History Main / IFightForTheStrongestSide

** This happened three times with Italy over two wars:
*** In UsefulNotes/WorldWarI, it was noted that Italy was likely to "rush to the aid of the victors". Indeed, despite nominally being part of the Triple Alliance (with Germany and Austria-Hungary), they found an excuse not to join in...and then joined the Allies after the war became deadlocked and it was clear that Germany wasn't going to win a quick victory.
*** In World War II, they only declared war on and invaded France at the proverbial last minute (joining in on June 10; for reference, the French air force had mostly stopped resisting on June 9, and Paris was declared an open city on June 10 and would fall on June 14). This would entitle them to annex or occupy various pieces of French territory once France surrendered...two weeks after they joined the war (and after they had only failed to take a few mountain passes, despite numerical superiority).

See also: AsskickingEqualsAuthority.

SubTrope of DefeatMeansFriendship.

In a normal DefeatMeansFriendship scenario, someone formerly opposed to the hero joins their side or at least becomes more affable towards them shortly after being defeated by them. In this trope, the defeat is the sole reason for their HeelFaceTurn. The defeated character effectively says, "Okay, now that I know you're stronger, I'm gonna join up with you now. " The reasons for this vary:

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

[[folder:Film-- Animated]]

[[folder:Film-- Live Action]]

** Sellswords are notorious for switching sides like this. When Queen Danys accuses Brown Benn Plumm of betrayal, he simply points out that his mercenary company the Second Sons took a vote, and didn't think she was going to win. Given that they originally were hired to fight her and then defected, she shouldn’t have been surprised. Now that Danys has proven herself a DragonRider, the Second Sons look ready to defect to her side again.

* In the Aesop's fable "The Birds, The Beasts, and The Bat," the birds and the beasts are at war. The bat repeatedly switches sides to fight for whichever side is currently winning. When the war is over, neither the birds nor the beasts want anything to do with him.

* The Spriggan Twelve of ''Manga/FairyTail'' are twelve extremely powerful mages who serve Emperor Spriggan of the Albareth Empire as his PraetorianGuard. Prime Minister Yajeel's conversation with Markarov implies that the main reason they follow Spriggan is because even they pale in comparison to him.

* In ''VideoGame/StarCraftIIHeartOfTheSwarm'', the Broodmothers (Zerg Queens that take the place of the old Cerebrates) were specifically programmed by Kerrigan to follow this logic. Dehaka, who joins with Kerrigan on the planet Zerus, cites this as his reason for joining her.

* Wrestling/PaulBearer would frequently switch allegiances between Wrestling/TheUndertaker and Wrestling/{{Kane}} depending on which of the two had the upper hand in their feuds. When Paul first turned on Kane to re-side with the Undertaker, he said outright that he did it because Kane was weaker than his brother.

** This holds true in the preceding series, ''WesternAnimation/StarWarsTheCloneWars'', as well. During the Clone Wars, Mandalore is shown to have entered a period of peace in spite of their ProudWarriorRaceGuy history, which Clan Vizsla disagreed with and so they formed the terrorist organization Death Watch under the leadership of Pre Vizsla. This eventually led them into a pragmatic alliance with Darth Maul to set up a false flag operation with Maul as the leader of a new, galaxy-spanning crime syndicate which will briefly take over Mandalore, allowing Vizsla and Death Watch to liberate it, become heroes, and end the pacifist government of Satine Kryze. When Vizsla decides to keep Maul locked up instead of setting him up to run his syndicate out of Mandalore, Maul engineers an escape and challenges Vizsla to a duel, killing him and claiming leadership of Death Watch in the process. Most of the Death Watch then sides with him, but Satine's sister Bo-Katan--who was also Vizsla's second-in-command--objects and goes on to lead a resistance against Maul in the Final Season and then the anti-Empire Mandalorian factions during ''Rebels''.

* Kenpachi Zaraki in ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'' eventually does a HeelFaceTurn (sort of, it's complicated) and decides to help out Ichigo and his TrueCompanions, on the basis that if Ichigo survives, Zaraki will get to [[BloodKnight fight him again]].

* In ''Manga/SaintSeiya'', Cancer Deathmask and Pisces Aprhodite are aware that the "Pope" is an evil usurper but they still serve him because of their firm belief that "might makes right", and Gemini Saga is definitely the strongest of them all.

* ''ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogArchieComics'': Sergeant Simian only works for the strongest; when Scourge attempted to win over the [[QuirkyMinibossSquad Destructix]] into working for him, he had to convince Simian that he was strong enough to earn the latter's respect and loyalty.

** In [[ComicBook/SupergirlRebirth "The Killers of Krypton"]], Rogol Zaaar's followers quickly and unanimously bow down to and join ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} when she beats Rogol Zaar down.

-->''Your devotion is nothing more than cowardice. You would not be here if you had anywhere else to go.''

* "When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature they will like the strong horse." - Osama bin Laden

* ''ComicBook/ArchieComicsSonicTheHedgehog'': Sergeant Simian only works for the strongest; when Scourge attempted to win over the [[QuirkyMinibossSquad Destructix]] into working for him, he had to convince Simian that he was strong enough to earn the latter's respect and loyalty.

* In ''Franchise/XMen'' storyline ''ComicBook/XCutionersSong'', Stryfe defeats Apocalypse, and then points out to Apocalypse's followers that their master's own "the Survival of the Fittest" creed means they should follow ''him'' now. Apocalypse's troops agree and side with Stryfe.

** The [[MurderInc Antican Crows]], of whom [[spoiler:Zevran]] was a member combine this with PragmaticVillainy. After their initial attempt to kill you fails, Ignacio will offer you a number of contracts. Complete them, and he'll assure you they all benefited your side of the civil war. If pressed for elaboration, he'll explain that the Crows are smart enough to know the Blight has to be stopped (the end of the world is bad for business); and after you survived their first attempt, they decided you and not Loghain are the best chance to stop it. He'll also warn you that another contract exists (once opened, it can't be closed), but no ''more'' will be placed on you, and he personally will not help the remaining assassin.

** The [[MurderInc Antican Crows]], of whom [[spoiler:Zevran]] was a member combine this with PragmaticVillainy. After their initial attempt to kill you fails, Ignacio will offer you a number of contracts. Complete them, and he'll assure you they all benefited your side of the civil war. If pressed for elaboration, he'll explain that the Crows are smart enough to know the Blight has to be stopped (the end of the world is bad for business); and after you survived their first attempt, they decided you and not Loghain are the best chance to stop it. He'll also warn you that another contract exists (once opened, it can't be closed), but no more will be placed and on you, and he personally will not help the remaining assassin.

* Saïx in ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'' outright says that TheHeartless ally with whoever's strongest, though this refers not to them making peace with or joining [[TheHero Sora]] (which would be...[[AlwaysChaoticEvil problematic]] on several levels), but to them ditching [[Disney/SleepingBeauty Maleficent]] and the Franchise/DisneyAnimatedCanon villains for the EvilerThanThou Organization XIII.