Over 100,000 women across Asia were victims of enforced prostitution by the Japanese Imperial Forces during World War II. Until as recently as 1993 the Japanese government continued to deny this shameful aspect of its wartime history. George Hicks's book is the only history in English regarding this terrible enslavement of women.

One of the ravages of war has always been rape, but in the 1930s and '40s the Imperial Japanese Forces made it systematic, forcing thousands of women into sexual slavery for their soldiers at highly organized "comfort stations." Drawn mostly from Korea (which was then ruled by Japan), the "comfort women" who tell their horrific stories in this book were shipped to the front lines and all over the war zones, often arriving in the same shipments with munitions and food. Like those staples, their sexual services were intended to keep an army working and alive; a common superstition among the troops was the belief that sex before battle could magically ward off injury. This searing, painful chapter in history was uncovered in part by a Japanese journalist, who came across photos of the women in classified documents.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

NOTE ON NAMES, INSTITUTIONS AND EXCHANGE VALUES

INTRODUCTION

1. Mars and Venus

2. The flesh market

3. Sex in a war zone

4. The Shanghai Regulations and their variations

5. The Empire of the Sun

6. The end of a nightmare, the beginning of another

7. Consciousness-raising and exposure

8. The politics of sex

9. The governments speak up

10. The international dimensions

Conclusion

SELECT ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX