January 9 – WWII: American and Australian troops land at Lingayen Gulf on western coast of the largest Philippine island of Luzon, occupied by Japan since 1942.
The Holocaust: Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg, who has saved thousands of Jews, is taken into custody by a Soviet patrol during the Siege of Budapest and is never again seen publicly.
January 18 – The Holocaust: The SS begins the evacuation of Auschwitz concentration camp. Nearly 60,000 prisoners, mostly Jews, are forced to march to other locations in Germany; as many as 15,000 die. The 7,000 too sick to move are left without supplies being distributed.
January 21–22 (night) – At the Grünhagen railroad station, located in East Prussia at this date, two trains, heading for Elbing, collide. At dawn the station is reached by Soviet Army infantry and tanks which destroy the station, killing between 140 and 150 people.
German Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz orders the start of Operation Hannibal, the mass evacuation by sea of German troops and civilians from the Courland Pocket, East Prussia and the Polish Corridor, evacuating an estimated 800,000-900,000 German civilians and 350,000 soldiers from advancing Soviet forces.
MVWilhelm Gustloff, with over 10,000 mainly civilian Germans from Gotenhafen (Gdynia) is sunk in Gdańsk Bay by three torpedoes from Soviet submarine S-13 in the Baltic Sea; up to 9,400, 5,000 of whom are children, are thought to have died – the greatest loss of life in a single ship sinking in history.
February 8 – The Alaska Anti-Discrimination Act of 1945, championed by charismatic native leader Elizabeth Peratrovich, is passed by the territorial Senate, after the legislature defeated a previous bill in 1943.
The capital of the Philippines, Manila, is liberated by combined American and Filipino ground troops. The suburb of Intramuros is devastated.[11]
The German garrison in Poznań capitulates to Red Army and Polish troops.
Bombing of Pforzheim: The heaviest of a series of bombing raids on Pforzheim, Germany by Allied aircraft is carried out by the British Royal Air Force. As many as 17,600 people, or 31.4% of the town's population, are killed in the raid and about 83% of the town's buildings destroyed, two-thirds of its complete area and between 80 and 100% of the inner city.
February 28 – In Bucharest, a violent demonstration takes place, during which the Bolşevic group opens fire on the army and protesters. In response, Andrei Y. Vishinsky, USSR vice commissioner of foreign affairs and president of the Allied Control Commission for Romania, travels to Bucharest to compel Nicolae Rădescu to resign as premier.
Battle of Kolberg concludes with the Baltic seaport (designated a key Festung (fortress) by the Germans) taken by Polish and Soviet forces and ethnic Germans evacuated or expelled.[18]
Adolf Hitler issues the "Nero Decree" ordering that all industries, military installations, machine shops, transportation facilities and communications facilities in Germany be destroyed ahead of Allied advances, but Albert Speer, placed in charge of the implementation, deliberately disobeys it.
Off the coast of Japan, bombers hit the aircraft carrierUSS Franklin, killing about 800 of her crewmen and crippling the ship.
March 26 – WWII: The Battle of Iwo Jima officially ends, with the destruction of the remaining areas of Japanese resistance, although there are Japanese holdouts here until 1949.
The Red Army pushes most of the Axis forces out of Hungary into Austria.
American official Alger Hiss is congratulated in Moscow for his part in bringing the positions of the Western powers and the Soviet Union closer to each other, at the Yalta Conference.
Japanese battleshipYamato and nine other warships take part in Operation Ten-Go, a suicide attack on Allied forces engaged in the Battle of Okinawa. Yamato is sunk by U.S. Navy aircraft in the East China Sea200 miles (320km) north of Okinawa with the loss of 2,055 of 2,332 crew, together with five other Japanese warships.
A devastating tornado outbreak occurs across the United States, which kills 128 people and injures over 1,000 others. This outbreak is heavily overshadowed by the death of President Roosevelt.[19][20]
The First Canadian Army assumes military control of the Netherlands, where German forces are trapped in the Atlantic Wall fortifications along the coastline.[21]
On his 56th birthday, Adolf Hitler leaves his Führerbunker, to decorate a group of Hitler Youth soldiers in Berlin. It will be his last trip to the surface from his underground bunker.
