“Comfort Women” is a term applied to sexual slaves of Japan during World War Two. This terminology is obviously one sided, ignoring the victims point of view. It originated from the Japanese word Wianbu. It us unclear how many “comfort women”, there were, but it is estimated to be at least 50,000 to possibly 300,000 women. Most women involved were from Korea and China, but also from the Dutch East Indies, the Phillipines, Taiwan, and other parts of Asia. As of the date of this writing, the Japanese government has never made a formal specific apology to these women. Those that are fighting to get such an apology, specifically for the Koreans, do not use the term Comfort Women out of respect. They instead use the Korean word for grandmother, “Halmoni.”
The origins of this sexual slavery stem from the Russo Japanese war of 1904-1905, during which many soldiers got STDs from raping women in Russian villages. When Japan began expanding it’s empire in the Pacific during the 1930s, the government set up a system to organize brothels or “Comfort Stations” to boost soliders morale and lower STD rates. Women were sold, lured with the promise of a factory job, or sometimes just kidnapped and taken to the brothels. Soldiers would come to these brothels all day, and the women sometimes had sex with 30 or more a day. The men were supposed to wear condoms, but sometimes refused, and the condoms were often repeatedly re-used anyway. Though techinically it was prostitution, the brothel owners often kept the soldiers money for themselves. Every 7-10 days the women were tested for STDs. Regulations required only STD free women could be with the soldiers, but some owners ignored these rules, and many women caught venereal diseases. If a woman had Syphillis they would get 606 injections or toxic mercury. Often they would be taken away from their homeland to other parts of the Japanese Empire, partly so local populations wouldn’t see their own women exerience this. Escape was next to impossible, and if one did manage to escape, they were lost in a foreign country anyway and often recaptured. Those who refused to have sex were tortured and killed. I met one women who described seeing a girl cut in half with a sword for refusing to “service” the soldiers. Other accounts tell of women being buried alive, forced to lay on a bed of spikes, and other atrocities.
After the war some women were killed by retreating Japanese soldiers, others commited suicide. Those that survived were temporarily sheltered at allied POW camps. Some were lost at sea after taking ships home that were bombed by the allies. Some managed to return home, but others stayed in the foriegn lands they’d been brought to. Korean women that returned home were ashamed and silent. Most Koreans didn’t talk about the issue or didn’t know about it, even though many victims suffered from health issues like bladder infections, fallopian tube disorder, and endometriosis. Not to mention the pschological scars they must have felt.
Finally in August of 1991, Hak-Soon Kim spoke out to the Korean media. After this many of Koreans came forward to tell their stories. (There was a Korean living in Okinawa named Pong-Ki Pae, who told her story in 1977, but she was not known to the Korean general public for a long time.)
What has followed since was a Korean, and then international movement for Japan to confess their crimes. The Japanese government has consistently denied the existence of such atrocities. Among the many counterclaims are that the comfort stations were privately run and not run by the military, that it was volunteer based/the women were not forced, or that it simply never happened. “Nonsense Speaking” is the general English term some Japanese give to general wartime atrocities, including comfort women. However some Japanese scholars have uncovered documents proving the Halmoni’s claims.
In 1992 a Buddhist human rights group opened The House of Sharing in Korea, which is a place for these now elderly women to live in community with each other. Currently there are monthly tours available for foreigners to meet and speak to the Halmonis and talk about the issue. I got to do one of these tours maybe a month ago. The House of Sharing also has a museum about the atrocities. On 1/8/92, the Halmonis began a weekly Wednesday demonstration in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul. There they continue to demand that the Japanese government make a formal admission and apology. The protests occur every week at noon regardless of the weather.
It is 2008, and the Halmonis are now in their 70s and 80s. Both Hak-Soon Kim and Pong ki Pae have passed away, and one of the Halmonies at Sharing House died earlier this year. These women will not walk the earth much longer, and continue to protest and tell their stories in the hopes of gaining some consolation in their lifetime. It is the hope of many worldwide that Japan does the right thing, and does it soon, so that these women around the world may pass on with peace and dignity.
For more information see
http://comfortwomen.wordpress.com/
www.nanum.org
(Originally published on myspace on 7/3/08)
