What happened in 1945

World5

• Feb 19980 (actual figure is disputed) Japanese soldiers die as a result of being attacked by long saltwater crocodiles in Ramree, Burma.
• Apr 7and nine other warships take part in Operation Ten-Go, a suicide attack on Allied forces engaged in the Battle of Okinawa. Yamato is sunk by U.S. Navy aircraft in the East China Sea north of Okinawa with the loss of 2,055 of 2,332 crew, together with five other Japanese warships.
• Apr 9WWII: The Battle of Königsberg, in East Prussia, ends with Soviet forces capturing the city.
• Jun 5The Allied Control Council, the military occupation governing body of Germany, formally takes power.
• OctUnited Nations foundedCreated by 51 countries after the League of Nations failed to stop the war. The five permanent members of the Security Council were given a veto. Japan joined in 1956.

Japan16

• Feb 19WWII: Battle of Iwo Jima – About 30,000 United States Marines land on Iwo Jima.
• Feb 23Battle of Iwo Jima: A group of United States Marines reach the top of Mount Suribachi on the island, and are photographed raising the American flag. The photo, Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima (taken by Joe Rosenthal), later wins a Pulitzer Prize.
• Mar 9WWII: Bombing of Tokyo: USAAF B-29 bombers attack Tokyo, Japan with incendiary bombs, killing 100,000 citizens in the firebombing. It is the single most destructive conventional air attack of the war.
• Mar 16The Battle of Iwo Jima unofficially ends.
• Mar 17WWII: Kobe, Japan is fire-bombed by 331 B-29 bombers, killing over 8,000 people.
• Mar 26WWII: The Battle of Iwo Jima officially ends, with the destruction of the remaining areas of Japanese resistance, although there are Japanese holdouts here until 1949.
• Apr 1WWII: Battle of Okinawa: The Tenth United States Army lands on Okinawa.
• Jun 21WWII: The Battle of Okinawa ends, with U.S. occupation of the island until 1972.
• Jul 27WWII: Bombing of Aomori – Two USAAF B-29s drop a total of 60,000 leaflets on the Japanese city of Aomori, warning civilians of an air raid and urging them to leave immediately.
• Aug 6WWII: Atomic bombing of Hiroshima – United States Boeing B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay drops a uranium-235 atomic bomb, codenamed "Little Boy", on the Japanese city of Hiroshima at 8:15 a.m. local time, resulting in between 90,000 and 146,000 deaths.
• Aug 9Atomic bombing of Nagasaki: United States B-29 Bockscar drops a plutonium-239 atomic bomb, codenamed "Fat Man", on the Japanese city of Nagasaki at 11:02 a.m. local time, resulting in between 39,000 and 80,000 deaths.
• Aug 14WWII: Emperor Hirohito accepts the terms of the Potsdam Declaration. His recorded announcement of this is smuggled out of the Tokyo Imperial Palace. At 19:00 hrs in Washington, D.C. (23:00 GMT), U.S. president Harry S. Truman announces the Japanese surrender.
• Aug 15Hirohito surrender broadcast (Gyokuon-hōsō): Emperor Hirohito's announcement of the unconditional surrender of Japan is broadcast on the radio a little after noon (12:00 Japan Standard Time is 03:00 GMT). This is probably the first time an Emperor of Japan has been heard by the common people. Delivered in formal classical Japanese, without directly referring to surrender and following official censorship of the country's weak position, the recorded speech is not immediately easily understood by ordinary people. The Allies call this day Victory over Japan Day (V-J Day). This ends the period of Japanese expansionism, and begins the period of the Occupation of Japan and sets the stage for Korean independence.
• AugAtomic bombings and the end of the warAtomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima on August 6 and on Nagasaki on August 9, and on August 15 Japan announced its surrender to the nation. These remain the only two times nuclear weapons have been used in war.
• Sep 2The final official Japanese Instrument of Surrender is accepted by the Supreme Allied Commander, General Douglas MacArthur, and Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz for the United States, and delegates from the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, China, and others from a Japanese delegation led by Mamoru Shigemitsu, on board the American battleship USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.

