War with Japan - fulfilled Stalin's promise

The entry of the USSR into the war with Japan was a foreseeable step - it is entirely possible that if Hitler's Germany had not unleashed fighting in Europe, this war had occurred much earlier. Separate armed clashes at the borders of Manzhou-go and Mongolia have occurred periodically since the mid-1930s. Some of them were so provocative that they could well serve as an excuse for declaring war. But worried about the military threat from the countries of the fascist coalition, Stalin, unwilling to separate military operations into two such remote front, in April 1941 signed a non-aggression pact with the Japanese leadership.

At the Yalta Conference, Stalin gave the Allies a clear promise that the war with Japan would be launched two or three months after Germany surrendered. And it should be noted that he kept this promise with phenomenal punctuality: on May 8, Germany laid down its arms, and at midnight on August 8 the Soviet Union launched military operations, unilaterally withdrawing from the previously concluded non-aggression pact.

It was hard to imagine that the war with Japan in 1945 would end in the same way as forty years ago. Now the Japanese army was opposed without exaggeration by the strongest army of the world, with unprecedented experience of conducting combat operations under the most difficult conditions and with a much more prepared opponent. Most of the Japanese army consisted of recruits, who did not even have the minimum skills for conducting successful combat operations. In many parts and formations there were no automatic weapons, there were not enough artillery and missiles.

In addition, the armament of the Soviet army at times superior to the obsolete aircraft and tanks of the Japanese. Well, and important was the fact that many of the fighters specifically asked for the Far East, remembering the dead there once grandfathers and fathers. All the 40 years that have passed since the infamous Portsmouth world did not erase the pain of defeat, and for Russian soldiers the capture of Port Arthur was no less significant than the capture of Berlin. This would be the final restoration of the honor of the Russian weapons, scolded by the Japanese, the war with Japan became a war with the ghosts of the past.

As was to be expected, military actions on the Far Eastern Front did not drag on - on Sept. 12 in the waters of the Tokyo Bay, on board the battleship "Missouri" was signed an act of unconditional surrender of Japan. The war, which lasted a little more than a month, was over, and all the goals of the Soviet Union were realized.

The war with Japan: the main results.

The main and unconditional outcome of our victory was the return of what was lost by the Russian Empire in 1905.

• Southern Sakhalin, which belonged to Japan for forty years, returned to the Soviet Union.
• The long-suffering Port Arthur, the legendary city, once again, albeit temporarily, belonged to us. Russian soldiers received a rare opportunity to get to the ancient cemetery and find here their relatives, about which they only heard that they were killed fighting with the Japanese. Surprisingly, many of them really succeeded, and as trophies they were able to take home a handful of earth from the graves of their ancestors and a photograph taken next to the grave monument. It was a unique moment when two armies met - Russian and Soviet.
• Kvantun and Dalny also temporarily switched over to the use of the USSR.
• The main group of the Kuril Islands, which crossed over to Japan in 1875, together with the southern part of the archipelago, went back to the use of Russia.

And the most significant political result of the USSR victory was the fall of the last country of the Hitlerite coalition. Fascism was completely destroyed and the Soviet Union once again confirmed its title of victorious country.