Elizabeth,
I’m inclined to doubt that many (perhaps any) Koreans were officers in the Imperial Japanese Army.
My doubt stems from the contempt the Japanese had for the Koreans they exploited in their Korean colony.
That doesn’t mean Koreans weren’t in positions of authority over civilian and military prisoners, but not necessarily as IJA officers.
There were various people and organisations attached to Japanese enterprises in occupied territories.
Koreans were generally at the bottom of the pile in any Japanese hierarchy.
My knowledge comes from the experience of Australians under Nippon.
Being at the bottom of the pile is almost certainly one of the reasons that Korean guards were often more brutal than Japanese guards in dealing with Australian prisoners on the Burma Railway and elsewhere. They were the brutalised victims of a brutal system able to vent their anger on people who couldn’t defend themselves. Just an exaggerated version of the harried Western office worker who comes home and kicks his dog after a bad day.
Here’s a link which illustrates the differences between what Australian POW’s on the Burma Railway during the war thought about being mistreated by an ostensibly Japanese guard (although in some cases it was worked out sooner or later that these blokes were really Koreans) and the self-serving version of Lee, the Korean guard.http://japanfocus.org/products/details/2505
This illustrates the possible difference between what prisoners thought and the actual rank and power of a guard or commandant.
Lee served as a supervisor of the prisoners at Hintok. As a civilian hired by the Japanese military, he was lower down on the chain of command than a private. However in the trial proceedings, he had somehow been transformed into the “Camp Commandant.” The reason for this was that the military prosecutors took the testimony of the prisoners at their word, without an objective investigation into the situation. Most of the Australian prisoners did not know Lee’s Japanese name. Instead, they gave the various guards nicknames, which in the case of Lee was “lizard.” The origin of this name is unknown.
It is surmised that the testimonies of imprisoned officers Richard Allen and Reginald Houston played a key role, as they stated that Lee was the officer in charge of the prison labor camp. Perhaps with some unease, the prosecutor admitted there was uncertainty regarding Lee’s official position, but that in actuality he had assumed the position of officer in charge.
According to testimonies of prisoners at the time, Lee was often at odds with the Australian army surgeon and Lieutenant Colonel E. E. Dunlop as he tried to meet the demands of the Japanese engineer corps to deploy laborers. Dunlop insisted that wounded soldiers not be used. The prisoners soon developed an animosity toward those Koreans directly overseeing them. Soldier Austin Pipe recounted that “lizard” was responsible for sending prisoners to work on the railroad, and others recalled that Lee had assaulted Dunlop. But other prisoners testified that Lee was among the gentler of the guards and had not assaulted Dunlop. For example, Captain Richard Allen testified that he could not recall Dunlop ever having been attacked by Lee, and that Lee was less brutal than the other guards. However, the vast majority of the testimony was unfavorable toward Lee. In order to sort out the war criminals, Australian investigators took pictures of the prison guards and showed them to the POWs. Those suspected of war crimes were then arrested and put on trial. There were no cross-examinations. Lee admitted to slapping those who disobeyed the rules, but denied taking any other harsh measures. It was difficult to gauge just exactly how much authority was granted to the Korean youth.
http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_international/196269.html
You will note that although Lee had the power of life and death over POW’s and wore a uniform, he wasn’t actually a Japanese soldier, or even anyone with any real authority in the Japanese army system. But the prisoners thought he was.
As with some other things since WWII, I think Lee is trying to revise history to put himself in a better light, because he was a bastard at Hintok when he had the power but now wants to portray himself as another victim of the Japanese. I don’t doubt he was, in part, but I judge his actions at the time on what he did then, not the way he tries to revise them now. The fact is, he chose to apply for a job as a prison guard and as an old man has the temerity to seek compensation from Japan for doing what he volunteered to do.
I’m afraid I see it as part of pattern of revisionism in both Korea and Japan as neither nation wants to admit the realities of their bad pasts. That includes the current hot issue of Korean comfort women, who in reality in many cases were sold by their parents to people who sold them on to the Japanaese army, but nobody wants to admit that now because it puts Korea in a bad light.