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North America11

• Feb 4WWII: President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Winston Churchill and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin hold the Yalta Conference.
• Mar 1President Franklin D. Roosevelt gives what will be his last address to a joint session of the United States Congress, reporting on the Yalta Conference.
• Mar 2Former U.S. vice-president Henry A. Wallace starts his term of office as United States Secretary of Commerce, serving under President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
• Mar 30American official Alger Hiss is congratulated in Moscow for his part in bringing the positions of the Western powers and the Soviet Union closer to each other at the Yalta Conference.
• Apr 12Vice President Harry S. Truman becomes the 33rd president of the United States upon the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt at the Little White House in Warm Springs, Georgia of an intracerebral hemorrhage.
• Jun 26The United Nations Charter is signed in San Francisco.
• Jul 16The Trinity nuclear test in New Mexico, the first of an atomic bomb, using about six kilograms of plutonium, succeeds in unleashing an explosion equivalent to that of 22 kilotons of TNT.
• Aug 8The United Nations Charter is ratified by the United States Senate.
• Aug 28The American-led Allied Occupation of Japan effectively begins with General Douglas MacArthur's arrival at Atsugi Air Base.
• Dec 9American General George S. Patton is involved in a car accident in Germany, resulting in his death on December 21.
• Dec 27Twenty-one nations ratify the articles creating the World Bank.

Europe46

• Jan 16WWII: Adolf Hitler takes residence in the Führerbunker in Berlin.
• Jan 30Adolf Hitler makes his last public speech, on broadcast radio, expressing the belief that Germany will triumph.
• Mar 19Adolf Hitler issues the "Nero Decree" ordering that all industries, military installations, machine shops, transportation facilities and communications facilities in Germany be destroyed ahead of Allied advances, but Albert Speer, placed in charge of the implementation, deliberately disobeys it.
• Apr 9Abwehr conspirators Wilhelm Canaris, Hans Oster and Hans von Dohnányi are hanged at Flossenbürg concentration camp, along with pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer and other people associated with resistance groups. Johann Georg Elser, would-be assassin of Adolf Hitler, is executed at Dachau concentration camp.
• Apr 16The Battle of Berlin begins, opening with the Red Army launching the Battle of the Oder–Neisse and the Battle of the Seelow Heights.
• Apr 20On his 56th birthday, Adolf Hitler leaves his Führerbunker, to decorate a group of Hitler Youth soldiers in Berlin. It will be his last trip to the surface from his underground bunker.
• Apr 22Adolf Hitler finally concedes that "everything is lost" at a meeting in the Führerbunker after learning that SS-Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner cannot mobilize enough men to launch a counterattack on the Soviet forces which are surrounding Berlin.
• Apr 24Battle of Berlin: Red Army troops complete encirclement of Berlin.
• Apr 27The last German formations withdraw from Finland to Norway. The Lapland War and thus, World War II in Finland, comes to an end and the Raising the Flag on the Three-Country Cairn photograph is taken.
• Apr 28The bodies of Benito Mussolini, his mistress, Clara Petacci, and other followers are hung by their heels at a gas station in the public square of Milan, Piazzale Loreto, following their execution by Italian partisans after an attempt to flee the country.
• Apr 29Adolf Hitler marries his longtime mistress Eva Braun, in a closed civil ceremony in the Berlin Führerbunker, and signs his last will and testament.
• Jul 17WWII: Potsdam Conference – At Potsdam, the three main Allied leaders hold their final summit of the war. President Truman officially informs Stalin that the U.S. has a powerful new weapon.
• Oct 24The International Court of Justice ("World Court") is established by the United Nations Charter.
• Nov 16The foundation of UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) is agreed at a meeting in London.
• Dec 3Communist demonstrations in Athens presage the Greek Civil War.

