# What time is used to record events? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 12, 2025, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954 "2025-08-12T03:40:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/1 "2025-08-12T03:40:30Z")
A recent topic in GD about WWII made me wonder… When Japan surrendered (the Emperor broadcasting they were done) what time was it? For instance, as of this post, it is 12:38pm, August 12 in Tokyo. In Washington, D.C., it is currently 11:38p, August 11. What is the official timekeeping for this (I assume there is some way they officially record these these things). I’d guess GMT but still…when Japan surrendered to the US was GMT the clock? (I get they surrendered to the Allies but it was mostly the US for them) ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/2 "2025-08-12T04:34:50Z")
[Evidently it was local time.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrender_of_Japan#Occupation_and_the_surrender_ceremony) > The formal surrender occurred on 2 September 1945, around 9 a.m. Tokyo time, when Japanese representatives signed the [Japanese Instrument of Surrender](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_Instrument_of_Surrender "Japanese Instrument of Surrender") in [Tokyo Bay](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokyo_Bay "Tokyo Bay") aboard USS _Missouri_, accompanied by around 250 other allied vessels, including British and Australian navy vessels and a Dutch hospital ship. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/3 "2025-08-12T05:03:01Z")
Newspapers and Histories almost exclusively use local time for events. UTC (GMT) is used for events in space. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/4 "2025-08-12T05:14:35Z")
But what is local? Tokyo calls Washington and says, “War over.” What is the local time? ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/5 "2025-08-12T05:17:21Z")
It would be someone in Tokyo making the call, so Tokyo time. If the sentence was about someone taking the call it would be DC time. If there was likely to be any confusion, the particular time zone would be specified. BTW, you couldn’t just make a phone call to an enemy nation in WWII. Communications would be initiated through a neutral country. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/6 "2025-08-12T06:51:41Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > UTC (GMT) is used for events in space. The Mars rover missions use local solar time of their location on Mars, which makes sense considering that they rely on their solar panels for power; so it’s useful to use a time that indicates whether it’s day or night. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/7 "2025-08-12T11:56:42Z")
It’s also convenient that a day on Mars is close to the same length as a day on Earth, so Martian times end up relatively intuitive. Not so for, say, a lunar operation, where “day” and “night” are each two weeks long. ---
**Author:** ![scudsucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scudsucker/32/14101_2.png) [@scudsucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scudsucker)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/8 "2025-08-12T14:44:10Z")
Speaking as an ISO-8601 prescriptive fanatic gaia-centric… I mean it is kind of stupid for us earth-centrics to divide timezones, just so that “wake-up” time is 06:00 all across the globe. Scheduling business meetings will get exponentially harder, but as a species, we (or our underlings) are just not that good at timezones. I mean, we are already bad at making it to that 07:00 meeting without realising the client is in Poland and it is mid afternoon for them The US military have solved this problem with ‘Zulu’ time, although UTC time also works. The ISO 8601 covers both Zulu and UTC. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/9 "2025-08-12T15:37:34Z")
> [@scudsucker](#): > > I mean, we are already bad at making it to that 07:00 meeting without realising the client is in Poland and it is mid afternoon for them Outlook and other calendar programs have been handling this problem for years. Fifteen years ago I had a team with members in Japan, Arizona, Texas, Pennsylvania, and Germany and there was never any confusion about meeting times. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/10 "2025-08-12T15:38:34Z")
For business meetings, or even most military planning, I doubt the distinction between Zulu and UTC would ever be relevant. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/11 "2025-08-12T15:42:24Z")
When I was in school decades ago, we were taught that the Armistice that ended World War I took effect on the 11th day of the 11th month at the 11th hour. That was battlefield (local) time. Similarly the first attack on Pearl Harbor was at 7:55 a.m. - also local time. Come to think of it, all the history I learned that had a specific time attached to it, from Lincoln’s death (7:22 a.m.) to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine (3:59 a.m.) was given in local time, although many times it was also “transleted” to Eastern and/or UTC time. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/12 "2025-08-12T16:26:25Z")
> [@Kent\_Clark](#): > > Similarly the first attack on Pearl Harbor was at 7:55 a.m. - also local time. I took a tour of the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum’s storage facility years ago, and they showed us the oldest surviving B-17. It was in the Philippines when war broke put on December 8th (other side of the date line). ---
**Author:** ![abcdefghij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/43a26b/32.png) [@abcdefghij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abcdefghij)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/13 "2025-08-12T16:40:47Z")
> [@scudsucker](#): > > The US military have solved this problem with ‘Zulu’ time Don’t give the military too much credit. Any “solution” is only as good as the local command implementing it. The XO of my submarine felt, for reasons only understood by him, that our boat should be on KILO time. Navigation logs were kept in ZULU. Control-room personnel were always cognizant of local time. For the first and last few days of patrol, everybody on the boat was attuned to home-port time. Easy-peasy. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/14 "2025-08-12T17:34:47Z")
> [@abcdefghij](#): > > The XO of my submarine felt, for reasons only understood by him, that our boat should be on KILO time. That’s… Roughly eastern Australia and Japan? Did you operate mostly in the Pacific, or have frequent port calls in that time zone? I can understand an officer wanting to keep time in his hometown’s zone, say, but Kilo doesn’t make sense for anywhere in America (I assume your XO was an American). ---
**Author:** ![abcdefghij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/43a26b/32.png) [@abcdefghij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abcdefghij)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2025, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/15 "2025-08-12T17:47:58Z")
XO was decidedly American. We operated exclusively in the Atlantic. Looks like my recollection was off; I have a distinct recollection of Kyrgyzstan or Kazakhstan, so ECHO or FOXTROT. No, it wasn’t because we had target packages there. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2025, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/16 "2025-08-13T03:19:16Z")
Contemporary newspaper accounts report that Americans heard Japan make its surrender announcement through its official Domei news agency at 7:30 am EWT (Eastern War Time) on August 10. Evening papers were therefore able to headline the news on the same Friday. Truman officially announced the surrender at 7:00 pm EWT on August 14. However, the signing of the surrender documents was at 9:04 am Tokyo time on September 2 , because the ceremony took place on the battleship Missouri in Tokyo Bay. Local time seems to have been used for each. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2025, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/17 "2025-08-13T05:47:50Z")
As an aside, some European countries remember the date of the Apollo 11 landing as 21 July 1969 rather than 20 July, which is the date with which it is associated in America. This is because the landing occurred after midnight in Europe. I believe, though, that the fact that the astronauts stepped outside the lunar module only six hours after touchdown may also have something to do with it. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2025, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-time-is-used-to-record-events/1021954/18 "2025-08-16T14:26:00Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Contemporary newspaper accounts report that Americans heard Japan make its surrender announcement through its official Domei news agency at 7:30 am EWT (Eastern War Time) on August 10. Evening papers were therefore able to headline the news on the same Friday. Truman officially announced the surrender at 7:00 pm EWT on August 14. American officers had already been pre-notified about the American announcement, so they got the news while it was still August 14 local time, before the public announcement early on August 15 local time. _The Japanese troops heard the same broadcasts, but they didn’t get orders to surrender until later, if at all. So they weren’t surrendering on August 10 or 14: they were waiting, or running away, or shooting at people who approached their positions, as local conditions and inclinations dictated._ _Formal surrender on September 2 was another big step, but the various theaters were still under military discipline. Singapore surrendered on September 12. Hong Kong formally surrendered on September 16. This wasn’t just because Japanese soldiers were still shooting at Americans: Chinese young men in some areas had been surviving by theft and brigandage, and in other areas went immediately to civil war, so transfer of control wasn’t just symbolic._