What the title says what if the Soviets were unable to successfully move their major industry past the urals and the unthinkable feat remains unthinkable does this have a major effect on the war? Does it change anything?
Well, that sort of takes away the counteroffensive around Stalingrad doesnt it?Well the Soviets were able to relocate thousands of factories, but also lost quite a few to the German invasion. There still already was industry in the Urals though. The inudtry of the Ural was increased by 200% from the evacuated factories so there alreayd wer thousand of factories there.
So, if the Soviets, even if they lose all those factories, still have some industry left to keep on producing. The workers were available, the industries already there could be expanded with materials received from lend-lease instead of reinforced with evacuated industry from the West. This will delay the production for the Soviets, probably going to impact some important campaigns, but in the long run i think the Soviets will be able to build up enough to at least get up to sufficient strength a year later than OTL.
Evacueted factories didn't had much impact on material delivered to army in defense of Moscow though. So no Moscow wouldn't be lost in 1941. But probably 1943 wouldn't be the same either.For the OP you would need certain butterflies that would have made the course of events occur--i.e. far worse Soviet rail network or far better German performance in the opening phases. In either event, the result is Russia loses Moscow in 1941 and then loses the war.