Yoshijirō Umezu signed the surrender instrument as Japan’s chief of the Imperial General Staff. He was the second Japanese representative to sign aboard USS Missouri on September 2, 1945.
Umezu represented Japan’s armed forces, while Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signed for the Japanese government. Their signatures followed Emperor Hirohito’s decision to accept the Potsdam Declaration and the government’s formal notification of surrender in August.
Umezu had opposed surrender during the final wartime discussions, but he obeyed the emperor’s order and signed the document. After the war, he was tried as a Class A war criminal by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. He was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment, dying in prison in 1949.