SDHF Newsletter No.89 THE ANATOMY OF A FALSEHOOD

THE ANATOMY OF A FALSEHOOD
Hisae Kennedy
January 28, 2015

Asia Pacific Journal carried an article about testimony given by Matsumoto Masayoshi. The 92-year-old resident of Sagamihara City (Kanagawa prefecture) is a former Christian minister who served as a medical corpsman in China during World War II. The author of the article is David McNeill, an Irish journalist. McNeill has consistently written articles that are anti-Japanese in nature. This one begins as follows.
“If we don’t face our past, we’re bound to repeat the same mistakes.” Japanese wartime medical orderly reports on army’s role in maintaining “comfort women” system.
According to Matsumoto, when Japanese troops raided a village, they would capture any women who were unable to escape, take them back to their barracks, and rape them. He also provided descriptions of his physical examinations of the women.
Ms. Kennedy together with American journalist Michael Yon and researcher Alfred Johnson visited Mr. Matsumoto at his residence and made a direct interview on this issue. The result was really astounding.
Firstly, Mr. Matsumoto denied that he met David McNeill. He further strongly criticized that Yoshida Seiji was a liar. He said that “Before they were comfort women, they were prostitute.” However, he had misconception about Women’s Volunteer Corps. perhaps through leftwing media. Even though he never witnessed abduction or war crimes against comfort women he thought comfort women were abducted from their home and raped. A falsehood was created by no intentional will.
Ms. Kennedy analyses how such false story developed adopting psychology of Dr. Elizabeth Loftus. For more detail you are recommended to read her essay.

*Essay: https://www.sdh-fact.com/CL02_1/131_S4.pdf

Questions are welcome.

MOTEKI Hiromichi, Secretary General
for KASE Hideaki, Chairman
Society for the Dissemination of Historical Fact