12 Facts About the End of World War II

On August 14, 1945, President Harry S. Truman announced the Japanese government had surrendered, a decision that would bring World War II to a close. Emperor Hirohito of Japan informed his own citizens on August 15, yet there was still work to be done. The written agreement that formalized the surrender wasn’t signed until September 2 of that year at a gathering aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.

Communities around the globe have celebrated August 14, August 15, or September 2 as Victory Over Japan Day, or V-J Day for short. Here are a dozen facts about the surrender 75 years ago this summer and the events that led up to it.

1. The Battle of Okinawa marked the last major battle in World War II.

Over 60,000 American soldiers and marines arrived at the shores of Okinawa on April 1, 1945. The island south of Kyushu formed a logical gateway for an invasion of Japan, and U.S. troops were prepared for a fight. Eighty-one days of incredibly savage combat by air, sea, and land followed, hampered by dense forest and volcanic crags. The Allies emerged victorious, but 12,000 Americans were killed in the effort. Japan’s forces lost around 90,000 troops, and 100,000 civilians also died in the battle.

2. Before V-J Day, V-E Day—Victory in Europe Day—fell on Truman’s 61st birthday.

Sworn into office on April 12, 1945, following the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Truman got to share an exciting piece of news early in his term. The Allies formally accepted Germany’s unconditional surrender on May 8—President Truman’s birthday. “Our victory is but half won,” Truman said. Though the violence in Europe had ended, things were coming to a head in the Pacific theatre.

3. To end World War II, the U.S. made a strategic decision to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki instead of other Japanese cities.

An atomic bomb had been successfully tested in the New Mexico desert on July 16, 1945. By deploying nuclear weapons against Japan, Truman and his advisors hoped to force an unconditional surrender—and avoid the need for a full-scale U.S. invasion of the Japanese mainland.

For maximum impact, it was decided the ideal targets would be cities that had suffered little damage from earlier bombings. Because of its cultural significance as Japan’s former capital, Kyoto was taken off the list. The target committee opted to focus on other cities with significant military headquarters and industrial centers. Hiroshima stood as a major base of operations in the Japanese defense effort. Nagasaki was one of the country’s key seaports. Both places were wartime manufacturing hubs.

4. The USS Indianapolis's secret mission ended in the worst naval disaster of World War II.

Components of the 9700-pound nuclear fission bomb nicknamed Little Boy, destined to be dropped over Hiroshima, were delivered in secret to an American air base in the Northern Mariana Islands by the USS Indianapolis. After dropping off the materials, the Indianapolis was torpedoed by Japanese submarine and quickly sunk just after midnight on July 30, 1945.

Around 300 crew members immediately went down with the ship. The remaining 900 men floated at the surface, awaiting rescue. They endured dehydration and hunger, hallucinations, salt poisoning, and frequent, vicious shark attacks. By the time rescue came on August 2, there were only 317 survivors.

On August 19, 2017, a research team led by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen located the wreckage of the Indianapolis on the bottom of the Philippine Sea, 3.4 miles below the surface.

5. The number of victims in Hiroshima and Nagasaki is still unknown.

At 8:15 a.m. on August 6, 1945, Little Boy exploded over Hiroshima. The blast's yield was equivalent to 15,000 tons of TNT. “What I felt at that moment was that Hiroshima was entirely covered with only three colors. I remember red, black, and brown … but nothing else,” recalled Akiko Takakura, an eyewitness who was then 20 years old. In minutes, dark smoke climbed nearly 4000 feet into the air. More than 90 percent of the city’s structures were damaged or destroyed.

Nagasaki was hit with an implosion-type plutonium bomb (called Fat Man) three days later. The blast’s effects—equaling 21,000 tons of TNT—were felt over an area of 43 square miles.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, “No one will ever know for certain how many died as a result of the attack on Hiroshima.” The same goes for Nagasaki. Patchy census records, the obliteration of government buildings, and other factors make it impossible to get at exact figures. The initial blasts are estimated to have killed 70,000 in Hiroshima and 40,000 in Nagasaki, not including those who later died of radiation poisoning or other injuries.

