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I know, I know, rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. What if the Germans withdrew from Belarus and the expose areas of the Baltic states before the Soviets launched Bagration in July 1944? I was discussing this operation recently and looked at a map and was pretty shocked how crazy it was that a bulge that deep in their lines was allowed, even if the Pripyet marshes helped cover the flank and the area was pretty defensible. IIRC several generals were begging to be allowed to pull back too, but Hitler forebayed it. What if he was successfully removed or just died of heart failure or something a few months before and whomever replaced him was more rational and said abandon Belarus and pull back the lines to straightening things and save on manpower?


They would do scorched earth and pull back AG-North and Center to Riga straight down to link up with AG-South. How do the Soviets react and how does that impact Axis operations going forward? With a step back in say June after the Normandy landings to converse manpower and shorten the line they would disjoint Soviet offensive plans so that offensive against AG-South in July is not deprived of Panzers to support AG-Center as per OTL, so they'd be far more able to resist, while the Soviets move up in Belarus and aren't able to attack while they get their logistics in order.

The Axis save about 400k men and hundreds of AFVs and aircraft, but then have the Soviets move up that much closer to Poland and Germany. Thoughts?
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