The Military Failures of Fascism

According to the dictionary definition of fascism (https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/fascism), Stalin's Russia was also "fascist", and won many wars, invading and occupying free democracies (Poland) for years.

It's a fun read and an interesting premise.

It's a bit light on rigor than I hoped when I saw the title. It describes 3 fascist or near-fascist states that lost in recent history: Germany, Italy, Franco's Spain. But I wanted to know if Rome under Julius Caesar would be considered fascist? Alexander of Macedon? And also non-western states as well.

IMO it is less about fascism but wars of conquests that are more likely to be doomed to fail. Maybe fascism is a requirement for desires of conquest so they are tightly related.

For conquest to succeed it must be quick and overwhelming. Otherwise it becomes a war of attrition against an enemy that has way better motivation than your army. But also, even if you have a decisive victory, it is almost impossible to stop at just one victory because the war machine will be thirsty for more and your entire economy will be dependent on it, so you have to keep going until total failure.