Willy Rudolf Foerster (15 July 1905 – 19 February 1966) was a German engineer and industrialist in Japan who rescued Jews during the Holocaust. He founded the F. & K. Engineering Company and the German-Japanese Machine Tool Company, called Nichidoku Kikai Seisakujo, in Tokyo. Foerster was a leading industrialist and one of the richest foreigners in Japan.
Early life
Born in Reichenbach im Vogtland, Germany in 1905, the son of a textile engineer. Studied mechanical engineering in Zwickau and Berlin and worked for both Krupp and BMW.
War
Rescue of Jewish refugees
With the help of the "Jewish Refugee Committee" he employed a sizable number of Jewish refugees from Germany and the occupied territories in his company. Being anti-Nazi, he organized, together with the "Jewish Refugee Committee" in Tokyo, the entry of his new employees and their families to Japan. Despite the enormous pressure of the Nazi party and the German missions abroad in Tokyo and Yokohama, he refused to dismiss his staff members. Publicly he dissociated himself from NS policy and called himself a "stateless person".
Hans Alexander Straus (Columbia Records) and Karl Rosenberg (Liebermann-Waelchli & Co.) in Tokyo, who organized the committee, received application documents from persecuted Jews in Germany and the German-occupied territories which they forwarded to Foerster. Foerster then provided a free passage to Japan. The family men worked at Foerster's company and their children attended school. In this way, a sizable number of Jewish refugees from Germany, Austria, and other countries, such as Czechoslovakia, came to Japan. In a letter written in 1939 to a stateless Jewish engineer in Germany, who had lost his job because of his Jewish descent, Rosenberg described Foerster as a man of "extraordinary independence, full of character and without prejudice". But even though the engineer was able to provide a passport without imprinted "J" and an employment contract with Foerster's company, the Japanese denied the entry of the family. But Foerster – as Rosenberg described – "worked desperately" to get a permission for the family to enter Japan. At least, like in other cases, he was successful. Shortly afterwards Rosenberg noted overjoyed, that Foerster was able, "despite extreme difficulties", to convince the Japanese authorities. Several other cases are documented. At the end of 1940, Foerster saved the children of one of his employees in Vienna from deportation to a concentration camp. Some months after their arrival in Japan they were deprived of citizenship by the German consulate in Yokohama. But Foerster was able to prevent the deportation of the whole family to the Shanghai Ghetto at the very last moment.
Defamation as an alleged criminal by German diplomats
Because of his resistance work, Foerster was defamed as an alleged criminal by German diplomats in Tokyo and Yokohama. For this purpose, they used a forged criminal record, which they spread in the German community. After the war, it was also handed over by the Japanese to the Allied Forces in Japan to discredit Foerster. It was based on the criminal record of a namesake of Foerster. This man was imprisoned several times in Germany for theft, dealing with stolen goods, and sexual crimes. He was born in 1890 in Reichenbrand near Chemnitz and not in 1905 in Reichenbach in the Vogtland. His records clearly show that he was imprisoned from 23 July 1937 until 23 June 1938 in the prison of Hoheneck in Germany. At this time Foerster was already living in Japan for years as a successful businessman. But later SCAP included the forged criminal record into the Foerster-file, which led, in combination with false statements of interested parties, e. g. former officials, to the destruction of Foerster's credibility.
Arrest
Because of his strong opposition against NS policy and anti-Semitism he, his Japanese wife Hideko Foerster, and several employees were arrested on 24 May 1943 by the Japanese Kenpeitai at the instigation of German authorities, who fraudulently denounced him as a "Soviet spy". Foerster was tortured (also by Josef Meisinger) and forced to sell his factory to a Japanese company. He was imprisoned for more than a year and released on 13 June 1944. Foerster was acquitted on being a "spy" by a Japanese court, but he was sentenced on probation i. a. because of anti-war propaganda and stirring up the public. Some days later he was placed under house arrest.