The Japanese Instrument of Surrender ceremony began at 9:02 a.m. on USS Missouri.
General Douglas MacArthur stepped before the microphones at 9:02 a.m. Japan Standard Time on September 2, 1945, and opened the 23-minute ceremony in Tokyo Bay. The timing was recorded in contemporary accounts of the event.
Japanese representatives had arrived at about 8:56 a.m. Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signed at 9:04, followed by General Yoshijirō Umezu at 9:06. MacArthur signed on behalf of the Allied powers at 9:08.
The proceedings ended at about 9:25 a.m. The precise sequence helps distinguish the ceremony from the earlier surrender announcement broadcast on August 15 and from the later postwar peace treaties.