The 1945 Japanese surrender ceremony aboard USS Missouri took place in Tokyo Bay.
The battleship was anchored there on September 2, 1945, while Allied ships gathered nearby. The location placed the ceremony close to Japan’s capital but still aboard an American warship under Allied control.
Tokyo Bay is an inlet on Japan’s Pacific coast that includes the approaches to Tokyo and Yokohama. It was strategically important during the Pacific War because it provided access to Japan’s political and industrial heartland.
The ceremony’s setting is sometimes described simply as “Tokyo,” but the document was signed aboard Missouri in Tokyo Bay, not at a building in the city. The distinction matters because the surrender was a naval ceremony conducted on an Allied vessel.