This Enemy?
p. 22 · Read in the full issue
Do We Wish
To Forgive
IN Manus, New Guinea, this month, an Australian court began to try 90 former Japanese officers on charges of war crimes—mostly the murder of Aus tralian servicemen who were taken prisoners.
Some reports of the court proceedings are inclined to become maudlin over the now “repentant” Japs, and their long delayed trial.
Australian newspapers are recom mended to go back to the records of 1942-44, and read details of the wav in which defenceless men and women were butchered. How about the large party which was captured in the jungle when escaping from Rabaul and slaughtered, one by one, on Tol Plantation? How about the two young Australian mission nurses who were led out to a newly-dug grave in North-east Papua and killed?
How about the 22 helpless prisoners (17 young New Zealand coast-watchers and five civilians) who were systematically butchered in Tarawa, because American bombers had made attacks on the fortress the Japs were building there?
And how about the 1,500 Australian soldiers who were taken out on that North Borneo death-march by these gentle Japanese, and of whom only five survived?
It would be well to remind ourselves, occasionally, that the leopard does not change his spots, and that the Oriental is a master of subterfuge.