The German city of Nuremberg, previously the site of the Nuremberg rallies, is occupied by American troops.
Heinrich Himmler, through Folke Bernadotte, Count of Wisborg, puts forth an offer of German surrender to the Western Allies, but not the Soviet Union.
Adolf Hitler finally concedes that "everything is lost"[22] at a meeting in the Führerbunker after learning that SS-ObergruppenführerFelix Steiner cannot mobilize enough men to launch a counterattack on the Soviet forces which are surrounding Berlin.
Hermann Göring sends the Göring telegram to Hitler, seeking confirmation that he should take over leadership of Germany, in accordance with the decree of June 29, 1941. Hitler regards this as treason.
The bodies of Benito Mussolini, his mistress, Clara Petacci, and other followers are hung by their heels at a gas station in the public square of Milan, Piazzale Loreto, following their execution by Italian partisans after an attempt to flee the country.
Troops of the Yugoslav 4th Army, together with the Slovene 9th Corpus NOV, enter Trieste.
Mass suicide in Demmin: An estimated 700–2,500 suicides take place, after 80% of the town has been destroyed by the Soviets during the past three days.
German surrender at Lüneburg Heath: All German armed forces in northwest Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands surrender unconditionally to Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, effective on May 5 at 08:00 hours British Double (and German) Summer Time.
The Netherlands is liberated by British and Canadian troops.[30]
Canadian soldiers liberate the city of Amsterdam from Nazi occupation.
A Japanese fire balloon kills six people, Elsie Mitchell and five children, near Bly, Oregon, when it explodes as they drag it from the woods. These are the only people killed by an enemy attack on the American mainland during WWII.
At 02:41, General Alfred Jodl signs the unconditional German Instrument of Surrender in SHAEF HQ at Reims, France, to end Germany's participation in the war. Surrender is effective on May 8 at 23:01 hours Central European Time (00:01 hours May 9 German Summer Time). This afternoon Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk, Leading Minister in the rump Flensburg Government, makes a broadcast announcing the German surrender and American journalist Edward Kennedy breaks an Allied embargo on news of the signing.[36]
Numerous RAF Lancasters land in Germany to repatriate British prisoners of war. Some 4,500 ex-POWs are flown back to Great Britain over the next 24 hours.
Victory in Europe Day (VE Day) is observed by the western European powers as Nazi Germany surrenders, marking the end of WWII in Europe.
Shortly before midnight (May 9 Moscow time) the final German Instrument of Surrender is signed at the seat of the Soviet Military Administration in Berlin-Karlshorst, attended by Allied representatives.
Canadian troops move into Amsterdam, after German troops surrender.
May 8–29 – Sétif and Guelma massacre: in Algeria, thousands die as French troops and released Italian POWs kill an estimated 6,000 to 40,000 Algerian citizens.
May 28 – U.S.-born Irish-raised William Joyce ("Lord Haw-Haw") is captured on the German border. He is later charged in London with high treason for his earlier English-language wartime broadcasts from German radio, convicted, and then hanged in January 1946.
German communists, led by Walter Ulbricht, arrive in Berlin.
Dutch painter Han van Meegeren is arrested for collaboration with the Nazis, but the "Dutch Golden Age" paintings he has sold to Hermann Göring (Koch) are later proved to be his own fakes.
May 30 – The Iranian government demands that all Soviet and British troops leave the country.
July 4 – Brazilian cruiser Bahia is sunk by an accidentally induced explosion, killing more than 300 and stranding the survivors in shark-infested waters.
The 1945 United Kingdom general election is held, though some constituencies delay their polls for local holiday reasons. Counting of votes and declaration of results are delayed until July 26 to allow for voting by the large number of service personnel still overseas.
The Trinity Test, the first of an atomic bomb, using about six kilograms of plutonium, succeeds in unleashing an explosion equivalent to that of 22 kilotons of TNT.
A train collision near Munich, Germany kills 102 war prisoners.
July 17–August 2 – WWII: Potsdam Conference – At Potsdam, the three main Allied leaders hold their final summit of the war. President Truman officially informs Stalin that the U.S. has a powerful new weapon.
