Why was wchar_t invented?

Question

Why is wchar_t needed? How is it superior to short (or __int16 or whatever)?

(If it matters: I live in Windows world. I don\'t

Answer 1

It is usually considered a good thing to give things such as data types meaningful names.

What is best, char or int8? I think this:

char name[] = "Bob";

is much easier to understand than this:

int8 name[] = "Bob";

It's the same thing with wchar_t and int16.