The Kenpeitai in Java and Sumatra

Book excerpt: This collection of memoirs by the Japanese military police (the Kenpeitai) of World War II is often infuriating and frustrating (these disciplined and fanatical former officers freely terrorized and repressed the native populations of Southeast Asia for such crimes as Marxism, Islam, and nationalism). Yet they are documents of great historical significance. The men are self-deceiving and self-glorifying rather than apologetic or self-critical, but the reader is allowed a rare glimpse of what a mind or mind-set justifies to itself during a state of war. These memoirs (only certain Indonesian sections are published here) clarify obscure motives and historical moments of the events during the Pacific War and the Japanese occupation.