This book analyzes the origins, nature, dynamics, and ruinous end of the Italian and German dictatorships. Emphasizing themes of aggression, fighting power, and staying power, it offers a comparative overview of the two countries’ trajectories from unification in the 1860s to national catastrophe in 1943–45. It evaluates Mussolini’s foreign policy, a subject still inadequately explored and poorly understood, and offers a novel and compelling interpretation of the synthesis of Prusso-German military tradition and Nazi revolution, which was a key factor in Germany’s ability to fight to the bitter end.