Seabees in World War II loaded into a U.S. Army Air Force B-29 bomber, named the Enola Gay. A short time later, the Enola Gay took off with its secret load from Tinian's North Field, The largest airfield of the WWII, which the Seabees had built, and started on her mission to Japan. Later in the day, the mission ended with the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima. This historic event sealed the fate of Japan. Realizing that the war was lost, the Japanese government negotiated a cease fire that went into effect on 16 August. On 2 September 1945 Japan formally surrendered,
Whaling in Japan there was halted in March 1945 when the islands were taken by US forces. By November 1945 the whaling stations received permission to reopen; however, most whaling ships had been commandeered by the Imperial Japanese Navy, and by the end of the war the factory ships and most of the whale catchers had been sunk. General Douglas MacArthur encouraged the surrendered Japan to continue whaling in order to provide a cheap source of meat to starving people (and millions of dollars in oil for the US and Europe). The Japanese whaling industry quickly recovered as MacArthur authorized two tankers to