On August 14, 1945, exactly 79 years ago, the Japanese government announced that it would accept its enemies' demand for unconditional surrender, bringing to an end the greatest war in human history, a war in which Japanese forces had been engaged continuously since 1937. So today is V-J Day (sometimes celebrated on August 15 or on September 2, when the formal terms of surrender were signed aboard the battleship Missouri in Tokyo Bay). As Ben Franklin said at the end of the American Revolution, "There never was a good war, or a bad peace."