However, the dates of the materials entering the warehouse recorded in this journal made Yang Jing feel confused.
The first batch of materials entering the warehouse as recorded in the ledger was in May 1943, which is almost the same date as the date when Terauchi Juichi signed the first letter in the "chain letter". In other words, Terauchi Juichi must have decided to do this at the time, so he launched the chain signature and directly allocated a part of the looted property to secretly disaster the secret base.
In the chain letter found in the shipwreck, the first person who also initiated this chain signature was Terauchi Hisaichi. The reason for launching this chain signature was also closely related to the fact that Yamamoto Isoroku was killed by the Americans in April of that year. Otherwise, if Yamamoto Isoroku had not died, it might not have been Terauchi Hisaichi's turn to initiate this matter.
The death of Yamamoto Isoroku made Terauchi Hisaichi realize the tension of the situation. Of course, long before Yamamoto Isoroku's death, the property looted from China and Southeast Asia had already been transported back to Japan and hidden in various secret bases in Japan.
But the homeland is the homeland, and it is obviously unsafe to put all the eggs in one basket. Perhaps it was precisely because of this realization that Isoroku Yamamoto proposed to build a secret warehouse outside the homeland to store the property looted from all over the place.
To be fair, the plan of diverting finances proposed by Isoroku Yamamoto was a good one, but unfortunately, the reason why the Imperial Headquarters did not give a clear answer was probably directly related to Emperor Hirohito at the time.
Ever since the discovery of the serial letters in the sunken Daiichi Shinko Maru, Yang Jing has been taking time to study some Japanese materials from the World War II period.
Japan is a poor island country with few resources to use, so Japan has repeatedly launched wars against other countries. They did not launch wars out of boredom, but because they had no other choice. Without resources, they could not develop, and if they could not develop, they would be bullied by others.
China, with its vast territory and abundant resources, has always been the object of the devil's coveted and has always been ranked first. Therefore, after the Opium War, the devil would constantly target the weak China and eventually invade China, starting China's iron-blooded but extremely tragic journey of resistance.
But no matter what, whether the Japanese invaded China or Southeast Asia, it was all for the huge resources. One of these resources was used to feed back to the Japanese. After all, if the Japanese wanted to develop rapidly and sustainably, they could not do without these resources and wealth. But at the same time, while plundering these wealth and resources, the Japanese royal family also did not forget to make a lot of money.
That is, the resources and wealth that Japan plundered from East Asia, Southeast Asia and even the Southwest Pacific over the years were divided into two parts. Most of them were handed over to Japan's top leaders to develop Japan's economic and military power, and a part of them was intercepted by the Japanese royal family.
Before World War II, the Japanese royal family was the real head of Japan. The royal family used wars to plunder a lot of wealth from all over the world, which was considered a legitimate thing by the Japanese.
So how much wealth did the Japanese royal family rob during the entire World War II and the invasion of China? This amount is probably unknown to outsiders except for the few people who presided over this matter. But it is absolutely not an exaggeration to use the word "amount" to describe the wealth looted by the Japanese royal family from various Asian countries.
As Japan launched a full-scale war of aggression against China and the Pacific War broke out, the Japanese army quickly spread throughout Southeast Asia and set up a secret organization called "Golden Lily" to plunder the property of Asian people. Emperor Hirohito appointed Prince Takeda Tsunesuke, a member of the imperial family, as the head of the organization, and several other imperial princes, such as Prince Asaka Naruhiko and Prince Kan'in Sainin, also participated in this mission.
Yang Jing once read a report in some materials that when the Japanese army captured Nanjing, the capital of China at that time, in 1937, they not only massacred hundreds of thousands of Chinese people and committed heinous crimes, but the Japanese royal family also used the "Golden Lily" to personally participate in the robbery of treasures.
In Nanjing, the Japanese military police special operations team searched everywhere, seized the property of the Chinese government, robbed the gold, jewelry, artwork and currency of wealthy businessmen and others, and even knocked out the gold teeth on the corpses. During this period alone, the Japanese looted at least 6,000 tons of gold.
These looted treasures were shipped directly from Shanghai to Japan, or transported to Northeast China by train or car for processing. Rare metals were graded, and other jewelry was melted and recast into gold ingots of uniform size before being shipped back to Japan. In addition, the Japanese military also sent the gang leader Kodama Yoshio to China to rob the ill-gotten gains of the gangs in China at that time. At first, Kodama loaded too much gold and silver on the plane to Japan, and the landing gear was crushed before takeoff. Later, he had to collect only the largest and best quality rubies, sapphires and diamonds...
In addition to precious metals such as gold, Japan also looted cultural relics, books, copper-nickel coins and other valuables from China. The total value is so amazing that it is still impossible to estimate. After crossing North Korea, these treasures were shipped back to Japan and became the property of the Japanese royal family.
At the same time, Japanese terrorists also plundered a large amount of gold and silver treasures in Southeast Asia. In addition to the countries invaded by Japan, the targets of Japan's robbery also included individuals, churches, temples, silver companies and underground economic groups in the occupied areas. In the late 1940s, it was estimated that the "spoils" obtained by Japan in Southeast Asia were nearly 100 billion US dollars, and there were many priceless treasures, which caused inestimable losses to the Asian people.
At that time, the Japanese army's behavior in Southeast Asia was not much worse than that in China. People in Southeast Asia generally believed in Buddhism, so there were many temples in Southeast Asia at that time. At that time, the Japanese army just rushed into the temples, robbed any valuables they saw, and even scraped off all the gold foil on the Buddha and took it away.
Just like the first batch of materials recorded in this diary, it was most likely gold foil scraped off the Buddha body in a temple in Southeast Asia.
The Japanese also believed in Buddhism, but they even robbed temples at that time, which shows how crazy the Japanese were at that time!
How much wealth was robbed? The answer is simple. When the situation in the Pacific Ocean became increasingly tense and unfavorable to Japan, the crazy Japanese army began to desperately transport the wealth to the mainland, but they could not even transport all the wealth. This shows how much wealth the Japanese robbed in Southeast Asia at that time!
PS: I’m going to the airport soon and will be home today.
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