- January 7
- In Yokohama, Japan, a US military commission condemns Lieutenant Kei Yuri of the Japanese Army to be hanged, for ordering a captured US soldier killed by bayonet, and allowing the starvation death of another. [511.5]
- The Recently elected government of Austria is recognized by the US, Great Britain, France, and the Soviet Union. [513.8]
- In Budapest, Hungary, former Hungarian Premier Laszlo de Bardossy is hanged. He had been sentenced to death for high treason by the Budapest Peoples Court in November. [515.9]
- In Budapest, Hungary, the People's Court sentences to death Dr. Vitez Laszlo Endre, former Under-Secretary of the Interior Ministry, Laszlo Vaky, former chief of gendarmes, and Andor Jaross, former Minister of the Interior. They were found responsible for the expulsion or extermination of 600,000 Jews and other crimes. [513.10]
- January 9
- In Manila, Phillippines, a US military commission sentences Takuma Higashije and Soichi Kobayashi to hanging for the murder of civilians and directing torture. [514.8] [694.6]
- In Borneo, the Labuan Military Court convicts and sentenced to hanging Japanese Captain Takakumo for the deaths of 824 prisoners. His adjutant Captain Watanabe is sentenced to be shot. [514.8]
- January 11
- In Yokohama, Japan, the US military commission convicts and sentences Lieutenant Chotaro Furushima to life imprisonment for mistreating American prisoners. [515.10]
- January 13
- India announces its total expenditure during the war: US$12 billion, with US$1.1 billion directly against Germany. Total casualties: 180,000. [516.3]
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- January 14
- Commander of the Canadian occupation force in Germany, Major-General Chris Vokes, commutes the death sentence of Kurt Meyer to life in prison. [101.20] [520.11]
- In Melbourne, Australia, a war crimes court sentences Japanese Admiral Hamanaka to death for the murder of an Australian prisoner in June 1945. [520.12]
- The United States announces its total expenditure during the war: US$200 billion. [520.12]
- The Soviet-Polish border treaty of August 1945 is ratified by the Supreme Council of the Soviet Union. [520.8]
- January 15
- In Melbourne, Australia, a court sentences Japanese Captain Kato to death by shooting for the execution of an Australian prisoner in Netherlands New Guinea. [521.3]
- In Canton, China, Huang Meili is executed by firing squad. Meili was convicted of collecting Chinese financial information for the Japanese during the occupation. [523.15]
- In Naples, Italy, a US military commission sentences three German Gestapo officers to be hanged for the murder of seven Allied soldiers. The three are SS Major August Schiffer, SS Under-Officer Albert Storz, and SS Lieutenant Heinrich Andergassen. A forth guilty person, gendarme Hans Butz, is sentenced to life imprisonment. [521.7]
- January 16
- At Labaun, Borneo, the Australian war crimes court passes death sentences on 28 Japanese as war criminals. Long prison terms are the sentence for another 29, and eight are acquitted. [523.15]
- January
- Remnants of a Japanese regiment surrender in the jungle of the Sierra Madre Mountains of north central Luzon, in the town of Casiguran. [525.5]
- In Lyon, France, a court convicts Francis Andre and seven others of conducting torture under the Vichy regime, sentencing all to death. [526.20]
- January 17
- Former Prime Minister Dr. Ba Maw of Burma under Japanese occupation surrenders to the headquarters of General MacArthur in Tokyo. [524.1]
- At the International Military Tribunal, French prosecutors begin presenting their case. [806.189]
- In Niemodlin, Lower Silesia, the bodies of 40,000 murdered Allied prisoners are found in a mass grave. The prisoners were killed in the Lambinowice concentration camp. [524.11]
- In Nikolayev, Russia, seven Germans are hanged for the killing of 105,000 Russians during the war. Two others are sentenced to twenty years in prison. [524.12]
- Poland issues six postage stamps marking the 1st anniversary of the liberation of Warsaw. [343.273]
- January 20
- A permanent International Military Tribunal is established in Tokyo, Japan. [806.204]
- January 21
- In Prague, Czechoslovakia, the National Court convicts Czech General Otto Blaha and General Robert Richtermoc of war crimes, and hangs the two a few hours later. General Gustav Mohapl is sentenced to 25 years in prison for trying to get Czechs to fight with Germans on the Russian front. [527.9]
- January 23
