USS Missouri hosted the September 2, 1945 ceremony where Japan formally signed its surrender.
The ceremony took place on the battleship's deck in Tokyo Bay. General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, opened the proceedings, and Japanese representatives signed the Japanese Instrument of Surrender. The event lasted about 23 minutes and was witnessed by representatives of the Allied nations.
Missouri was an Iowa-class battleship commissioned by the United States Navy in 1944. It had served in the Pacific during the final months of World War II, including operations connected with the invasions of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Its selection gave the ceremony a highly visible naval setting close to Japan's capital.
The ship's location also carried symbolic meaning. Missouri was anchored near the place where Commodore Matthew Perry's squadron had entered Tokyo Bay in 1853. A flag associated with Perry's expedition was displayed during the ceremony, although the surrender ceremony's other flags and shipboard details have sometimes been misidentified in popular retellings.
USS Missouri is preserved today as a museum ship at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.