"This is not a mad act of a legion, but a premeditated purpose of the Japanese High Command!" —Mortsto Farnorland, Acting Head of the Philippine Red Cross.
Mortsto Farnorland, an American pastor, served as head of the Red Cross in Manila, the largest city in the Philippines, during World War II.
In 1942, japan took the place of the Americans in the Philippines, and Mortsto Fano had the opportunity to escape, but chose to remain in Manila for the sake of public welfare.
In February 1945, when the Japanese, already premonitioned defeated, began a massacre of the citizens of Manila, Mortsto Fano, one of the witnesses, testified at a post-war military tribunal to punish Japanese war criminals, revealing the tragedies he had witnessed.
He said: At about 10 a.m. on February 12, 1945, a Japanese officer led more than 20 Japanese soldiers into LaSalle University and forcibly brought more than 70 people at the university, including 30 women and young girls, 15 monks, 1 priest and 4 adult men from families, to the playground. With a single order, the Japanese soldiers began to kill them one by one by shooting, slashing, and piercing. Three girls, covered in blood, were slashed and humiliated by several Japanese soldiers. Subsequently, Japanese soldiers set fire to classrooms, and many people who did not escape were burned to death. These things can also be proved by the abbot who escaped the disaster.
On February 23, Japanese soldiers broke into a hospital near the Citadel of Santiago and killed both paramedics and patients. Japanese soldiers also forced more than 50 TB patients into a small stone building, locked iron doors, and threw petrol bottles and grenades through windows just to listen to the screams inside. Poor young nurses, without exception, were ravaged, and a few were nailed to the wall by Japanese soldiers as targets for shooting. The others were either stabbed to death by Japanese soldiers or disemboweled.
On February 24, Japanese soldiers killed all the prisoners in the dungeon, most of whom were arrested for resisting the Japanese. The dungeon was 15 feet wide and 18 feet long, and Japanese soldiers fired indiscriminately into the dungeon and threw grenades and Molotov cocktails. No one can say exactly how many prisoners there are in the dungeon. It was not until the American counter-offensive into Manila that the dungeon's iron gates were opened. According to a U.S. military commander, the bodies were glued together and many of them were broken, so it was difficult to count, the rough estimate was between 250-300, all the bodies were skinny, and it was obvious that the Japanese did not feed them for a long time before killing them, deliberately killing them in starvation.
The Japanese had gone completely insane, and even the Spanish consulate would not let it go. Although the Spanish flag was prominently displayed in front of the Spanish consulate, the Japanese burned the consulate. More than 50 Spaniards in the consulate were killed by burning and slashing.
Japanese soldiers captured a large number of women and children hiding in a Spanish-run shelter on Taft Avenue. Immediately afterward, the Japanese soldiers, including the Japanese expatriates, held out their clutches to the women in front of the children and killed them in all kinds of cruel ways after humiliation, the children cried out in fright, and the Japanese stabbed and slashed at the poor children with daggers and bayonets. Several Spanish monks cursed the Japanese loudly and tried to rescue the children. The Japanese, apparently enraged by their actions, herded the monks into a hut and threw in a few grenades. When the Japanese left, people went in to try to find the survivors, and five of the hundreds survived, one of whom had his arms cut off by the Japanese, and four of whom were severely burned and stabbed, but fortunately they all survived.
Mortsto Farnorland has a diary that he did an investigation after the Japanese began the Manila Massacre, and in the area where he lived, more than 1,300 civilians, including pregnant women, were killed by the Japanese, while the youngest was only two years old. What he saw was only a corner of the Massacre in Manila, many more poignant images that he had only heard of, but had not seen for himself. The images he saw alone were enough to prove that every Japanese soldier was guilty, and none of them were innocent. Therefore, he said the opening words: "This is not a crazy act of a legion, but a premeditated purpose of the Japanese High Command!" ”