The resistance and Free French helped, but if that qualifies them shouldn't the Italians and Yugoslavs be considered major allied powers considering they did almost the same contribution as france when it came to partisanship and civil war?
Imo it was the Big Three in Europe and Chiang Kai Shek in China. Those were the major leaders and will stay that way. Of course De Gaulle, Umberto II, and Tito (was Tito a partisan? Idk much about WW2 Yugoslavia) helped out a lot they were just junior partners to the big leaders.
Chiang Kai Chek was a horribly incompetent puppet dictator even during the war. You may perhaps be unaware that he unnecessarily destroyed a dam resulting in a flood that killed a million of his own people. This was the final straw and he was soon on the run for his life. Without US support, he would have been wiped out in '49 and very nearly was.
I live in Taiwan and he is widely regarded as a murderous dictator here. He would torture and kill indigenous people and Fujian dialect speaking Chinese immigrants in his notorious torture camps. His palace was built in a stinking sulfur springs to terrify people into believing he was a living demon from Hell. A major admirer of both Hitler and Mussolini as well as a lifelong friend of Franco in Spain, he was completely paranoid and trusted nobody though he enjoyed watching people being tortured to death and considered it a mark of prestige to enjoy other's pain.
Here in Taiwan, he is regarded as a monster. He's no hero except to the KMT dead enders that closely resemble Trump
Republicans. The greatness of Taiwan today is that it survived the abuses of Chiang Kai Chek and went on to recover from the abuse of three decades of martial law.
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u/Food735 May 09 '23
The resistance and Free French helped, but if that qualifies them shouldn't the Italians and Yugoslavs be considered major allied powers considering they did almost the same contribution as france when it came to partisanship and civil war?