American Marines posing with a collection of Japanese skulls, Pacific Theater, WW2. Trophy-taking was so widespread that by 1944, declaring bones at Hawaii customs had become routine procedure. (600×453)
by EaterofGrief
American Marines posing with a collection of Japanese skulls, Pacific Theater, WW2. Trophy-taking was so widespread that by 1944, declaring bones at Hawaii customs had become routine procedure. (600×453)
by EaterofGrief
8 Comments
Teeth, skulls, ears, noses, the U.S. military had to officially ban trophy-taking twice during the war. It didn’t work. When Japanese remains were repatriated from the Mariana Islands in 1984, around 60% of the bodies were missing their skulls.
Worth noting: [Japan’s Unit 731 ](https://www.utterlyinteresting.com/post/unit-731-japan-s-horrific-human-experiments-program-during-world-war-ii)conducted live human experiments on POWs on an industrial scale. The Pacific War was brutal on both sides, this is just one part of that story. More on the US trophy taking can be read about [here](https://www.utterlyinteresting.com/post/american-mutilation-japanese-war-dead).
(Both of the above hyperlinks are very Not Safe For Work)
The War was incredibly brutal for all sides involved. My grandfather served in the Australian Navy in the Pacific theatre, he told stories of cutting the hands off their own men caught in homosexual acts and throwing them overboard to drown. Fucked up stuff.
It’s kinda nuts to think that the average American (conscript) would so easily behead and defile enemy corpses for entertainment.
Ok. The Japanese military did far worse. Far worse… specifically to civilian populations they invaded. This should shock no one.
A lot of those skull were from the shallow sand graves of the native islander. When the heavy rains came graves would gun uncovered and wash the graves out
Just shows what all people are capable of. We are all born with the capability for savagery and the only thing separating us from barbarism is the thin veneer of so called civilization that’s low key class warfare and survival.
And then these men went home and became fathers … (if they weren’t already).
Fucking ghouls