Behind the curtain of World War II history lies a darker, lesser-known theatre of horror — one not waged with bullets or bombs, but bacteria. In this episode of Hangar 51 Files, we unseal the archives on Japan’s notorious Unit 731: a secretive biological warfare programme that turned human experimentation into a military science.

From the icy compounds of Manchukuo to the corridors of postwar Allied intelligence, we follow the trail of human suffering and scientific ambition—where plague, cholera, and anthrax became weapons, and prisoners became mere “logs” in the name of imperial research.

We investigate:

* The rise of ultramilitarism and its corruption of medical ethics

* The experimental atrocities of Unit 731 and its sister unit, Unit 100

* Japan’s bioweapons deployment plans against China, the USSR — even the U.S.

* The post-war scramble to suppress, exploit, and whitewash the programme

* How Cold War priorities trumped justice — and turned war crimes into research opportunities

This isn’t just a history of science gone rogue — it’s a story of realpolitik, secrecy, and the uncomfortable truth that some files were never meant to be opened… until now.

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