80th Anniversary of the End of WWII

September 2, 2025

On June 18, 1945, Marine Private Marion Rounds, Jr. of Company "L", Third Battalion, Twenty Second Marines, Sixth Marine Division was killed in action on Okinawa somewhere near Kunishi Ridge. His brother's son, Senator Mike Rounds, who was named after this hero, quietly honored him by shepherding through the U.S. Senate in 2025 the only resolution in Congress remembering the end of World War II. s.

There had not been any mention of the end of WWII in Congress since 2005. That year, Chairman of the House International Relations Committee (today's House Foreign Affairs Committee), Congressman Henry Hyde (R-IL) successfully had passed in the House of Representatives H. Con. Res. 191. As the last Pacific War veteran ln Congress, Hyde felt a deep obligation to the men and women who served with him. They should not be forgotten. Thus, he reitred from Congress frustrated that he could persuade the Senate to pass a similar resolution. The Bush White House objected to the resolutions prose and obstructed its introduction.

A concurrent resolution must be adopted by both the U.S. House and Senate to become the official sentiment of both chambers. It is not a public law nor is it approved by the President. However, if it is not passed by both chambers it is not recognized in the chamber that does pass it. That the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations would not introduce the resolution allowed the Senate to kill the resolution without taking any personal responsibility, defying the White House, or offending the Japanese government.

Twenty years later, Senator Rounds with Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) fulfilled the obligation that Senator Lugar could not. They succeeded in honoring the veterans of the Pacific War as well as all who were sweep up in the last and bloodiest battle of WWII, the Battle of Okinawa. The resolution also called attention to the importance of the Pacific allies the U.S. gained after the war.

Nevertheless, the "friends" of Japan still managed to strip from the resolution a reaffirmation that the 1951 Treaty of Peace with Japan (San Francisco Peace Treaty) "is based upon the judgments of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo and of other Allied War Crimes Courts." Removal of the reference to the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal was one of demands in 2005 as well.

119th CONGRESS

1st Session

S. RES. 383 

Commemorating the 80th anniversary of the conclusion of World War II with the surrender of Imperial Japan and honoring veterans of both the Pacific and European theaters.

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IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

September 10, 2025

Mr. Blumenthal (for himself and Mr. Rounds) submitted the following resolution; which was considered and agreed to

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RESOLUTION

Commemorating the 80th anniversary of the conclusion of World War II with the surrender of Imperial Japan and honoring veterans of both the Pacific and European theaters.

Whereas, after the attack on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese on December 7, 1941, the United States declared war on Japan, and later declared war on Germany and Italy after their declarations of war on the United States, fully entering the United States into World War II and joining the Allies to fight the Axis Powers in a war in which over 16,300,000 citizens of the United States served in the military;

Whereas, during World War II, approximately 415,000 United States servicemembers were killed, another 670,000 were seriously wounded, and 130,000 were held as prisoners of war; and

Whereas September 2, 1945, marked the official end of World War II, with representatives of the Allied and Japanese governments signing the Instrument of Surrender, prepared by the Department of War and approved by President Harry S. Truman: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, That the Senate—

(1) honors all veterans, living and deceased, of the Pacific and European theaters of World War II on the 80th anniversary of the conclusion of World War II;

(2) expresses the deep appreciation and gratitude of the United States for the valor and selfless service of the veterans of World War II;

(3) calls on the people of the United States to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the signing of the Instrument of Surrender aboard the USS Missouri (BB–63) on September 2, 1945, as a day of appreciation for the members of the “Greatest Generation” who, through their sacrifices both in the Armed Forces and on the home front, preserved liberty for future generations;

(4) mourns the more than 200,000 people, including more than 12,000 United States servicemembers and up to 150,000 Japanese civilians, who died from April 1 to June 22, 1945, in the Battle of Okinawa, which was the only land battle on the home islands of Japan and the costliest ground combat of the Asia-Pacific War, and which led President Harry S. Truman to re-examine the costs of invading mainland Japan;

(5) reaffirms the Treaty of Peace with Japan, done at San Francisco September 8, 1951 (commonly known as the “Treaty of San Francisco”), which formally ended the “state of war”; and

(6) recognizes the alliances and partnerships formed in the Indo-Pacific region following World War II, including those with Japan, Australia, the Philippines, Singapore, the Republic of Korea, and Thailand, as well as critical defense sites developed on Okinawa, Guam, Wake Island, the Northern Mariana Islands, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of Palau, and elsewhere, have contributed immeasurably to the continued peace and prosperity enjoyed throughout the Indo-Pacific region.

