ABSTRACT
In the years 1917–45 the dictatorships in the USSR, Italy and Germany played a key role in Europe. In 1917–21 the USSR emerged, and was followed by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. In the inter-war years authoritarian but essentially conservative regimes increasingly began to adopt aspects of Fascism, such as corporatism and paramilitary party militias. In 1945, while the Italian and German dictatorships were destroyed, the Soviet dictatorship achieved a new lease of life, and was able to form a series of satellite states in Eastern Europe, which survived until 1989.
