General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Allied Commander, speaking at the opening of the surrender ceremonies, on
board USS Missouri (BB-63).
Aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay, Japan formally
surrendered to the Allies, bringing an end to World
War II.
By the summer of 1945, the defeat of Japan was a foregone
conclusion. The Japanese navy and air force were destroyed.
The Allied naval blockade of Japan and intensive bombing of
Japanese cities had left the country and its economy devastated.
At the end of June, the Americans captured Okinawa, a Japanese
island from which the Allies could launch an invasion of the main Japanese home islands.
August 6, the U.S. B-29 bomber Enola Gay dropped an atomic
bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, killing an estimated
80,000 people and fatally wounding thousands more.
On August 9, a second U.S. atomic bomb was dropped on the
Japanese coastal city of Nagasaki.
Army General Douglas MacArthur signs the Instrument of Surrender.
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