Japanese emissaries, led by Lieutenant-General Takazo Numata, sign an instrument of surrender in Rangoon, Burma.

Lieutenant-General Numata (Chief of Staff to Field Marshal Count Terauchi) and Rear Admiral Kaigye Chudo enter a hall and take seats at a table opposite a panel of senior Allied officers. The instrument is signed and various papers and files transferred from one table to the other. The Japanese delegation stand up, bow, and leave the hall.

Notes

Historical context: Japan lost the last of her armies in Burma in July 1945. Increasingly intense conventional bombing by the United States caused massive loss of life and wrecked war industries before culminating in atomic attacks on 6/8/1945 and 9/8/1945. In the same period the Soviet Union declared war and invaded Japanese-occupied Manchuria. The Japanese government surrendered unconditionally on 15/8/1945.

Formal Japanese surrender in south east Asia would not be occur until 12/9/1945 in Singapore. The agreement signed in Rangoon was a preliminary step ordering local Japanese commanders to obey the instructions of British occupation forces. This facilitated the recovery of Allied prisoners of war and internees, a process known as RAPWI.