按：日本自明治维新脱亚入欧走到今天，以日本民族的勇毅决绝、潜心向学，还是走了不少弯路，直到二战后在美国协助下，摆脱对天皇的迷信和军国的狂热，才进化到如今的地步，列为世界文明族群之列。 回头看一衣带水的西岸大陆，还没进入到正常人类社会。这文明的鸿沟，真乃云泥之别矣。
1945年9月2日的东京受降仪式在美国战列舰“密苏里”号上举行，盟军最高统帅麦克阿瑟将军向全世界人民发表广播讲话(全文)：
今天，枪炮声沉没了，一场大悲剧结束了。一个伟大的胜利赢得了。天空不再降临死亡，海洋只用于贸易交往，人们在阳光下可以到处行走。全世界一片安宁和平，神圣的使命已经完成。我在此向你们报告，我替那些无数远赴丛林、沙滩、太平洋深处并且永陷其中、已无法出声的人们说话。我也要替正在归途中，即将面对在危亡边缘上被他们拯救过的未来所带来之挑战的数百万无名勇士发言。
回首巴丹岛和克雷希岛那段漫长且路程崎岖的残酷日子，全世界活在恐惧中、各处的民主受攻击、近代文明在天平上颤动。我要感谢慈悲的上帝给我们信仰、勇气和力量去塑造胜利。我们体验了失败的痛苦和胜利的喜悦，从中领悟到决不能走回头路。我们必须前进，在和平中维护在战争中赢得的东西。
我们面临一个新的时代。胜利带来对往后的安全和文明的存续这两者的深切关注。随着科学的进步，战争的毁灭潜能实际上已经到了要对传统战争概念修正的一个节点了。
人类自始就在寻求和平，曾经试图以各种国际手法来预防或解决国际争端。至今可行的方法只适用个人，但是大至国际范畴的机制还没有成功过。军事联盟、强权均衡、国际联盟等机制逐一失败，仅余战争一途。我们只剩最后一次机会。如果我们不制定一个更强大且公正的系统，世界末日就在跟前了。要拯救肉体必须从精神着手，因为这个问题的根本是神学上的。它涉及心灵的重建与人类性格的改善，以配合过去两千年来在科学、艺术、文学和所有物质及文化上的发展。
我们今天站在东京回顾92年前的同胞佩里将军。他所做的是揭开日本与世界在友谊、贸易、商务上的屏蔽，要带日本进入一个开明且进步的时代。但糟糕的是，从西方取得的知识却被锻造成压迫和奴役人类的工具。言论自由、行动自由、甚至思想自由都透过盲从迷信诉求和暴力施加所抹杀了。我们致力于波茨坦宣言的原则，要解救日本人民于奴役状态。我的目标是要在解散武装部队和消弭战争潜力的重要程序完成之后，尽速履行这一项承诺。
日本民族的活力若经过适当导引，会纵向发展而非横向扩张。如果这个民族的才智转入建设性的途径，这个国家可以从现在的悲惨状态中自我提升至尊荣的地位。
太平洋地盆已经进入一个新的解放境界。自由处于攻势，民主正在迈步。摆脱桎捁的亚洲及欧洲人民正在尝试免于恐惧的自由甜果。
美国在菲律宾已经发展出一个在自由亚洲的典范。在菲律宾，美国已证明东方和西方的人民可以互信和互利地并肩齐步而行。
因此，同胞们！我今天向你们报告，你们的子女秉持美国军人沉稳、坚毅的战斗精神，基于反抗只有神话才有的狂热敌人。他们已经忠诚地效力于你们。他们以坚韧的精神和力量为我们赢得了胜利。他们正在归途中，好好照顾他们。
General MacArthur’s Radio address to the American People, September 2, 1945
Peace Restored: the surrender of Japan and the end of World War II
September 2, 1945; At the conclusion of the Surrender Ceremony, General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, broadcast this speech:
“Today the guns are silent. A great tragedy has ended. A great victory has been won. The skies no longer rain death — the seas bear only commerce men everywhere walk upright in the sunlight. The entire world is quietly at peace. The holy mission has been completed. And in reporting this to you, the people, I speak for the thousands of silent lips, forever stilled among the jungles and the beaches and in the deep waters of the Pacific which marked the way. I speak for the unnamed brave millions homeward bound to take up the challenge of that future which they did so much to salvage from the brink of disaster.
As I look back on the long, tortuous trail from those grim days of Bataan and Corregidor, when an entire world lived in fear, when democracy was on the defensive everywhere, when modern civilization trembled in the balance, I thank a merciful God that he has given us the faith, the courage and the power from which to mold victory. We have known the bitterness of defeat and the exultation of triumph, and from both we have learned there can be no turning back. We must go forward to preserve in peace what we won in war.
A new era is upon us. Even the lesson of victory itself brings with it profound concern, both for our future security and the survival of civilization. The destructiveness of the war potential, through progressive advances in scientific discovery, has in fact now reached a point which revises the traditional concepts of war.
Men since the beginning of time have sought peace. Various methods through the ages have attempted to devise an international process to prevent or settle disputes between nations. From the very start workable methods were found insofar as individual citizens were concerned, but the mechanics of an instrumentality of larger international scope have never been successful. Military alliances, balances of power, leagues of nations, all in turn failed, leaving the only path to be by way of the crucible of war. We have had our last chance. If we do not now devise some greater and more equitable system, Armageddon will be at our door. The problem basically is theological and involves a spiritual recrudescence and improvement of human character that will synchronize with our almost matchless advances in science, art, literature and all material and cultural developments of the past two thousand years, It must be of the spirit if we are to save the flesh.
We stand in Tokyo today reminiscent of our countryman, Commodore Perry, ninety-two years ago. His purpose was to bring to Japan an era of enlightenment and progress, by lifting the veil of isolation to the friendship, trade, and commerce of the world. But alas the knowledge thereby gained of western science was forged into an instrument of oppression and human enslavement. Freedom of expression, freedom of action, even freedom of thought were denied through appeal to superstition, and through the application of force. We are committed by the Potsdam Declaration of principles to see that the Japanese people are liberated from this condition of slavery. It is my purpose to implement this commitment just as rapidly as the armed forces are demobilized and other essential steps taken to neutralize the war potential.
The energy of the Japanese race, if properly directed, will enable expansion vertically rather than horizontally. If the talents of the race are turned into constructive channels, the county can lift itself from its present deplorable state into a position of dignity.
To the Pacific basin has come the vista of a new emancipated world. Today, freedom is on the offensive, democracy is on the march. Today, in Asia as well as in Europe, unshackled peoples are tasting the full sweetness of liberty, the relief from fear.
In the Philippines, America has evolved a model for this new free world of Asia. In the Philippines, America has demonstrated that peoples of the East and peoples of the West may walk side by side in mutual respect and with mutual benefit. The history of our sovereignty there has now the full confidence of the East.
And so, my fellow countrymen, today I report to you that your sons and daughters have served you well and faithfully with the calm, deliberated determined fighting spirit of the American soldier, based upon a tradition of historical truth as against the fanaticism of an enemy supported only by mythological fiction. Their spiritual strength and power has brought us through to victory. They are homeward bound—take care of them.”
Source: 夏威夷州密苏里舰纪念协会
