However, in 1940, when his profits declined, he put a substantial portion of his remaining wealth into a plan to build a restaurant in Manchuria, which turned out to be an investment scam.

At this time, Mr. Park's brother-in-law was involved in recruiting Korean comfort women and sending them overseas to provide sexual services to Japanese soldiers.

Partly because of his financial difficulties, Mr. Park decided in 1942 to travel to Japanese-occupied Southeast Asia with his brother-in-law to manage a comfort station, and he stayed there until 1944.

On February 1, 1944, he started work at a comfort station called "Kikusui Club", which he continued to manage until December 16, 1944, when he left for home.

[3] Mr. Park's daily responsibilities were to man the front desk at the station between around 2:00 PM and 1:00 AM, to take the guests to the comfort women's rooms and to record all profits and expenditures.

[10] Some of Mr. Park's other frequent responsibilities included shopping for daily goods, collecting and distributing rations, maintaining his car, and attending air raid watches.

[9] According to the diary, the comfort women sometimes received leaves of absence if they became pregnant, regular examinations for sexually transmitted infections, and medical care.

Mr. Park mentions that many of his fellow Korean comfort station managers also owned a diverse range of other investments throughout Asia, including cafeterias, factories, and confectionaries in places like Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand.

[10] Though Mr. Park was often nostalgic for his Korean hometown,[12] his business did allow him to live a comfortable life while overseas and he spent lavishly on clothing, shoes, and watches for himself.

According to Kan Kimura, the diary is "highly credible", noting that Mr. Park died before the comfort women issue became a source of tension between Japan and South Korea.

[16] In the diary, Mr. Park stated that he left Korea in 1942 as part of the "fourth comfort corps", the existence of which is confirmed in a US research report written in November 1945.

He points out that the comfort women were people who took advantage of the war's special demand and tried to make a fortune and open a new life, and should not be regarded as incapable.

Choi believes that the comfort women were not sex slaves, but rather were more similar to the karayuki-san, Japanese prostitutes who plied their trade abroad.

[6] By contrast, Professor An points to a diary entry showing that the comfort women were forced to transfer to new work sites along with the Japanese Army regardless of their own wishes, and to one entry which states that two comfort women in Burma attempted to quit their jobs and return home but were forced by the Japanese military to continue working.