>>20514I remember hearing once that Hitler supposedly claimed in a dinner that the result of the five year plans Stalin introduced created an industrial goliath "greater than even the Reichswerke Hermann Göring."
Now, presuming this is real it's not entirely out of the ordinary and reflects the frankly bizarre relationship Fascism had with the USSR; it was equal parts realpolitik and also the arbitrary whims of the various Fascist dictators. ᴉuᴉlossnW, for example, claimed that Stalin had essentially created "Russian Fascism" or "National Bolshevism" during their initial years trading with one another. Funny enough I think ᴉuᴉlossnW even claimed that Stalin's own purge of his political enemies was not all that different from his, the difference was that Stalin being the Russian "Leader" was thus influenced by some "Mongol Spirit" and was reflected in him ordering mass executions, whereas Italians used the more "refined" and "civilized" method of forcing individuals to drink castor oil and shit out their innards in order to publicly humiliate them.
It should be noted that Fascists tried to apply at least some kind of bizarre "Fascist Analysis" to Stalin. For example, I believe it was Ribbentrop who excitedly claimed that, in fact, Stalin was a nationalist who was going to build a "Great Russia" of sorts. He elaborated (or maybe it was Hitler himself) that there was in fact a wedge within the Communist movement that on one side had Stalin as some sort of "modern day Genghis Khan" (the context in which it was in implied that was a positive thing) who would expand Russia's power and territory, versus Trotskyist "Internationalists" who sought to ferment global revolution and were part of some international Jewish Conspiracy. Essentially they saw "Socialism in One Country" as not altogether contradictory with what Fascists wanted, and Fascists themselves liked to think they were "pragmatists" who could take bits and pieces from liberalism or socialism to "make it work."
Hitler's own opinion on Stalin, while colored by the fact that he was on meth and would vasscillate wildly between one statement or another, was that himself, ᴉuᴉlossnW, and Stalin were the three most historically significant figures of the 20th century. Which, I mean, given the level of power Stalin was perceived as having within the USSR, makes sense from a Fascist perspective. "The Leader" figure in Fascism isn't just supposed to be a man, but the living embodiment of the Nation itself. While figures like Roosevelt were sneered at by some Fascists for having his power limited by democratic institutions, Stalin was seen as the "embodiment of the Great Russian Nation" who, victory or defeat, would still be known as a "Great Man" of history.
Finally, reading Molotov Remembers you'd get an interesting insight into the Third Reich's diplomacy. There were talks of a supposed alliance that the Bolsheviks hoped would buy them time to prepare for war. You'd have Hitler himself excitedly talk about how the USSR could have India (might be because of some weird "Eurasian Horde" ideas he had) as long as it let the Germans incorporate Romania into its sphere. A more clever man than me could probably draw a neat metaphor about Russia's place as either European or Asian from these frustrating debates over who gets what; Germany seeing Russia as a fundamentally "Eastern" Nation whereas Russia tried to orient itself towards the West.
The Third Reich's own diplomatic corps was desperate to avoid war, even at the cost of going behind Hitler's back. In the leadup to Operation Barbarossa, you had German diplomats desperately hoping if they could bring the USSR into the Axis Powers they could prevent a war Germany would lose. Ultimately the scheme failed, because Hitler saw Stalin as a titanic rival to be defeated, and any deal with the Reich wasn't worth the ink.