- In Paris, France, the Court of Justice condemns Jean Luchaire to death for collaborating with Germans for personal gain. [531.10] [656.2]
- January 24
- The Supreme Court of Canada hears the case of the government's policy of deporting Japanese Canadians. [7.330]
- January 25
- In Yokohama, Japan, a US military commission sentences to death Japanese Captain Kaichi Hirate for atrocities against Allied prisoners. [532.6]
- In Camarines Narte Province, 150 miles south of Manila, the Philippines, 72 resisting Japanese soldiers are killed by a Philippine battalion of US Army's 86th Division. The confrontation followed several efforts to induce their surrender. [536.3]
- January 26
- In Genoa, Italy, the Pavia tribunal sentences to death former Fascist Prefect of Genoa Carlo Emanuele Basile. [533.31]
- January 27
- General Georg Thomas of the German Army General Staff claims that Reinhard Heydrich staged the 1939 Munich beer celler explosion to end the peace movement of high army officers. [534.2]
- January 29
- In Kiev, a military tribunal senetences twelve German officers and soldiers to hanging for the murder of Soviets. Four others receive prison sentences of 15-20 years. [535.4]
- Spain deports the first group of 23 of 255 Nazi prisoners, destined for the Nuremberg prison. [536.5]
- The government of Canada announces that all German war prisoners in the country will be moved to Great Britain. [536.15]
- January 30
- The Austrian government submits to the European Advisory Council its claims of reparations from Germany, totaling US$7.65 billion. [537.4]
- January 31
- In Bordeaux Harbor, France, US tanker Antietam strikes a floating mine and sinks. [537.4]
- February 2
- A US military commission in Yokohama, Japan, convicts Captain Hiroji Honda of the Japanese Army of failing to prevent subordinates from committing atrocities against Allied prisoners. Honda is sentenced to twenty years of hard labor. [575.20]
- Russian occupation authorities notify officials of the Austrian Danube Steamship Company (Donaudampfschiffahrtgesellschaft) that it has taken possession of the company's assets, and will operate it in the future. Russian makes the claim under the Postdam Declaration clause granting the USSR German assets in eastern Austria. [576.1]
- An Austrian court sentences former Finance Minister Rudolf Neumayer to life imprisonment for treason, for voting in favor of annexation with Germany. [575.23]
- Two Italian archaeological libraries stolen by Germany during the war are returned to Rome. [575.25]
- The Supreme Allied Headquarters reports casualties of the Hiroshima blast: 78,150 dead, 13,983 missing, 9428 serious and 27,997 minor injuries, 176,987 general sufferers. [575.8]
- The US Navy Department announces US submarine fleet sunk 1944 Japanese major vessels during the war, including 194 warships, killing 276,000. The Navy also admits that the US violated the 1930 London Naval Treaty in ordering unrestricted submarine warfare against Japan. [575.20]
- February 3
- In Riga, Latvian Soviet Republic, seven Germans are convicted of war crimes and executed. [576.2]
- February 5
- The United States recognizes the government of Rumania. [578.1]
- February 6
- American General Douglas MacArthur in Tokyo, Japan, orders the arrest of nineteen Japanese suspects of war crimes. [579.17]
- February 8
- At the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg, Soviet Union prosecutors begin presenting their case. Soviet Lieutenant General Roman Rudenko lists a summary of German property damages against the Soviet Union: complete or partial destruction of 2508 church buildings, 1710 towns, 70,000 villages/hamlets, 31,850 industrial establishments, 40,000 miles of railroad, 4100 railroad stations, 40,000 hospitals, 84,000 schools, and 43,000 public libraries. 7 million horses, and 17 million sheep and goats were slaughtered or driven off. Total damage is estimated at 679 billion rubles. [580.6] [806.194]
- February 9
- Soviet Premier Josef Stalin announces a new Five-Year Plan for the Soviet Union to guarantee the country's future security. Stalin blames World War I and II on the capitalistic world economy, due to the imbalance of raw materials and markets. [581.1]
- In London, England, a representative of the Soviet Union presents its reparations demands on Italy: the equivalent of US$100 million of industrial plants of northern Italy. [581.29]
- Greece demands Italian reparations of US$3 billion in sulphur, textiles and agricultural machinery, automobiles, and reconstruction equipment. [581.29]
