Text 36999, 94 rader
Skriven 2006-08-20 06:54:00 av LEE LOFASO (1:123/140)
Ärende: Victory in Japan Day
============================
This message was from JOE NICHOLSON to BOB BREED,
originally in conference MEMORIES
and was forwarded to you by LEE LOFASO.
                    -------------------------
 -=> Quoting Bob Breed to Jim White <=-

 BB> So you probably have no idea what today's date means to us older
 BB> dudes?  (8/15/45)


 VJ Day - Victory in Japan and the end of World War Two in 1945

 htt://www.HISTORIC-UK.com/historyUK/england-history/vjday.htm

 VICTORY IN JAPAN DAY ( V-J DAY)

 In 1945 the End of World War II was celebrated on
 Victory in Japan (VJ) Day
 There was much joy and celebration around the
 world when on 15th August 1945 US President Harry
 S Truman declared the day as Victory in Japan Day,
 at a White House press conference.
 President Truman announced that the Japanese
 Government had agreed to comply in full with the
 Potsdam Declaration demanding the unconditional
 surrender of Japan.
 To crowds gathered outside the White House,
 President Truman said: "This is the day we have
 been waiting for since Pearl Harbor."
 The end of war was to be marked by a two-day
 holiday in the UK, the USA and Australia.
 At midnight, the British Prime Minister Clement
 Atlee confirmed the news in a broadcast saying,
 "The last of our enemies is laid low."
 The Prime Minister expressed gratitude to
 Britain's allies, in Australia and New Zealand,
 India, Burma, all countries occupied by Japan and
 to the USSR. But special thanks went to the United
 States "without whose prodigious efforts the war
 in the East would still have many years to run".
 The following evening King George VI addressed the
 nation and the Empire in a broadcast from his
 study at Buckingham Palace.
 "Our hearts are full to overflowing, as are your own.
 Yet there is not one of us who has experienced this
 terrible war who does not realise that we shall feel
 its inevitable consequences long after we have all
 forgotten our rejoicings today."
 Historic buildings all over London were floodlit
 and people crowded onto the streets of every town
 and city shouting, singing, dancing, lighting
 bonfires and letting off fireworks.
 But there were no celebrations in Japan - in his
 first ever radio broadcast, Emperor Hirohito
 blamed the use of "a new and most cruel bomb" used
 on Hiroshima and Nagasaki for Japan's surrender.
 "Should we continue to fight, it would not only
 result in the ultimate collapse and obliteration
 of the Japanese nation but would lead also to the
 total extinction of human civilisation."
 What the Emperor failed to mention however, was
 that the Allies had delivered Japan an ultimatum
 to surrender on 28th July 1945.
 When this was ignored, the US dropped two atomic
 bombs on Hiroshima on 6th August and Nagasaki on
 9th August, the day that Soviet forces invaded
 Manchuria.
 The Allies celebrated victory over Japan on 15th
 August 1945, although the Japanese administration
 under General Koiso Kuniaki did not officially
 surrender with a signed document until 2nd
 September.

 Both dates are known as VJ Day.
 If VJ Day marked the end of World War II, what of
 the six long years of bitter conflict that would
 ultimately lead to these celebrations?
 The timelines below present the major events of
 each of these years, from the German invasion of
 Poland in 1939, to the evacuation from Dunkirk in
 1940, and on through the Japanese attack on Pearl
 Harbour in 1941, followed by Montgomery's famous
 victory at El Alamein in 1942, and onto the Allied
 landings at Salerno in Italy in 1943, the D-Day
 landings of 1944, and into the early months of
 1945, crossing the Rhine and then on to Berlin and
 Okinawa.

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