Night of the Long Knives

The Night of the Long Knives (1934) (German, Nacht der langen Messer), also known as Reichsmordwoche or "the Blood Purge", was a lethal purge of potential political rivals in the Sturmabteilung (SA) paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party. Occurring late on a Saturday night, the murders targeted Nazi members who were associated more with socialism than with nationalism, and hence were viewed as a threat by Chancellor Adolf Hitler. It took place a year after the SA had itself been used to expel Communist deputies from the Reichstag, which had permitted the passage of the Enabling Act giving Hitler dictatorial powers.

Background

By the summer of 1933, the SA (Sturmabteilung) had grown discontented with the progress of the Nazi regime. Many had taken seriously the "socialism" of "National Socialism" (due to their years of unemployment) and were angry that Hitler and the other party leaders had not. They grew increasingly distant from the Nazi leadership as a result and believed further steps needed to be taken to achieve substantive social and economic change. They also wanted to become the core of a new German army.

Related Topics:
1933 - Sturmabteilung - Nazi regime

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Hitler dominated Germany's government by 1934 but still feared losing power in a coup d'état. To maintain complete control he allowed political infighting to continue among his subordinates. As a result a political struggle grew, with Hermann Göring, Joseph Goebbels, Heinrich Himmler, and Reinhard Heydrich on one side and Ernst Röhm, the leader of the SA, on the other. The SA was the only remaining viable threat to Hitler's power.

Related Topics:
Coup d'état - Hermann Göring - Joseph Goebbels - Heinrich Himmler - Reinhard Heydrich - Ernst Röhm

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The power of Röhm and his violent organization frightened his rivals. Goering and Himmler asked Heydrich to assemble a dossier of manufactured evidence to suggest that Röhm had been paid 12 million marks by France to overthrow Hitler. Himmler presented the "evidence" to Hitler, fuelling his suspicion that Röhm intended to use the SA to launch a plot against him ("Röhm-Putsch"). Himmler at the time had nearly completed the restructuring of another Nazi organization, the SS (Schutzstaffel), from one tasked with protecting Nazi leaders into a secret police formation. The eventual marginalization of the SA removed an obstacle to Himmler's accumulation of power over the coming years.

Related Topics:
Marks - France - Schutzstaffel - Secret police

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Hitler had always liked Röhm; he was one of the first members of the Nazi Party and had participated in the Beer Hall Putsch. But Hitler was under increasing pressure to reduce the SA influence. Hitler's wealthy industrialist supporters were concerned over the SA's socialist leanings: Socialist rhetoric had been useful for the Nazi rise to power, but the ideology stood in contradiction to nationalist Nazi goals. Military leaders were likewise alarmed by Röhm's proposal that the German army, which was limited by the Treaty of Versailles to 100,000 men, be absorbed into the larger SA, which in early 1934 numbered 2.5 million. Some leaders of the Nazi party also joined in the dislike many conservative officers expressed over the overt homosexuality of Röhm and some other SA leaders. The Night of the Long Knives was a significant prelude to life in Nazi Germany, and its use of terror to eliminate dissent—expanding later into the Holocaust.

Related Topics:
Beer Hall Putsch - Socialist - Military - Treaty of Versailles - Homosexual - Nazi Germany - Terror - Holocaust

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~