This paper examines the effectiveness of educational resource material designed as a case study exercise for use in a university classroom to improve intercultural communication between Japanese and Koreans. The material was based upon current issues surrounding the history of “comfort women” in WWII. After participating in the case study exercise in a class on intercultural communication, a total of 147 students wrote reaction papers assessing this case study material as an effective intercultural communication teaching method. The author applied content analysis methodology to these student papers. The results showed that the majority of the students reacted positively to the utilization of these materials in the exercise. Furthermore, 85% of the students reacted to the “comfort women” in this case study by empathetically adopting their perspectives. In conclusion, the case study methodology employed in this classroom exercise was effective in inducing empathy, which has the potential to enhance intercultural communication between university students from Japan and Korea. Finally, the author proposed utilizing history based materials for improving intercultural relations.