Motionless

Everett Reamer 2011

Standing at attention in the hot sun, with beatings if you even twitched, was one of the tortures endured by the POWs of Japan. Two Americans were once noted in Guinness Book of Records for their endurance to this treatment. Today, the category “motionless” does not appear in the print edition and the current “record” is inexplicably days less than those held by the American POWs.

According to a Guinness official we contacted, Om Prakash Singh of India holds the record of standing motionlessness with 20 hours 10 minutes and 6 seconds. Mr. Singh’s record was last included in 2006 Edition of the Guinness Book of World Records. Thereafter, the record was removed from the book, but not from the database, due to the space limitations according to the Guinness representative.

Eliminated from the Guinness database--and we asked--appear to be two records that far exceed Mr. Singh’s. The Guinness Book of World Records in the 1987 through 1991 editions all noted Pvt Everett Reamer stood at attention for 132 hours without food, water or relief.

Ohio native, Pvt Reamer fought on Corregidor with the 60th Coast Artillery Antiaircraft. As a POW he was sent to Japan to be a slave laborer for Nippon Express (Nippon Tsuun) at the Osaka Main Headquarters Camp No. 1-B (Chikko). After “stealing” Red Cross boxes that the Japanese had withheld, he and others were tortured and forced to stand at attention on August 15, 1944. He was the last to drop, 132 hours later on August 20, 1944.

He was then taken to Japanese Army Headquarters in Osaka where he was sentenced to solitary confinement at Osaka's Sakai Prison. His cell was 5 x 8 feet with solid concrete walls. There were no bars and no window—just a small slit at eye level for the guards to pass food through. There was no bed, no heat, and no running water. He slept on the concrete floor. His toilet was a wooden pail. He wasn’t allowed to stand; he could only sit on the floor. He says he kept sane by repeating the 23rd Psalm each day.

He remained there until August 22, 1945 when the guards gave him a huge bowl of rice. “I thought I had died and gone to heaven,” Reamer says. Then they called him out of his cell, along with the seven other allied POWs. He was certain they were to be shot. Instead, they were told that the war was over and “we are now friends.”

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Mr. Reamer who we interviewed in June 2011, was told by a Guinness Book editor in New York not to be surprised if the Japanese government finagled to have the item removed. Although the cause cannot be confirmed, it is true that the record was removed. Maybe, because the feat was “involuntary” it no longer qualified.

You can read Mr. Reamer's story in his memoir Unconquerable Faith: Surviving Corregidor, Bataan, and Japan or HERE or HERE. 

Mr. Reamer was able to give us copies of his Guinness Book entries, but we could not confirm Sgt Sam Moody’s claim that he too was included. Mr. Moody died in 1999. However, there are still POWs alive who were with him at Nippon Sharyo’s Narumi POW camp who remember the incident.

Samuel Moody, who his fellow prisoners said was always getting in trouble, was forced to stand at attention for stealing a bowl of rice (in some accounts it was a canteen of cooking oil). He stood in the prison camp yard for 53 hours.

Before he died, Moody fought to receive token compensation from the Japanese companies that enslaved him and other POWs. In 1992, Masashi Mazobuchi, a spokesman for the Japanese Embassy in Washington said that although the Japanese government ''deeply regrets'' all wartime incidents, all legal questions were settled in the Tokyo war crimes trials. ''Of course, morally, some individuals are not satisfied,'' he said.

Moody was one of six Lynn, Massachusetts men who survived the Bataan Death March. He was considered the city’s preeminent war hero and his portrait was included in the 1949 time capsule buried in the cornerstone of the Lynn Memorial City Hall and Auditorium.

As previously noted, Mr. Moody’s last congressman was John Mica (R-FL). You can obtain a free copy of Sam Moody’s memoir, Reprieve from Hell from Mr. Mica's office. The current congressman from Lynn, Massachusetts is John Tierney (D-MA). Everett Reamer’s congressman is Trent Franks (R-AZ). None of these representatives has yet to become co-sponsors of H. Res. 333.

If you wish to follow up with the Guinness Book of World Records, try HERE.