World War II by country
Wikimedia list article

Almost every country in the world participated in World War II. Most were neutral at the beginning, but relatively few nations remained neutral to the end. World War II pitted two alliances of nations against each other, the Allies and the Axis powers. Estimates of death toll range from 40 to 90 million people (including all genocide casualties). The main Axis powers were Nazi Germany, the Empire of Japan, and the Kingdom of Italy; while the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and China were the "Big Four" Allied powers.
The countries which were either involved in or affected by World War II are listed alphabetically, along with a description of the role which they played in the conflict.
Participants and non-participants during World War II
Neutral powers
North Yemen
Switzerland
Tibet
Spain
Afghanistan
Sweden
Vatican City
Bhutan
Ireland
Portugal
Estonia (from 1939-1941)
Lithuania (from 1939-1941)
Latvia (from 1939-1941)
Liechtenstein
Argentina (until 1945)
Peru (until 1945)
Venezuela (until 1945)
Ecuador (until 1945)
Uruguay (until 1945)
Paraguay (until 1945)
Axis powers
Source:
Germany (from 1939–1945)
Italy (from 1940–1943)
Japan (from 1940–1945)
Hungary (from 1940–1944)
Hungary (GONU) (from 1944)
Romania (from 1940–1944)
Bulgaria (from 1941–1944)
Slovakia (from 1939–1945)
Croatia (from 1941)
Philippines (from 1943)
North Italy (from 1943)
Thailand (from 1941)
Iraq (1941)
Bohemia and Moravia
Italian Albania (from 1940–1943)
Finland (from 1941–1944)
Vichy France (nominally neutral, officially known as the "French State") (from 1940–1944)
French Indochina (de facto Japanese occupation post 1944)
French Indochina of Japan (1945)
Vietnam
Luang Prabang
Kampuchea
Dutch East Indies of Japan (from 1942–1945)
Serbia (officially known as the "Government of National Salvation") (from 1941–1944)
Lokot Autonomy (from 1941–1944)
Montenegro (from 1941–1944)
Belarus (from 1941–1944)
German Albania (from 1943–1944)
Hellenic State (from 1941–1944)
Norwegian State (from 1942–1945)
Kosakenland (from 1944)
Yugoslavia (1941) (2 days)
Chetniks (1941–1945)
Burma (from 1942–1945)
Macedonia (1944) (A proposed puppet state of Germany in Macedonia)
Azad Hind (from 1943)
Manchukuo
Mengjiang
Wang Jingwei regime (from 1940)
Iran (co-belligerent)
Reichskommissariat Ukraine (from 1941)
Reichskommissariat Ostland (from 1941-1943)
Reichskommissariat Niederlande (from 1940-1944)
Allied powers
United Kingdom (from 1939)
United States (from 1941)
Soviet Union (from 1941)
China
France (until 1940)
Poland
Mongolia (1945)
Czechoslovakia (from 1939)
Chetniks (1941)
Nepal
Saudi Arabia (1945)
Philippines (from 1941)
Canada (from 1939)
Newfoundland
India
Australia
Poland (from 1939)
Free France (from 1940–1944)
New Zealand
San Marino (1944)
Southern Rhodesia
Mexico (from 1942)
Dominican Republic (from 1941)
Belgium (from 1940)
Netherlands (from 1940)
Luxembourg (from 1940)
Norway (from 1940)
Brazil (from 1942)
Liberia (from 1944)
Korea
Egypt
Haiti (from 1941)
South Africa
Finland (from 1944)
Iraq (from 1943)
Italy (from 1943)
Italian resistance movement (1943–1945)
Romania (from 1944)
Bulgaria (from 1944)
Yugoslavia (1941)
Turkey (1945)
Greece (from 1940)
Syria (1945)
Lebanon (1945)
Muscat and Oman
Iran (from 1941)
Ethiopia (from 1941)
Denmark (1940)
LANÇ (1942-1945)
Cuba (from 1941)
Panama (from 1941)
Costa Rica (from 1941)
Tuva (from 1941-1944)
Việt Minh (from 1941)
Yugoslavia (from 1941)
Anglo-Egyptian Sudan
Provisional Government of the French Republic (from 1944)
Belgian Congo (from 1940)
Afghanistan
Under Prime Minister Mohammad Hashim Khan, Afghanistan stayed neutral. Despite British pressure, Afghanistan maintained friendly relations with the Axis during the war, in the hopes that the Axis would help stop British influence in the region, which came from the British Raj and Mesopotamia. In 1940, the Afghanistan legation in Berlin asked whether Germany would cede land in British Raj to Afghanistan if it should win the war; specifically, the king and minister wanted to acquire all the ethnic Pashtun land between the Durand Line and the Indus River. Despite this stated goal, Afghanistan stayed out of the war, neither suffering an attack nor attacking any other country.
In 1941, Western press reported that Amanullah Khan, a former king who lost his throne in a civil war in the 1920s, was working as an agent for Nazi Germany in Berlin.
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