Assess Albert Speer’s contribution to the Nazi war effort Essay

Albert Speer’s contribution to the Nazi war effort started well before the declaration of war. His work for the Nazi regime aided Adolf Hitler in lifting the morale of the German people and consolidating Nazi power which was determined to engage in armed conflict. Speer was an accomplished architect and a highly efficient organiser. Hitler addressed Berlin’s university students at a Berlin rally in 1931, and Speer who was in the audience was so overwhelmed by what he heard that he joined the Nazi party and committed himself to his work. By 1932 he was working independently as an architect and used his party contacts to gain him more work. In 1933, Goebbels asked Speer to renovate the Propaganda Ministry. His next project proved to be even more successful planning and organising massive banners, swastikas and searchlights for the celebration of the Day of National Labour on the Tempelhof Field in Berlin on May 1st 1933. Goebbels was so impressed that he commissioned Speer to design the surround of the Nuremberg Rally later that year. Soon he was renovating Nazi Party offices and through his hard work and enthusiasm he mad a name for himself amongst the Nazi leadership. With the death of Hitler’s architect Troost, Hitler co-opted Speer as his personal architectural advisor. They became personal friends and Speer moved his family to be near Hitler’s mountain lodge. Speer was commissioned to rebuild the Nuremberg Party Rally grounds and due to his success in propaganda architecture Hitler appointed him in 1938 as General Building Inspector for the National Capital. Speer placed his department at the disposal of the Wehrmacht. Among his innovations were quick-reaction squads who construct roads and cleared away debris. Before long, these units would be used to clear bomb sites. As the war progressed, he failed to convince Hitler of the need to suspend peacetime construction projects, so he continued to work on the Berlin and Nuremburg plans. Speer also oversaw the construction of buildings for the Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe, and developed a considerable organization to deal with this work. Speer continued with his duties designing and constructing for the Reich up until 1942. In this period, his ideas and plans were used by Hitler to show the German population how great the nation could be. That year he was appointed Reich Minister for Armaments & Munitions as a reward for his faithful and unswerving loyalty to Nazi Party and Hitler. Hitler also believed that due to his close relationship to Speer and Speer’s loyalty, he could control arm’s production. Speer’s effect was immediate. In the first six months, he increased production of guns by 27%, tanks by 25% and ammunition by 97%. By the end of 1944, production had increased by 300%. This included a rise in the construction of aircraft from 9500 in 1941, to 34300 by 1944. All this was done with only a 30% increase in the workforce. Speer convinced Hitler that many workers should be diverted from producing consumer items for armaments production. He also used foreign workers and prisoners to work as forced labour. When German war production was at its peak in late September 1944, there were over seven million foreign labourers and 400,000 prisoners of war working as slave labourers. This was approximately 20% of the total workforce. Speer was so efficient with his duties, that many historians credit him with prolonging the war for a further twelve months. Speer was a great believer in the V1 & V2 Rocket programs to swing the tide of the war in Germany’s favour. He claimed that the inability of senior Nazi figures to fully comprehend rocket technology led to a delay in overcoming initial problems with the V2. He believed that the V2 would have been operational far sooner if the project had received greater backing. General Eisenhower claimed after the war that if the V Weapon program had been in place in earl 1944, the D-Day landing may have been impossible. In early 1944, Speer was admitted to a clinic as a result of health problems. During the period of his recovery, he had time to reflect and in doing so, realised his growing disenchantment with Hitler and the Nazi regime. In November 1944 in a private conversation with Joseph Goebbels he indicated his belief that a German victory was not possible. The war was going so poorly for Germany that even Speer’s talent and efficiency drives were unable to reverse the oncoming defeat. By the middle of the year, he had disobeyed Hitler’s orders to put a halt of producing aircraft and boost anti-aircraft production. He also refused to engage in Hitler’s ‘Scorched Earth’ policy which meant that all infrastructure, power supplies, records & documents and food be destroyed before it could fall into the hands of the advancing Allied forces. He did this because he had realised that such an action would devastate any possible chance of recovery for the German people after the war had been lost. It is evident that Albert Speer had an overwhelming effect on the Nazi war effort. His ability to organise and plan projects from architecture, which would lift the peoples morale, to the production of arms which enabled the German armed forces to continue the fight against the allies for so long. Without a person of his ability, the German war machine and the Nazi government would have fallen far earlier.

