Replace Rommel.

Eh, no, actually it probably prolonged the war and helped the Axis as it meant they caught the Soviets with their pants down by leading Stalin to conclude the Germans were preparing for a sustained Mediterranean war and that the Germans would wait until 1942 (with of course the only people who'd say otherwise being brave or suicidal or both) while also ordering his troops to stand down on the alert, the same factor handicapping them yet again.
Stalin was an idiot, he knew the forces were there on the border, he knew Hitler hated him, it was just his own paranoia that kept him from joining the dots.
 
Stalin was an idiot, he knew the forces were there on the border, he knew Hitler hated him, it was just his own paranoia that kept him from joining the dots.

I would have to agree with that, Stalin at a whim could get a moronic thought into his head and murder hundreds of thousands of his people or decide that the German Army massing on his border was just a fake out to the British. If the Afrika Corps wasn't sent down to Libya it might be slightly more likely Stalin would get worried Hitler was about to attack. But, this is Stalin we are talking about who was a bone head to say the least when he had an idea in his head like that Hitler won't attack until at the earliest 1942 he was more then willing to ignore massive evidence to the contrary.
 
I've always wondered what would have happened if a) Churchill hadn't had that ridiculous urge to help the Greeks (and thus ensuring German intervention) and b) if O'Connor hadn't been captured. I think that Tripoli would have fallen and Rommel would have been little more than a footnote in history.
Completely right IMO.
Even ignoring it costing the Axis a few days before the attack on the USSR it diverted German tanks, troops and most importantly many logistical trucks away from the Russian Front.
It didn't, actually. The rasputitsa delayed the start, not the Greek campaign.
Its entirely possible that if the Afrika Korps was instead booked for the Eastern Front Leningrad falls in the summer of 1941
Conceivable. What's more significant IMO is the presence of X Fliegerkorps on the Eastern Front. Attacks on Sov oil at Baku become possible, when they weren't OTL...

Bigger still is what happens when O'Connor romps on through Abyssinia & Libya. Mussolini falls? Hitler orders the occupation of Italy? Britain offers Italian POWs the chance to join the Allies?:cool: (Under Brit COs, they wouldn't have been totally useless...) Enough to persuade Winston to make France a more equal ally? Even make Italy one?

Does it shorten the war?:eek::cool::cool:
 
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