World War, 1939-1945

President Harry S. Truman is shown bestowing the Congressional Medal of Honor on Sergeant Ralph G. Neppel, 21, Glidden, Iowa. Sergeant Neppel is one of 28 soldiers who received this award in the East Room of the White House on this day. Sergeant Neppel lost his legs below the knee in action in Germany, December, 1944. This photo was submitted by the photographer to the third White House News Photographers Photo Contest and is titled "Nation's Highest Honor."

Yoshijiro Umezu was a general in the Imperial Japanese Army in World War II. He was convicted of war crimes and sentenced to life imprisonment

Hideki Tojo was a general of the Imperial Japanese Army, the leader of the Imperial Rule Assistance Association, and the 27th Prime Minister of Japan during much of World War II, from October 17, 1941, to July 22, 1944. As Prime Minister, he was responsible for ordering the attack on Pearl Harbor, which initiated war between Japan and the United States, although planning for it had begun in April 1941, before he entered office.

Foreign Minister Shigenori Togo was Minister of Foreign Affairs for the Empire of Japan at both the start and the end of the Japanese-Allied conflict during World War II. He also served as Minister of Colonial Affairs in 1941, and assumed the same position, renamed the Minister for Greater East Asia, in 1945.

Ambassador Toshio Shiratori was a Japanese ambassador to Italy from 1938-1940. He was an advocate of military expansionism, counseling an alliance between Nazi Germany, Italy and Japan to facilitate world domination. Shiratori was found guilty of conspiring to wage aggressive war by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in November 1948 and sentenced to life imprisonment.

Teiichi Suzuki, who served as a lieutenant general in the Imperial Army, was the last surviving member of a group of top leaders convicted of war crimes. He was the primary planner of Japan's wartime economy, serving as state minister of the Planning Board from 1941 to 1943.

Colonel Cyril Hew Dalrymple Wild of the British military sits in the witness box at the War Ministry Building Courtroom in Tokyo, Japan. He was a War Crime Liaison Officer, who testified for the prosecution that Japan violated Siam's neutrality, also to the mistreatment of prisoners of war by the Japanese in a trial of twenty-seven ex-leaders of Japan. He was killed the next day in a plane crash on his way to Singapore.

Lieutenant General Robert L. Eichelberger and his party visited the International Military Tribunal of the Far East Courtroom. From left to right Major J.J. Gibbons, Mrs. Gibbons, Major General Byers, Mrs. Byers, Lieutenant General Robert Eichelberger, and Mrs. Eichelberger. They listen to the cross-examination of Vice Admiral Richardson during the Pearl Harbor phase of the War Crimes Trial in Tokyo, Japan.

Colonel Cyril Hew Dalrymple Wild of the British military sits in the witness box at the War Ministry Building Courtroom in Tokyo, Japan. He was a War Crime Liaison Officer, who testified for the prosecution that Japan violated Siam's neutrality, also to the mistreatment of prisoners of war by Japanese in trial of twenty-seven ex-leaders of Japan. He was killed the next day in plane crash on his way to Singapore.

Kuniaki Koiso was a Japanese general in the Imperial Japanese Army, Governor-General of Korea and 28th Prime Minister of Japan from July 22, 1944, to April 7, 1945. He was convicted of war crimes and sentenced to life imprisonment