Saturday, August 31, 2013

August 31, 1945; PREPARATIONS FOR JAPAN'S SURRENDER:

THIS WAS REPORTED TODAY, AUGUST 31, 1945:


HUNTINGDON, PA,, THURSDAY, AUGUST 30, 1945

 
By RALPH TEATSORTH
United Press Correspondent
General MacArthur Headquarters, Yokohama, Japan,
Aug. 30. —Gen. Douglas MacArthur set up headquarters in Yokohama today as the first 40,000 troops of his occupation army raised the Stars and Stripes over Japan's largest naval base, two airfields and a big slice of the Tokyo plain.

A half dozen or more Japanese towns, some within a few miles of the southern outskirts of Tokyo, were occupied by Allied air and sea-borne forces in their first few hours ashore.

MacArthur, supreme occupation commander, established his headquarters in Yokohama's new Grand Hotel with other "top American officers less than an. Hour after landing at Atsugi Airfield from Okinawa,.

From the top of the hotel MacArthur could see. Emperor Hirohito's Palace in the heart of Tokyo. Both Hirohito and the Japanese government now must take, their orders from MacArthur.

South, of Yokohama, Admiral Chester W. Nimitz —Mac Arthur's partner in the conquest of Japan — and Admiral William F. (Bull) Halsey of Third Fleet fame went ashore at the newly-occupied Yokosuka naval base, formerly Japan's No. 1 navy yard. It already had surrendered formally to. Halsey's deputies.

JAPS. TAKE DEFEAT
WITH APATHY BUT
GLAD WAR IS OVER

By JAMES F. McGLINCY
United Press Correspondent
Tokyo, Aug. 30.— Today we reached the end of the long road, to Tokyo and found what must surely be the world's worst bombed city.

 The Japanese capital—or that part of it which is still standing,—received its first Americana today almost with apathy.

There were no incidents as this correspondent and a few other; Americans entered the city in the early afternoon.

If the Japanese had any feelings at all about our appearance, it seemed to be one of gratitude—gratitude that the war is over at long last.

Only yesterday I was in this  party of the first American correspondents to enter China's great metropolis of Shanghai.

The contrast between China's great city and the sprawling metropolis of Tokyo was complete, Shanghai has hardly been touched! by bombs. Tokyo lies in ruins.

Critics Say
Full Story
Not Told

By JOSEPH L. MYLER
United Press Correspondent
Washington, Aug. 30.—President Truman said today that he thought the Army and Navy Pearl Harbor reports showed that the disaster resulted fundamentally from "the "policy which the country itself pursued" in '1941—a policy of non-preparedness.

The president expressed his views at a press conference while numerous Congressmen , were demanding further investigations and public courts martial of top officers who drew part of the blame.

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