Innocent Love Walter McDonalds Essays

Innocent Love Walter McDonalds Essays Innocent Love Walter McDonalds Essay Innocent Love Walter McDonalds Essay Walter McDonald and Theodore Roethke similarly use sound devices in diverse ways to emphasize different facets of their poems while ultimately continuing to uphold a shared theme. Roethke does a particularly good job in My Papas Waltz of replicating the cadence of a waltz in the meter of its stanzas. Roethkes arrangement of mutes, aspirates, and semivowels not only complements the waltz like rhythm but also is able to highlight certain words and phrases. The first two stanzas of the poem, much like the introduction of the waltz, are smooth, long and flowing. The plurality of semivowels, aspirates, liquids and vowels almost trick our ears into believing we are actually hearing a waltz and the dancers are gliding effortlessly across the floor. However, in the third and fourth stanzas, the waltz comes to an abrupt halt with its smooth progressive rhythm being broken up by a collection of mutes. Words such as battered, missed, scraped, beat and clinging all break up the graceful waltz and suggest a more negative meaning. The emergence of mutes, especially in the last stanza where there is a strong mute ending in every line, Roethke suggests a paradox in the waltz where there seems to be a kind of underlying danger and violence to the dancing. The alcoholism of the father seems to be kept in check more or less by the controlled rhythm of the waltz and by the fathers and sons desire to maintain intimacy with each other. The waltz starts with a vowel sound, whiskey, but ends with appropriately a strong mute of clinging and connection. In contrast, in Walter McDonalds Life With Father there is a severe absence of strong mutes. Much like how the children hide from whiskey / in daddys snoring the poem flows through the seemingly pleasant vowels, aspirate, liquids and semivowels. Daddy is a perfect word that is a representation of the love and respect that comes from the constant fear that the children have for their father. McDonald could have easily inserted a strong mute to bring out the immense fear and panic of the children, but by not doing so he is able to show reverence and respect. The sound utilized by McDonald almost seems to stress softness, motion and ease. Even though fear is clearly apparent, the childrens overlying feelings of affection and respect for their father carry on amidst the strife and terror. The life with father cannot be even closely described as normal but yet the sounds utilized give us the impression that the children must be satisfied, and are thankful for what they have and find joy wherever possible. Thus we see that the overlying conflict between alcoholic parents and their simplistic nai ve children are often revealed explicitly in such poems as Life with Father and My Papas Waltz. Here both Walter McDonald and Theodore Roethke create an interesting paradox in their poems when they focus on the cruelty, brutality and viciousness of alcoholism in the home especially in relation to families but yet accentuate the ongoing feelings of love, affection, respect and compassion that children continue to hold for their fathers despite their faults. The similarities and differences of these poems in imagery and sound devices respectively, draw attention to the common theme that these poems have. McDonald and Roethke stress very effectively the strength of the family unit and its ability to preserve and endure through hardship. Problems such as alcoholism often break up families but these poems are a testament to the importance of the family unit and its unity and how amidst all conflict, love persists and thus can bind together all things.

Go Pro Case Study Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Go Pro Case Study - Essay Example During a surfing activity with camera in his palm he got his business idea. The future wife of the Woodman, Woodman’s mother and Woodman’s father gave the startup capital to do the business. Arrangement of money, creation of the team and the arrangement of several other resources were the main challenges in front of the Nick Woodman. Learning the market and the customer were also initial challenges for Woodman. Currently the business of the GoPro is significantly successful. In the year 2013 the revenue of the organization increased by 87% and the total revenue was $985 million. The company is certainly profitable in nature. Net income almost doubled in the year of 2013. It became $61 million in 2013 in compare to $32 million of 2012. All these facts are clearly articulating its profitability. Both revenue and the net income have increased which are clear indications of profitability. Sony action cam and CENTR cam are the competitions for the GoPro. The company went for initial public offering in the month of June 2014. Almost $100 million capital was raised from the sale of stocks. The stock was traded in between the range of $21 to $24. Being an US company in NASDAQ the stock is being traded. Code of the stock in NASDAQ is GPRO. Ten years full of slogs, dedicated and committed management, business understanding and the innovation of products are the driving forces for the growth of the company. GoPro sales High Definition personal cameras mainly for the purpose of the extreme and action related video photography. Targeted customers of the GoPro are active teenagers, athletes; people who are involved with deep water surfing and enjoy different expeditions, adventures and mountaineering (Solomon). Marketing campaigns of the GoPro are intoxicating in nature. The organization knows very well how to amaze the people. The organization allows its users to make commercials of the company. All these created such a strong brand identity. Nick Woodman and his

Business communication Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Business communication - Essay Example the staff motivated and producing at a high level of performance it is imperative for the executive managerial staff to keep the lines of communication open. Business communication plays an important role in my day to day activities at work. Everyday my supervisor provides me with a written list of the things that I am supposed to do during my shift. The supervisor when he provides me with the list verbally speaks to me for about five minutes. The first couple of minutes are usually composed of informal information, but the rest of the time he communicates precisely what tasks I am supposed to perform during the day. Another form of communication which I have to closely monitor is electronic information. The growth in electronic communication in the 21st century is staggering (Johns, 2005). All company memos are sent to the employees via email. Each employee has their own corporate email account. Each week there is a staff meeting between the managers and all the employees of the company. The meetings are recorded by video for documentation and quality control purposes. Each employee has a phone in their desk with a specific extension. T he company encourages the employees to talk through the phone with other colleagues about business matters instead of walking to their desk. The phone is also used for business communication between the employees and any customer that calls the firm. An alternative form of communication that is also used by the company to maintain communication with the firm’s customers is an online forum. The forum is used to answer customer questions and inquiries. This forum also has the capability to communicate with customers through a live chat. â€Å"The truth is that the most important part of customer care is effective communication and all the things that go with that† (Dalecarnegie, 2010). The different forms of communication devices and techniques utilized by my firm help me in my daily activities because it facilitates my work. I