Short answers, pulled from the story.
Victory over Japan Day refers to three specific calendar moments in 1945. August 15 marks the day Emperor Hirohito broadcast his surrender announcement to the Japanese people via radio. A third moment arrived on September 2 when the formal Instrument of Surrender was signed aboard the battleship USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.
Time zone differences meant that news reached the United States on August 14, creating a second commemorative date there. President Harry S Truman declared September 2 as the official U.S. V-J Day during the signing ceremony. The United Kingdom and many Pacific nations adopted August 15 as their official V-J Day.
Thousands of drunken Navy enlistees rioted in San Francisco during a three-night period of vandalism and murder. More than 1,000 people were injured and thirteen died in those chaotic streets. Life magazine published photographs showing servicemen kissing women in skirts across cities like Los Angeles and Miami.
Well over one hundred American prisoners of war were murdered after news broke. Captain Hoshijima Susumi revealed that the last prisoners had been killed at Ranau on August 27. Death orders found at Batu Lintang camp proposed murdering approximately two thousand prisoners and civilian internees on September 15.
Some Japanese soldiers continued fighting on isolated Pacific islands until at least the 1970s. The last known soldier surrendered in 1974 after hiding for decades. Shoichi Yokoi remained hidden for twenty-seven years before finally giving himself up.