@general-6-stars
As I said, there are different views as the chapters are written by different professors. The one by David Glantz is most interesting. He says that had Germany taken Moscow, the this is how the general sequence in the east would have transpired:
Soviet counteroffensive in the central USSR, winter 1941.
German offensive in the southern USSR, summer 1942.
Soviet counteroffensive in the southern USSR, winter 1942.
German offensive in the southern USSR, summer 1943.
Soviet counteroffensive in the southern USSR, summer 1942.
I’m not in the beat position to explain it, but the reason why the general tide would have been similar to history is something like the commanders involved, geography, political considerations, and other factors, regardless of what ifs.
His conclusions at the end of the chapter is that something which the Soviets call “objective reality”, where no single decision made solely for the Eastern Front (example, what if Germany attacked Moscow instead of Stalingrad) could have changed the outcome of the war.
It says that the rapier’s thrust was crucial in the chess like war of North Africa, but in the east, a war waged with meat axes, the thrust only gave a fleeting advantage.
The rest of the book is so good I don’t wanna spoil it to you.