Latest / The History of Germany: Kingdoms, War, and Rebuilding Europe — Fexingo History / The Night of the Long Knives: Hitler's Inner Purge
Transcript
- Lucas: We've talked a lot about how Hitler came to power, but one thing that really cemented his control was the purge of his own party's paramilitary. I'm talking about the Night of the Long Knives in 1934. Luna: The SA, right? The brownshirts. Lucas: Exactly. The Sturmabteilung, or SA, had been crucial to Hitler's rise — they were street brawlers who intimidated political opponents. But by 1934, their leader Ernst Röhm was becoming a problem. Röhm saw the SA as the nucleus of a new revolutionary army, and he wanted to merge it with the regular army, the Reichswehr. Luna: That must have scared the traditional military leaders. Lucas: It terrified them. The Reichswehr generals were conservative aristocrats who despised the SA's radicalism and its working-class character. They made it clear to Hitler: if he wanted the army's loyalty, he had to rein in Röhm. And Hitler needed the army, because President Hindenburg was dying, and only the army could guarantee the succession. Lucas: Meanwhile, Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Göring were feeding Hitler rumors that Röhm was planning a coup. They had their own ambitions — Himmler wanted to expand the SS, and Göring wanted to eliminate rivals. So they convinced Hitler that the SA was about to seize power. Luna: Was there any truth to those rumors? Lucas: Almost certainly not. Röhm was loyal to Hitler, and the SA had no real plan to overthrow him. But Hitler decided to act anyway. On June 30, 1934, he flew to Bad Wiessee in Bavaria, where Röhm and other SA leaders were staying at a hotel. They were arrested in their beds — some were shot on the spot. Luna: Wait, Hitler personally went there? Lucas: He did. He confronted Röhm, had him taken to Munich's Stadelheim prison, and later ordered his execution. But the purge didn't stop with the SA. Hitler used the opportunity to settle old scores. Kurt von Schleicher, the former chancellor, was shot dead in his home. So was Gustav von Kahr, the man who had crushed Hitler's 1923 Beer Hall Putsch. Luna: That sounds like a convenient way to eliminate political enemies. Lucas: It was exactly that. Gregor Strasser, a former Nazi rival, was also killed. The SS, under Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich, carried out the executions — about 85 to 100 people in total, though the exact number is disputed. They were shot at the Lichterfelde barracks in Berlin, among other places. Lucas: After the purge, Hitler gave a speech in the Reichstag on July 13, claiming that the SA had been plotting a putsch and that he had acted to save the nation. The cabinet then passed a law, the Gesetz über die Notwehr des Staates, which retroactively legalized the killings. Luna: So the murders were made legal after the fact. Lucas: Exactly. And the army, grateful that the SA threat was gone, publicly supported Hitler. When Hindenburg died a month later, Hitler combined the presidency and chancellorship, becoming the Führer. The Night of the Long Knives was the moment he broke the last constraints on his power. Luna: It's chilling how easily the elites went along with it. Lucas: Yeah. And it's a reminder that the Nazi regime wasn't just about external enemies — it also devoured its own. This show, like all of Fexingo History, is ad-free because we think the story matters more than commercials. If that matters to you, you can support us at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. Every bit helps keep this independent. Luna: Definitely. So, after the purge, the SS really came into its own, didn't it? Lucas: Absolutely. The SS had been a small guard unit before — Hitler's bodyguards, basically — but after the SA was gutted, Himmler's SS became the primary internal security force. They took over the concentration camps, and Theodor Eicke, who had commanded the Dachau camp, organized them into a brutal system. From then on, the SS was the real power behind the regime. Luna: And Röhm's vision of a 'second revolution' — a socialist one — was completely buried. Lucas: Yes. The SA had wanted to break the old conservative elites, but Hitler chose to ally with industry and the army. The Night of the Long Knives sealed that alliance. It also sent a message: no one, not even top Nazis, was safe if they became inconvenient. Lucas: Interestingly, the purge was initially called the 'Röhm-Putsch' by Nazi propaganda, implying that Röhm was the traitor. But within a year, the term 'Night of the Long Knives' emerged, borrowed from a German folk song about medieval massacres. It stuck because it captured the brutality so well. Luna: And it's a phrase we still use today for any violent internal purge. Lucas: Exactly. So in a way, Hitler created the archetype for the modern political purge — and also showed that the rule of law could be twisted to justify anything.