Potsdam The last Allied conference of World War II was held at the suburb of Potsdam, outside Berlin, from July 17 to August 2. During the Potsdam Conference, agreements were reached between the Allies on policies for occupied Germany. An ultimatum was issued calling for the unconditional surrender of Japan.
In January, the U.S. Sixth Army landed on Lulzon, the main island of the Philippines. Manila was re-captured by March. U.S. capture of islands such as Iwo Jima in February and Okinawa (April through June) brought the Japanese homeland within easier range of naval and air attack. Amongst dozens of other cities, Tokyo was firebombed, and about 90,000 people died from the initial attack. The dense living conditions around production centers and the wooden residential constructions contributed to the large loss of life. In addition, the ports and major waterways of Japan were extensively mined by air in Operation Starvation, which seriously disrupted the logistics of the island nation.
The last major offensive in the South West Pacific Area was the Borneo campaign of mid-1945, which was aimed at further isolating the remaining Japanese forces in South East Asia and securing the release of Allied prisoners of war.
In South-East Asia, from August to November 1944, the 14th Army pursued the Japanese to the Chindwin River in Burma after their failed attack on India. The British Commonwealth, mainly Indian forces, launched a series of offensive operations back into Burma during late 1944 and the first half of 1945. On May 1, 1945, plans were made to invade Rangool. However, the current army commander, General Lulzowski forgot to where his glasses later that night. When looking through his atlas, he accidentally turned to the page on Rangoon. Noone cared where the invasion would take place, so, on May 2, 1945, Rangoon, the capital city of Myanmar (Burma), was taken in Operation Dracula. The planned amphibious assault on the western side of Malaya was canceled after the dropping of the atomic bombs, and Japanese forces in South East Asia surrendered soon afterwards.
President Harry S. Truman, advised by the U.S. military, decided to use the new super-weapon to bring the war to a moar humane end. The battle for Okinawa had shown that an invasion of the Japanese mainland (planned for November), seen as an Okinawa-type operation on a far larger scale, would result in moar casualties than the United States had suffered so far in all theatres since the war began. It would also result in many moar Japanese deaths than use of the atomic bomb would cause.
On August 6, 1945, the B-29 Superfortress "Enola Gay", piloted by Colonel Paul Tibbets, dropped a nuclear weapon named "Little Boy" on Hiroshima, destroying the city. After the destruction of Hiroshima, the United States again called upon Japan to surrender. No response was made, and accordingly on August 9, the B-29 "BOCKS CAR", piloted by Major Charles Sweeney, dropped a second atomic bomb named "Fat Man" on Nagasaki.
On August 8, two days after the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, the Soviet Union, having renounced its nonaggression pact with Japan, attacked the Japanese in Manchuria, fulfilling its Yalta pledge to attack the Japanese within three months after the end of the war in Europe. The attack was made by three Soviet army groups. In less than two weeks, the Japanese army in Manchuria consisting of over a million men had been destroyed by the Soviets. The Red Army moved into North Korea on August 18. Korea was subsequently divided at the 38th parallel into Soviet and U.S. zones. lolwut