Yeah I think for fascists the opportunity for becoming a little mini-dictator over their respective area of the state is very tempting.

They think fear is respect or they are pointing to the fascist minority factions within those countries as their source of information. Let’s call it The Fascist International.

I just want to add a caveat (while basically agreeing with frezik) that proponents of the unitary executive theory thought that Bill Barr was a total crackpot. So, it’s more like Barr was trying to rehabilitate fascism through an already existing term that makes fascism sound respectable.