On the night of August 14, 1945, Japan stood at the edge of two very different futures. The Emperor had decided to accept the Allied demand for surrender, and a recording of his announcement was ready to be broadcast to the nation the next day.

But not everyone agreed that the war should end. A group of determined army officers believed surrender was dishonorable and set out to stop it. They planned to seize the Imperial Palace, place the Emperor under “protective custody,” and destroy the recording before it could be heard.

This desperate attempt, known as the Kyūjō Incident, would become the last gamble to keep Japan in the fight. In this episode, we will walk through that tense night, the plotters’ moves, the loyalists who stood in their way, and how, despite the chaos, Hirohito’s voice carried across the nation on August 15, signaling the end of World War II.

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