79 years ago, on May 8, 1945, the Final Act of Unconditional Surrender of Germany was signed, and May 9 was declared Victory Day. On May 8, 1945, at 22:43 Central European Time (May 9 at 00:43 Moscow Time), the final Act of Unconditional Surrender of Nazi Germany and its armed forces was signed in Karlshorst, a suburb of Berlin. However, the Berlin surrender act was not the first. As Soviet troops surrounded Berlin, the military leadership of the Third Reich faced the issue of preserving what remained of Germany. This was only possible by avoiding unconditional surrender. It was then decided to surrender only to the Anglo-American forces but to continue combat operations against the Red Army. The Germans sent representatives to the Allies to officially confirm the surrender. On the night of May 7, in the French city of Reims, an act of surrender of Germany was concluded, according to which hostilities were to cease on all fronts at 23:00 on May 8. The protocol stipulated that it was not a comprehensive treaty of surrender of Germany and its armed forces. However, the Soviet Union demanded unconditional surrender as the only condition for ending the war. Stalin considered the signing of the act in Reims only a preliminary protocol and was dissatisfied that the act of Germany's surrender was signed in France, not in the capital of the aggressor state, especially since fighting on the Soviet-German front was still ongoing. At the insistence of the USSR leadership, the Allies' representatives gathered again, this time in Berlin, and together with the Soviet side, signed another Act of Surrender of Germany on May 8, 1945. The parties agreed that the first act would be called preliminary, and the second — final. The ceremonial signing took place under the chairmanship of Marshal Zhukov, and the signing ceremony was held in a specially prepared hall of the military engineering school, decorated with the state flags of the USSR, USA, England, and France. Representatives of the allied states sat at the main table. Soviet generals whose troops had taken Berlin, as well as journalists from many countries, were present in the hall. After the unconditional surrender of Germany, the Wehrmacht government was dissolved, and German troops on the Soviet-German front began to lay down their arms. In total, from May 9 to 17, the Red Army captured about 1.5 million enemy soldiers and officers and 101 generals based on the act of surrender. Thus ended the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet people. In the USSR, the surrender of Germany was announced on the night of May 9, 1945, and by order of I. Stalin, a grand salute of a thousand guns was given in Moscow that day. By the decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR to commemorate the victorious conclusion of the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet people against the German-fascist invaders and the historic victories of the Red Army, May 9 was declared Victory Day.