Emperor Hirohito delivered the recorded radio announcement of Japan’s surrender on August 15, 1945.
The broadcast is known as the Gyokuon-hōsō, or Jewel Voice Broadcast. It carried Hirohito’s reading of the Imperial Rescript on the Termination of the War, which told the Japanese public that the government had accepted the terms of the Potsdam Declaration.
For many Japanese listeners, this was the first time they had heard the emperor’s voice. The speech used formal Classical Japanese and difficult audio recording, so some listeners did not immediately understand that it meant Japan had surrendered. Hirohito did not use a simple conversational announcement.
The broadcast followed the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Soviet declaration of war against Japan. It was not the formal signing ceremony; Japanese representatives signed the surrender instrument aboard USS Missouri on September 2.