Latest / The History of Germany: Kingdoms, War, and Rebuilding Europe — Fexingo History / The Night of the Long Knives: Hitler's Blood Purge
Transcript
- Lucas: So, by the spring of 1934, Hitler had been chancellor for just over a year. The Reichstag fire, the Enabling Act — he'd already dismantled much of the Weimar constitution. But there was a problem brewing inside his own movement. Luna: The SA, right? The brownshirts. Lucas: Exactly. The Sturmabteilung, the SA, was a paramilitary force that had been crucial to Hitler's rise — street brawls, intimidation, that kind of thing. By 1934, it had swelled to nearly three million men, far larger than the regular army, the Reichswehr. And its leader, Ernst Röhm, was getting restless. Lucas: Röhm wasn't just a loyal soldier. He wanted the SA to absorb the Reichswehr and become the new German army. He talked about a 'second revolution' — a socialist, anti-capitalist revolution that would break the power of the old elites, the Junkers, the industrialists. That terrified both the army leadership and conservative politicians like Vice Chancellor Franz von Papen. Luna: So Hitler had a choice between his old street fighters and the army? Lucas: Exactly. And he needed the army. The Reichswehr's officers were the ones who could actually defend Germany. Plus, President Hindenburg, who was old and dying, respected the army above all. If the Reichswehr turned against Hitler, his whole position could collapse. So Hitler chose the army. Lucas: But there was another factor: Heinrich Himmler's SS, the Schutzstaffel. Up to that point, the SS was technically part of the SA, but Himmler had been quietly building it into a rival organization. He and his deputy, Reinhard Heydrich, fed Hitler reports that Röhm was planning a coup. Whether those reports were true is debatable, but they gave Hitler the pretext he needed. Luna: So what happened on the night itself? Lucas: The purge started on June 30, 1934, and lasted through July 1 and 2. Hitler personally flew to Bad Wiessee, a spa town where Röhm and other SA leaders were staying. He stormed into Röhm's hotel room, had him arrested, and then the SS and Gestapo fanned out across Germany, executing a list of targets. Lucas: But it wasn't just SA leaders. Hitler used the opportunity to settle old scores. Kurt von Schleicher, the former chancellor who had briefly preceded Hitler, was shot dead in his home along with his wife. Gregor Strasser, a left-leaning Nazi who had broken with Hitler, was killed in prison. Even Gustav von Kahr, the Bavarian official who had crushed Hitler's 1923 Beer Hall Putsch, was murdered. Luna: Wait, von Schleicher's wife was killed too? That's terrible. Lucas: Yes, it was a brutal, wide-ranging massacre. At least 85 people were officially listed as killed, but historians believe the real number was higher — perhaps over 150. The SS even executed some people by mistake, like a music critic named Willi Schmid who was confused with someone else. Luna: And what about Röhm himself? Lucas: Röhm was held in a prison cell in Munich. Initially, Hitler hesitated to have him killed, perhaps out of old loyalty. But ultimately, on July 1, SS officer Theodor Eicke, along with Michel Lippert, visited Röhm's cell and gave him a pistol, telling him to kill himself. When Röhm refused, saying 'If I am to be killed, let Adolf Hitler do it himself,' they shot him dead. Lucas: Now, the key thing is how Hitler handled the aftermath. On July 13, he addressed the Reichstag and claimed that the purge was necessary to stop a treasonous plot. He then had the cabinet retroactively legalize the killings with the 'Law Regarding Measures of State Self-Defense' — a single paragraph that declared the actions of June 30 and July 1 and 2 were legal acts of state defense. Luna: So he just made murder legal? Just like that? Lucas: Yes. And the Reichswehr was so grateful that they publicly endorsed Hitler. Defense Minister Werner von Blomberg issued a statement praising Hitler's 'soldierly decision and exemplary courage.' From that point on, the army was effectively subordinated to the Nazi Party — a bargain that would have terrible consequences later. Luna: What about the public reaction? Did people know what was happening? Lucas: The Nazi regime controlled the press, so the official story was that Hitler had bravely prevented a putsch. Many Germans accepted that, especially since the SA had become unpopular for its thuggish behavior. But there were also whispers. Some people knew that innocent men had been killed. The writer Erich Maria Remarque, in exile, wrote about it. Still, there was no serious resistance. Lucas: For the SS, the Night of the Long Knives was a huge victory. Himmler's organization became independent from the SA and was soon given the task of running the concentration camps. The purge also signaled that Hitler was willing to kill anyone, even his closest allies, to maintain power. It was a clear warning to potential rivals inside and outside the party. Luna: So in a way, this is when the Nazi dictatorship really became absolute. Lucas: Exactly. When Hindenburg died a few months later, in August 1934, Hitler combined the offices of chancellor and president and became the Führer. The army swore a personal oath of loyalty to Hitler, not to the constitution. The Night of the Long Knives had removed the last internal threat to his leadership, and the path to war and genocide was open.