You can speculate what would have happened if Tula fell in the autumn of 1941, but there is one thing - fighting for the city "to do" would exhaust even more, and so already chasing the remnants of forces, German troops. By contrast, the Soviet forces involved in Tula's defense were not so big that their defeat was a problem.

Zhukov would surely have to speed up his offensive - what he does here.
