6 MAY 1942 – SURRENDER OF LAST U.S. FORCES IN THE PHILIPPINES

After a heroic stand by American and Filipino forces against the advancing Japanese in late-1941 and early-1942, U.S. Army Lieutenant General Jonathan M. Wainwright communicated his intent to surrender the last American troops fighting in the Philippine Islands on 6 May 1942.

After the loss of 70,000 troops in Bataan the previous month, Lieutenant General Wainwright moved his headquarters to the island of Corregidor, continuing to resist as American and Filipino troops fought on in the southern islands of the archipelago.

Faced with the overwhelming might of the attacking Japanese and the prospect of massive and pointless casualties, Wainwright concluded that surrender was the only moral option. He communicated his intent to surrender Corregidor to Japanese Lieutenant General Masaharu Homma on 6 May.

Lieutenant General Homma rejected this conditional surrender, demanding that Wainwright order all American troops across the Philippines to lay down their arms. With no leverage left, Wainwright reluctantly agreed, signing the surrender document by midnight.

Wainwright broadcast the surrender instructions over the radio the next morning, although significant American and Filipino forces refused to obey the orders and fought on as guerillas. Wainwright was interned in a series of prisoner of war camps, and at the war’s end stood behind General Douglas MacArthur at the Japanese surrender ceremony aboard the USS Missouri.

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