From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Yamashita's Gold, as is the broad term for the billions of dollars in gold looted from East Asia by Japan during World War II. The gold itself is belived to have been anything from gold bullion to religous statues. The idea was that the gold from Asia would finance Japan's war effort, since that nation is poor in resources. The gold had to be transported from the continent back to Japan, via the sea. Most of the stolen gold from South East Asia was first shiped to the port of Singapore, where it was then relayed to the Philippines. From the Philippines the gold was intended to be shiped to the Japanese home islands. However, as the war in the Pacific progressed, the US Navy took a heavy toll on Japan's shiping. The Japanese then took the gold and hid it in caves and underground complexes throughout the Philippines, hoping to recover it after the war was over. However, many of those who knew of the locations of the gold were either executed or incarcirated for war crimes, including General Tomoyuki Yamashita, the General in charge of the Philippines, and aleged ringleader of the operation. Thus, the wereabouts of the gold were lost. Many have attempted expiditions to recover the gold, most turn up empty handed. Ferdinand Marcos claimed to have discovered the location of the gold and used it to finance his lifestyle. This has been discredited, and Marcos was proven to be a ruthless dictator who stole from the Filipino treasury.
A number of fictionalized creations involved Yamashita's Gold. Among them the computer game Medal of Honor: Rising Sun and a Filipino film, Yamashita: The Tiger's Treasure [1].
