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It is completely wrong that the USSR was a benign evil. Actually absence the German army, the Soviets who had already invaded and captured various countries, would end their mobilization and end up conquering Europe. On paper the USSR was actually stronger than Germans when Germany invaded. They were just in the middle of mobilization and not ready yet and the Germans had some advantages in term of military effectiveness which weren't necessarily something that could be quantified by everyone before the war. In terms of hardware and personnel, the USSR had the advantage.
Note, that doesn't mean that USSR was going to imminently attack, it might have taken a few years.
The fact that both the nazi and soviet regime were motivated in part by rational fear of each other which effected their foreign policy agenda, doesn't of course change the fact that both had an imperialist agenda and were quite willing to be brutal conquerors.
Too much credit and sympathy is given to the Soviet Union as an entity, (I will contrast this to sympathy towards civilians targeted by Nazi Germany who do deserve sympathy, but then even German civilians deserve some sympathy for their targeting, and almost everyone forgets that there were also massacres of Germans by the USSR before ww2 started), because it was invaded by Nazi Germany first before they got to invade them after German vs western power war would have weakened both Germany and countries like France. Also, the USSR was conducting massacres of civilians before the nazis started, before the nazi regime existed and after the nazis fell, including targeting various ethnic groups. They even tried to pin the Katyn massacre to the nazis which it self increases the fog of war effect, considering their participation in the post ww2 making of historical narrative about what happened, and it isn't as if the USSR are only regime willing to promote war propaganda.
The way FDR adminstration and media reacted to the coverup of Katyn massacre is especially notable. Such sympathies colored not only the propaganda of the time but understanding that endured today.
https://newcriterion.com/article/katyn-the-long-cover-up/
But like I said we still have enough evidence to make a negative judgement of the Nazi regime that condemns its behavior, even though there are actually room for examination of such narratives and whether aspects have been exaggerated. I still think that it is a given that the position and treatment of various non German ethnic groups would be bad in a nazi Germany victory, and the question being how bad.
The massacres of the USSR matter including of ethnic groups, even though it hasn't been focused by those who popularize history after ww2, because of course they have their agenda of which group suffering to focus upon and elevate.
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