This is by far the best book available on this sordid chapter in Japan's history. Yuki Tanaka's sophisticated and textured assessment of Japan's institutionalized system of sexual slavery draws on a rich array of sources and sheds new light on the larger historical context of ". . . how sex is used and abused to maintain military organization and discipline."
The suffering of tens of thousands of teenage girls, ignored for half a century, is recounted in graphic detail. Those in Japan who seek to deny, minimize, rationalize or mitigate this inhumane system can no longer evade the powerful indictments argued so compellingly in "Japan's Comfort Women." Tanaka's dispassionate and logical analysis of the evidence and what it implies leaves little wiggle room for Japan's Dr. Feelgoods and their popular attempts to conjure up a glorious, exculpatory and unstained version of the country's conduct during World War II.
Tanaka counters by placing the comfort women in the larger historical context of Japan's economic and military expansion, beginning with the "karayuki-san" (prostitutes) in the late 19th century. At this time, Japanese women were sent to overseas brothels run by Japanese men that were scattered about Southeast Asia. Their earnings and remittances were a crucial source of capital feeding development in Japan, and they spearheaded Japanese economic penetration of the region.