- February 11
- The U.S. Military Tribunal in Japan convicts Lieutenant General Masaharu Homma of the Japanese Army of ordering the Bataan Death March and condoning other wartime atrocities. He is sentenced to death by firing squad. [605.1]
- The secret agreement by the Allies made in Yalta is published publicly. The terms of the Soviet Union joining the war versus Japan include maintaining the status quo in Outer Mongolia, the restoration of southern Sakhalin and adjacent islands to the Soviet Union, and the gain to the Soviet Union of the Kurile Islands. [606.1]
- At the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg, former German Field Marshal General Friedrich von Paulus testifies as a witness for the Russian prosecution. He says the initiators of the German attack on Russia are Hermann Göring, Wilhelm Keitel, and Alfred Jodl, with plans started on September 3, 1940. [606.12]
- (over 33 hours) American combat engineers, intelligence officers, a German prisoner and his French guard (party of thirteen total) unearth thirty huge crates from southern Bohemia, containing documents of the Czech state, and complete records of German occupation of Czechoslovakia. The German Gestapo had buried the documents about a year ago, in a shaft 6 x 6 x 30 feet deep, with over fifty booby traps. [657.2]
- February 12
- The US Government issues a 131-page memorandum to nineteen republics of the Western Hemisphere charging that the Argentine Government gave active support to the German war effort, and now gives refuge to powerful Nazi interests. [607.1]
- February 18
- Australia issues three postage stamps celebrating peace at the end of World War II. [306.496]
- February 19
- In Canada, a surplus Landing Ship loaded with $2 million worth of liquid mustard gas is intentionally sunk in the Atlantic Ocean, off Nova Scotia. The gas had been acquired from the United States in 1942. [51.12]
- February 20
- The Supreme Court of Canada rules that part of the government's orders-in-council on deporting Japanese Canadians is invalid, but parts of the orders were made under the War Measures Act, making them legal. [7.330]
- In Justice Court in Paris, Marcel Bucard, leader of the French Blueshirt Fascists, is condemned to death. [654.6]
- February 21
- A special people's court in Helsinki, Finland, finds former President Rysto Ryti guilty of leading Finland into war against Russia at the side of Germany. He is sentenced to ten years of hard labor in prison. Seven other former Government officials are also convicted, with sentences of 2 to 5 1/2 years. [655.12]
- February 22
- In Paris, France, Jean Luchaire is executed by a firing squad. He was convicted January 23 of treason as Delegate for Information and Propaganda in the Vichy government. [656.2]
- In Yokohama, US 8th Army war crimes commission sentences Captain Shigeru Aono to ten years prison hard labor for maltreating Allied prisoners. [656.2]
- Spanish Government executes ten former Spanish comrades of French resistance fighters, including Cristino Garcia and Manuel Castro Rodriguez. [656.7]
- February 23
- In Manila, Philippines, Japanese Lieutenant General Tomoyuki Yamashita is hanged as a war criminal. Also, Lieutenant Colonel Seichi Ohta, former head of Japanese Thought Police in Philippines, and Takuma Higashigi, Japanese civilian interpreter. All were convicted of torture and murder of Filipino civilians. [656.1]
- The USSR issues three postage stamps depicting the Moscow Victory Parade, June 1945. [343.525]
- February 25
- In Yokohama, Japan, the former Japanese Army captain in charge of Fukuoka prisoner-of-war camps is convicted of committing and condoning atrocities against prisoners. He is sentenced to life in prison. [658.12]
- February 28
- US Military Trial Commission in Shanghai, China, sentences five former Japanese soldiers to be hanged for strangulation and cremation of three American B-29 airmen at Hankow in December 1944. [658.13]
- Combined Chiefs of Staff reveal that the American, Canadian, and British Governments had experimented with building ice ships during 1942-43. The Habbakuk project was to create a 2 million ton ship made of ice and wood pulp, 2000 feet long, 300 feet wide, as a floating aircraft base. [658.14]
- A war crimes court in Singapore sentences Lieutenant General Fukuei Shimpei, commander of Japanese prisoner-of-war camps in Malaya to death by shooting. [659.14]
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