On December 13, 1987, exactly 50 years had passed since the Nanjing Massacre. On this day, an elderly Japanese man came to Nanjing, and his hands were also stained with blood. But when he walked to the monument, he slowly knelt down with his legs bent, deeply repented to those compatriots who had suffered the disaster, and bravely exposed the atrocities of the Japanese army to the world. Who is this repentant Japanese veteran? What kind of experience did he have in this life? Let's go back to 1912 and re-understand the life of this Japanese veteran who repented.
His name is Higashi Shiro, and he was born in 1912 in Kyoto, Japan. In early 1937, he responded to the Emperor's call to join the army and began his destined extraordinary life. Higashi Shiro had a habit of keeping a diary, so what happened during that time was basically recorded in its entirety. On September 1, Higashi Shiro was ready to officially set off with the troops, and his mother also came to bid him farewell. However, after the two met, there were no warm words, only a strange exhortation from the mother: you can go with peace of mind, and if you are unfortunate enough to be captured, you will directly cut yourself off. After saying that, he handed over a small knife used to cut his abdomen.
On December 13, Dong Shilang's troops broke through the gates of Nanjing, and immediately began a terrible massacre. At that time, Higashi Shiro was still a "hot-blooded" soldier, and although he was sometimes surprised by the actions of some soldiers, he also participated in many killing operations. It can also be seen in the diary that during that time, Under the command of the commander of the troops, Higashi Shiro completely turned into a bloodthirsty demon. After that, he followed the troops all the way and participated in the battles in Xinxiang, Wuhan, Xiangdong and other places. In August 1939, Higashi Shiro returned to China to recuperate as a soldier, and five years later he was conscripted into the army again, but the Japanese army was already dying at that time. On August 15, 1945, Emperor Hirohito delivered a surrender speech, and Higashi Shiro's unit surrendered in Shanghai, after which he also returned to Japan smoothly and began a peaceful and prosperous life.
What changed in Higashi Shiro's heart after the end of the war is now unknown. But at the 1987 Kyoto Peace Fair, Higashi Shiro published his diary, and materials including the Nanjing Disaster were presented to the public. He said that he had participated in that war, and the things he had done could not be erased, and now some people may have "forgotten" what happened at that time, but he could often review the contents of his diary, and those scenes often appeared in his mind. In order to reflect on the crimes he had committed in those years, and also to apologize to those innocent people, he took out all the information in his hands. In December, the Diary of Higashi Shiro was officially published, which became ironclad evidence of the crimes committed by the Japanese army in Nanjing. On December 13, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Nanjing catastrophe, Dong Shilang came to Nanjing and knelt down in front of the monument to deeply repent.
In 1993, a Japanese man named Mitsuharu Hashimoto took Higashi Shiro to court for untruthful records, followed by an eight-year lawsuit. In order to expose the truth of history to the world, Dong Shilang also came to Nanjing and other places 6 times to collect evidence, and each time he apologized to the people of Nanjing. Although he finally lost the case, he never stopped moving towards the truth and fought with those people. Even though he was scolded as a traitor, a traitor, and even though he had always been intimidated, Higashi Shilang still insisted on his heart, participated in various investigation activities, and donated various materials such as diaries to the memorial hall, once again laying a nail in the truth of the Nanjing catastrophe.
On January 3, 2006, Director Zhu Chengshan received bad news from Japan, and Mr. Higashi Shiro died of illness that morning at the age of 93. The Memorial Hall of the Compatriots Killed in the Nanjing Massacre of the Japanese Army Invading China was also the first time to send condolences to Dong Shilang's family, and then Nanjing City also sent people to attend his funeral. In honor of this repentant Japanese veteran and the brave warrior, a memorial service was held in the memorial hall on January 4. The survivors of the Nanjing catastrophe, Chang Zhiqiang and Jiang Genfu, arrived, and they were also impressed by this brave old man. Duan Yueping, who was initially looking for evidence, also came to the scene and bowed to this warrior who insisted on the truth.
Toshiro participated in the invasion and massacre, a fact that cannot be changed. Of course, he can also hide all this and try to prevent people from finding the truth, but Toshiro still stands up in the face of various threats and gives a heavy blow to those who try to falsify history, and he successfully changed from a ghost to a human, and this courage and responsibility are worthy of admiration.