Yeah they were an empire run like and by meth addicts. Terrifying to face, shockingly clever, and headed directly to destruction with the only question being whether they or someone else landed the killing blow on them.

These were not hyper competent tacticians, it was a society that hyped itself into a blood frenzy, convinced of their own superiority and that they’ll be destroyed if they don’t destroy everyone else first. That’s a terrifying threat, but so’s a meth addict with a knife and paranoid delusions.

They were hemorrhaging competence through their Nazi bullshit. Yeah they had some people like von Braun, but they lost people like Einstein (and special shout-out to Fermi who defected from Italy because his wife was Jewish). Additionally their behavior in held territory actively fostered partisan resistance and encouraged fighting to the death.

And that’s ignoring the fact that they broke the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact while at war with France and England and at war in Africa and while leaving Italy to defend itself. The Soviets were a force unto themselves having been the only army to trounce Russia in centuries.