Lots to digest here but yes, Germany and Japan benefitted greatly from early initiative, luck, and lack of coordinated response from Allied nations. Once the Allied nations woke up and provided a systematic response, mostly a disaster for Axis powers (they were overextended and unpopular). Axis powers also suffered from "brain drain" (Fermi and Einstein being examples...helped develop atom bomb, game over). As Machiavelli said "countries that are easy to take are hard to keep, countries hard to take are easier to keep". Germany "took" France and others but couldn't keep them due to resistence, similarly Japan/Philippines. Putin "has" Chechnya but will never "keep" Ukraine for reasons above.