July 21 – WWII: President Harry S. Truman approves the order for atomic bombs to be used against Japan.[41]
The Potsdam Declaration demands Japan's unconditional surrender; Article 12, permitting Japan to retain the reign of the Emperor, has been deleted by President Truman.[41]
July 30 – WWII: Heavy cruiser USSIndianapolis is hit and sunk by torpedoes from the Japanese submarineI-58 in the Philippine Sea. Some 900 survivors jump into the sea and are adrift for up to four days. Nearly 600 die before help arrives. Captain Charles B. McVay III of the cruiser is later court-martialed and convicted; in 2000, he is posthumously exonerated.[45]
August 7 – U.S. President Harry Truman announces the successful atomic bombing of Hiroshima, while he is returning from the Potsdam Conference aboard the U.S. Navy heavy cruiser USSAugusta(CA-31), in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
Bombing of Kumagaya, Japan, by the United States using conventional bombs, beginning at 00:23.
Hirohito surrender broadcast(Gyokuon-hōsō): Emperor Hirohito's announcement of the unconditional surrender of Japan is broadcast on the radio a little after noon (12:00 Japan Standard Time is 03:00 GMT). This is probably the first time an Emperor of Japan has been heard by the common people. Delivered in formal classical Japanese, without directly referring to surrender and following official censorship of the country's weak position, the recorded speech is not immediately easily understood by ordinary people. The Allies call this day Victory over Japan Day (V-J Day). This ends the period of Japanese expansionism, and begins the period of the Occupation of Japan and sets the stage for Korean independence.
Philippines President José P. Laurel issues an Executive Proclamation putting an end to the Second Philippine Republic, thus ending his term as President of the Philippines.
Russian code clerk Igor Gouzenko comes forward with numerous documents implicating the Soviet Union in many spy rings in North America, both in the United States and in Canada.
September 8 – U.S. troops arrive in Southern Korea, while the Soviet Union occupies the north, with the dividing line being the 38th parallel of latitude. This arrangement proves to be the indirect beginning of a divided Korea, which will lead to the Korean War when North Korea invades in 1950.
Chairman of the Nationalist Government of China Chiang Kai-shek officially accepts the Japanese capitulation at Nanking.[49]
Japanese troops in Keijō (present day Seoul) formally relinquish control over Southern Korea to the United States, effectively ending Japan's 35-year rule of Korea.[50][51]
The Japanese Army formally surrenders to the British in Singapore.
The office of governor-general of Korea is disbanded by the United States Army Military Government in Korea, formally ending Japan's 35-year rule in Korea.
Assembly of the world's first general purpose electronic computer, the Electronic Numerical Integrator Analyzer and Computer (ENIAC), is completed in the United States, covering 1,800 square feet (170m2) of floor space, and the first set of calculations is run on it.
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"Central Europe Campaign – 522nd Field Artillery Battalion". Archived from the original on March 20, 2016. Retrieved January 12, 2015. Jewish prisoners from the outer Dachau camps were marched to Dachau, and then 70 miles south. Many of the Jewish marchers weighed less than 80 pounds. Shivering in their tattered striped uniforms, the "skeletons" marched 10 to 15 hours a day, passing more than a dozen Bavarian towns. If they stopped or fell behind, the SS guards shot them and left their corpses along the road.
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Myers, Brian Reynolds (December 16, 2023). "The Power to Mystify". Sthele Press. Assertion that the emperor's surrender 'abruptly' ended Japan's occupation of the peninsula, which in fact continued in the southern part for more than three weeks?
Dagnino, Maruja. "Lali Armengol Argemi". In Transparencia Venezuela (ed.). 20 mujeres venezolanas del siglo XX(PDF). pp.68–71. Archived from the original(PDF) on May 6, 2021. Retrieved June 12, 2022.
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Theodore Dreiser Recalled. Clemson University Press. 2017. p.311. ISBN9781942954446.
Ian Buruma. Year Zero: A History of 1945 (Penguin Press; 2013) 368 pages; covers liberation, revenge, decolonization, and the rise of the United Nations. excerpt
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Keith Lowe. Savage Continent: Europe in the Aftermath of World War II (2012) excerpt and text search
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