In the final moments of the Second World War, all prisoners were killed to conceal evidence. Estimates of those killed by Unit 731 and its related programs range up to half a million people, and none of the inmates survived. Additionally, Unit 731 produced biological weapons that were used in areas of China not occupied by Japanese forces, which included Chinese cities and towns, water sources, and fields. The victims also came from different nationalities, with the majority being Chinese and a significant minority being Russian. Victims included not only kidnapped men, women (including pregnant women) and children but also babies born from the systemic rape perpetrated by the staff inside the compound. It routinely conducted tests on people who were dehumanized and internally referred to as 'logs.' Experiments included disease injections, controlled dehydration, biological weapons testing, hypobaric pressure chamber testing, vivisection, organ harvesting, amputation, and standard weapons testing. Unit 731 was responsible for some of the most notorious war crimes committed by the Japanese armed forces.

It was based in the Pingfang district of Harbin, the largest city in the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo (now Northeast China, formerly named Manchuria) and had active branch offices throughout China and Southeast Asia.

It killed an estimated 200,000 to 300,000 people. Unit 731 ( Japanese: ７（なな）３（さん）１（いち）部（ぶ）隊（たい）, Hepburn: Nana-san-ichi Butai ), short for Manshu Detachment 731 and also known as the Kamo Detachment : 198 and the Ishii Unit, was a covert biological and chemical warfare research and development unit of the Imperial Japanese Army that engaged in lethal human experimentation and biological weapons manufacturing during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) and World War II.

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