Which Japanese general signed the 1945 surrender instrument as the army’s representative?

Yoshijirō Umezu signed the 1945 surrender instrument as Japan’s army representative.

Umezu was chief of the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff, the senior army officer representing Japan at the ceremony aboard USS Missouri on 2 September 1945. He signed after Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu, who represented the Japanese government. Their signatures covered both the political and military sides of Japan’s capitulation.

Umezu had opposed surrender and initially resisted signing, but Emperor Hirohito personally appealed to him to attend. The instrument required Japanese forces to cease hostilities and accept the authority of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers. Umezu’s signature therefore confirmed the army’s submission to the surrender terms.

He is sometimes confused with other prominent Japanese commanders, including Tomoyuki Yamashita, who commanded Japanese forces in the Philippines and later faced a war-crimes trial. Hideki Tojo had been prime minister earlier in the war and was not a signatory. Umezu himself was later tried at the Tokyo war-crimes tribunal and died in prison in 1949.