On December 7-8; 1941; Japanese forces carried out surprise attacks on Pearl Harbor; attacks on British forces in Malaya; Singapore; and Hong Kong and declared war; bringing the US and the UK into World War II in the Pacific.

After the Soviet invasion of Manchuria and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945; Japan agreed to an unconditional surrender on August 15. The war cost Japan and the rest of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere millions of lives and left much of the nation's industry and infrastructure destroyed. Pictures From History