It is a fact that Mao supported romanization. <https://np.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/54ky8m/til_th...> Presumably, had the PRC switched decades ago, no doubt Taiwan would today cite its sticking with the traditional written language as yet more proof of it being the "real" China, while the PRC would no doubt point to the millions of illiterates who were taught to read in the Western alphabet as proof of the superiority of its approach. (And vice versa, of course, had Taiwan been the one that chose to romanize.)

> it just couldn't be implemented before computers were powerful enough.

Wubi was presented by Wang at the 38th UN General Assembly in 1984.

So while they missed a few years, that's not bad.