6. The Soviet Union declared war on Japan less than a month before World War II ended.

At the Allies' Tehran Conference in November 1943, the Soviet Union had agreed to declare war on Japan three months after Germany's surrender to force an end to World War II while retaking occupied territory from Japan. That day came on August 8, 1945. About 1.6 million Soviet troops were swiftly dispatched to Japanese-occupied Manchuria (modern-day northeastern China). The USSR inflicted heavy losses during their engagements with Japanese forces in China, Korea, and the Kuril Islands.

7. Japan formally surrendered aboard the USS Missouri, ending World War II.

On August 14, 1945, Emperor Hirohito announced Japan's unconditional surrender to the Allies. The news rocketed around the world, launching joyous celebrations, parades, and patriotic displays to mark V-J Day. On September 2, aboard the USS Missouri, Japanese Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu and General Yoshijiro Umezu signed the official Instrument of Surrender document crafted by the U.S. War Department. Also present was General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander of the Allied powers.

“It is my earnest hope and indeed the hope of all mankind that from this solemn occasion a better world shall emerge out of the blood and carnage of the past,” MacArthur told the gathered crowd. The USS Missouri would go on to participate in both the Korean and Persian Gulf Wars before it was decommissioned for the last time on March 31, 1992.

8. The pair in the iconic Times Square kiss photo, taken on V-J-Day, didn’t know each other.

Titled “V-J Day in Times Square,” the picture was snapped by Alfred Eisenstaedt for Life magazine. Since Eisenstaedt didn’t write down the couple's names, their identities were a mystery for decades. Then Lawrence Verria’s 2012 book The Kissing Sailor: The Mystery Behind the Photo that Ended World War II seemed to put the matter to rest: It pegged George Mendonsa and Greta Zimmer Friedman as the couple.

Except they weren’t a couple at all. Mendonsa was a sailor on a date with his future wife at the time. Upon hearing the news of Japan’s surrender, he excitedly grabbed Friedman—a dentist’s assistant he didn’t know—and planted a kiss on her lips. Unfortunately, Friedman wasn't into it. “It wasn’t my choice to be kissed,” she later said. “The guy just came over and grabbed!”

9. Frustrated soldiers in the Pacific theatre waited months to return home.

The United States couldn’t immediately bring all of its soldiers home once the Axis Powers surrendered. And that created plenty of tension overseas. Rep. Clare Boothe Luce, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Connecticut, said on September 17, 1945 that every congressperson was “under constant and terrific pressure from the servicemen and their families” who wanted swift discharges.

Servicemembers stationed in Japan and the Far East began stamping the phrase “No Boats, No Votes” onto their homebound letters—indicating that if they didn't get picked up soon, leaders would hear about it in the following year’s congressional elections. Four thousand homesick troops held a mass protest in Manila on Christmas Day. Similar demonstrations took place in London, Paris, and Frankfurt.

10. The last World War II Japanese internment camp in the United States closed in 1946.

Around 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were imprisoned in internment camps across seven U.S. states beginning in 1942. President Franklin D. Roosevelt authorized the detention of Japanese-Americans regardless of citizenship status or loyalty to ensure "every possible protection against espionage and against sabotage" following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The last of these camps, located in northern California, stayed open until March 20, 1946.

11. Some Japanese soldiers kept fighting long after the end of World War II.

Second Lieutenant Hiroo Onoda was 23 years old when he was sent to Lubang Island in the Philippines on December 26, 1944. He and three enlisted men would remain there years after the war ended. Disbelieving reports of Japan’s defeat, the soldiers regularly fought with islanders they mistook for enemy combatants. One of Onoda’s comrades surrendered in 1950 and by 1972, police officers had shot the other two.

Lieutenant Onoda didn’t give up until after he was rediscovered by a Japanese traveler in 1974. A delegation including one of Onoda’s former commanding officers came to Lubang later that year to accept his surrender.

Two additional holdouts, Shoichi Yokoi and Teruo Nakamura, remained hidden elsewhere in the former Pacific theatre until 1972 and 1974, respectively.

12. Only one state officially celebrates the end of World War II.

Rhode Island is the only state in the union that celebrates the end of World War II as an annual legal holiday. Victory Day falls on the second Monday of August.