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USSR / Russia5

• Jan 12WWII: The Soviet Union begins the Vistula–Oder Offensive in Eastern Europe, against the German Army.
• Apr 16is sunk by Soviet submarine L-3 in the Baltic Sea while evacuating German troops and civilians as part of Operation Hannibal; 7,000–8,000 drown.
• May 2The Soviet Union announces the fall of Berlin. The famous picture of Raising a Flag over the Reichstag is taken at this date.
• Aug 9The Soviet–Japanese War opens: The Soviet Union begins its army offensive against Japan, in the northern part of the Japanese-held puppet region of Manchuria, including the 25th Army (Soviet Union)'s advance into the northern peninsula of Korea.
• Aug 23Soviet–Japanese War: Joseph Stalin orders the detention of Japanese prisoners of war in the Soviet Union.

Asia17

• Jan 30Raid at Cabanatuan: 121 American soldiers and 800 Filipino guerrillas free 813 American prisoners of war from the Japanese-held camp in the city of Cabanatuan, in the Philippines.
• Feb 3Battle of Manila: United States forces enter the outskirts of Manila to capture it from the Japanese Imperial Army, starting the battle. On February 4, U.S. Army forces liberate Santo Tomas Internment Camp in the city.
• Feb 16American and Filipino ground forces land on Corregidor Island in the Philippines.
• Feb 23The capital of the Philippines, Manila, is liberated by combined American and Filipino ground troops. The suburb of Intramuros is devastated.
• Mar 3United States and Filipino troops take Manila, Philippines.
• Jul 5WWII: The Philippines are declared liberated.
• Aug 15The August Revolution in Vietnam begins, with the Viet Minh taking over the capital Hanoi, taking advantage of the collapse of Japanese power.
• Aug 17Proclamation of Indonesian Independence: Indonesian nationalists Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta declare the independence of the Republic of Indonesia, with Sukarno as president and Mohammad Hatta as vice-president, igniting the Indonesian National Revolution against the Dutch Empire.
• Aug 19Chinese Civil War: Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek meet in Chongqing to discuss an end to hostilities between the Communists and the Nationalists.
• Aug 30Vietnam's capital Hanoi is taken by the Viet Minh, which ends the French occupation in what becomes North Vietnam, and thus the southern provinces become South Vietnam. This ends the August Revolution.
• Sep 9Japanese troops in Keijō (modern-day Seoul) formally relinquish control over Southern Korea to the United States Army Military Government in Korea, while Soviet forces control Northern Korea from Heijō (modern-day Pyongyang), effectively ending 35 years of Korea under Japanese rule and beginning the Division of Korea at the 38th parallel.
• Oct 19Members of the Indonesian People's Army attack Anglo-Dutch forces in Indonesia.
• Oct 27Indonesian National Revolution: Battle of Surabaya – Pro-independence Indonesian soldiers and militia fight British and British Indian troops in Surabaya.
• Nov 6Indonesians reject an offer of autonomy from the Dutch.
• Nov 10Indonesian National Revolution: Battle of Surabaya – Following the killing of British officer Brigadier A. W. S. Mallaby on October 30, the British Indian Army (in support of its allied Dutch colonial administration) begins an advance on Surabaya in the Dutch East Indies against Indonesian nationalists; although most of the city is retaken in 3 days of heavy fighting, the strength of the resistance leads to today being celebrated as Heroes' Day (Hari Pahlawan) in Indonesia.

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Middle East1

• Mar 22The Arab League is formed, with the adoption of a charter in Cairo, Egypt.

Latin America1

• Oct 17A massive number of people, headed for the General Confederation of Labour (Argentina), gather in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires to demand Juan Perón's release. This is known to the Peronists as the Día de la lealtad (Loyalty Day) and considered the founding day of Peronism.