensive data one could use to determine the total number. There are,
however, various opinions on the total number. of comfort women, all based on estimates made by researchers.
The case of Maria Rosa Henson
Estimates vary, depending on the basic assumption applied and the related methodology selected by the person
Maria Rosa L. Henson was born in Pasay City on 5 December 1927. She was an extramarital daughter of a bid landowner
conducting the research. One method is to take the total number of military personnel stationed overseas during the
and his housemaid. She was raped by Japanese soldiers first in February 1942. While she went to fetch firewood with her
Pacific
War,
then
postulate
how many
personnel
there
would
have
been perone
comfort
woman.
This
method
includes
From
Final
Report
(Fullraped
text
here
) Japanese,
uncles the
and
neighbors
for of
herPhilippine
family,
shegovernment
was
caught and
by three
of whom
seemed
to be
an officer..
consideration
of
the
replacement
rate
for
comfort
women,
since
some
were
brought
to
replenish
the
numbers
of the
After two weeks she was again raped by the same Japanese officer, while fetching firewood. She felt strong anger toward
Many
of
the
Lolas
were
taken
forcibly
by
Japanese
soldiers
while
in
their
home.
A
few
were
taken
while
they
were
at
home
Japanese
military,
and joined the HUKBALAHAP, an anti-Japanese guerilla group. A year passed. In April 1943 she was
others being
repatriated.
while
a
few
were
either
or running
an errand
for their and
parents.
them were still
single
were
arrested
by
Japanese
check
point
in the suburbs
of Anheles
takenMany
to theofheadquarters.
There
shebut
wasthere
forced
to other
be a
Estimates at
ofaworking;
Researchers
married
comfort women.
woman. A Lola from Bicol was asleep when the Japanese came to their village and rounded up all men and young
Name
Year of school
Number
of whereParameter
NumberThen,
of they were
women and were taken
in of
the elementary
building;
they were heldReplacement
until the next morning;.
taken
to the
Another
Lola being
was told
by her
mother
to buy
food from
the nearby
town while
the otherthen
onewas
was
Publication
Military
comfort
women
She said
thatmunicipal
during Scholar
thehall.
occupation,
after
raped
the first
time,
she joined
the guerrilla
resistance
movement,
gathering
"sisid"
(wet)
rice
near
the
pier
in
Malabon.
captured, raped again, taken by order of Japanese
military headquarters and confined with other women for nine months,
Personnel
during which time she was raped time after time.
Ikuhiko
Hatamilitary
1993
million whichone
forformer
fifty wither municipal/provincial
1.5
90,000building, big
They were taken to
Japanese
camps or 3garrisons
were
soldiers
private
houses,was
elementary/high
school which
buildings,
churches.
A Lola
narrated
that
all the
a particular
Rosa Henson
taken into a hospital
was hospitals
convertedorinto
a garrison.
Together
with
other
six corners
women,ofshe
was forced
church
in
Manila
had
a
woman
being
raped
by
the
Japanese
every
night.
There
was
even
a
case
where
the
Lola's
house
to provide sex for their
Japanese captor.
months, she
comfort45,000
station which was a
Yoshiaki
1995 After three
3 million
onewas
for transferred
hundred to another
1.5
itself
into
a agarrison.
Aother
tunnel
was reportedly
used
to house
comfort
women.
formerwas
riceconverted
mill. Lola
and
group
of
young
women
were
washing
clothes
when
a
Filipino
collaborator
of the Japanese
Yoshimi
soldiers
suggested that they could earn money from washing clothes for the Japanese soldiers. They went with the collaborator to
Their
period ofsoldiers
confinement
ranged
from three
daysThey
to more
than
a year.
About
25 percent
ofand
them
were
confined for four
one
for
2
200,000
three Japanese
who were
waiting
for them.
were
taken
to a30
two-storey
houses
were
held
months
while 17
percent
wereday
kepttime
for three
months
andsoldiers
percent
were there
for Henson
one month.
there forora longer
year washing
clothes
during
and being
raped
atl6night(
Testimonies
of Rosa
). All the Lolas
reported to have been raped throughout their period of confinement. Seven Japanese soldiers first raped this Lola who hails
Sutheir
Zhiliang
1999
million
30 interrogated.
3.5 And every
360,000
from the Visayas in
house while
the other 3family
members one
werefor
being
night thereafter for
seven days, three to five Japanese soldiers raped her. A Lola fromsoldiers
Manila was raped a4month after 410,000
her capture. Of her six to
seven month confinement in the garrison, three or more soldiers continuously raped her about three times a week.