60TH ANNIVERSARY OF WORLD WAR II'S END

ASSOCIATED PRESS Jiro Yukimura, 84, of Kauai removed his hat yesterday as taps played during a ceremony marking the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II aboard the Battleship Missouri Memorial in Pearl Harbor. About 300 veterans from World War II and another 200 veterans participated in a ceremony aboard the ship where Japan formally surrendered in Tokyo Bay on Sept. 2, 1945. Yukimura, the father of former Kauai Mayor JoAnn Yukimura, was the only Japanese American on board the USS Missouri during the Japanese surrender ceremony 60 years ago.

A legacy held high

A ceremony aboard the USS Missouri
honors the sacrifices of all soldiers

Veterans commemorated the 60th anniversary of the Japanese surrender in World War II yesterday aboard the battleship where the war officially ended and surrounded by the harbor where it all began for the United States.

Adm. Gary Roughead, Pacific Fleet commander, paid tribute yesterday to the veterans of World War II who pledged "their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor."

Speaking from the deck of the battleship USS Missouri, now a floating museum in Pearl Harbor, Roughead said the legacy of those veterans must be kept alive.

More than 400 World War II veterans were among the more than 1,000 people to mark the end to the United States' bloodiest war.

Turning to the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Roughead said: "Perhaps, though, our gratitude for this past example and sacrifice is best reflected in the deeds and devotion of those who now wear our nation's cloth.

"Freedom's latest defenders do battle in a new global war, fought for the same fundamental reasons that all of America's wars have been fought: They fight in defense of our nation, her people, her interests and the freedom she represents; they fight in defense of the unalienable rights that belong to all."

CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA@STARBULLETIN.COM Marines aboard the USS Missouri fired a salute during yesterday's commemoration of the end of World War II.

Like the World War II veterans, "they, too, have pledged 'their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor' in the latest struggle against 'the darkness of tyranny and terror,'" Roughead said.

"Freedom, and its universal applicability, has always been, and will remain, our national cause," said Roughead. "And we will continue to fight so that freedom may ring the world over. Just as we did more than 60 years ago, we again wage war against freedom's enemies and against those who seek to destroy the very fabric of our free society."

Roughead said Pearl Harbor, with the sunken battleship USS Arizona resting 1,000 feet off the Missouri's bow, is "a hallowed and special place."

A plaque on the deck of the battleship marks the location where the Japanese signed the surrender documents.

The "Mighty Mo" was outfitted in its best ceremonial garb complete with brightly colored signal flags for yesterday's ceremony.

Gov. Linda Lingle said the veterans of World War II are "all heroes."

"Since that famous surrender of Sept. 2, 1945," Lingle said, "peace has been a fragile commodity. In retrospect of the devastation caused in the aftermath of World War II, we must take this opportunity to recognize this greatest generation of men and women who sacrificed so much to protect our American way of life."

Lingle noted the sacrifices of the more than 1,000 sailors and Marines still entombed in the battleship USS Arizona, the troops who freed Europe and the Pacific, and their families.

"Your determination and resolve," Lingle added, "helped save the world from fascism, genocide and autocratic rule. Your bravery helped the shape the world's destiny as a democratic and a free society, and that is our destiny."

William Chamberlain, 84, of Chico, Calif., described yesterday's ceremony as "very emotional."

"It's like that any time you start talking about the war," said Chamberlain, who served on the USS Taylor, one of three destroyers that escorted the Missouri into Tokyo Bay 60 years ago.

"Our destroyer served as a press boat," said Chamberlain. "We had 270 reporters on board, and after we took them out to the Missouri, we were anchored 50 yards off its port side."

Clayton Cass, 79, of Palm Springs, Calif., said he was one of the seamen who had to carry a table from the Missouri's mess hall which Gen. Douglas MacArthur used to sign the surrender documents.

"I watched the entire thing from my duty station at the 40 mm gun near the bridge," said Cass.