Night of the Long Knives

Adolf Hitler, the leader of the Nazi party, gave a cruel order of a bloody purge of his own political party. He assassinated those Nazis who could emerge as his political enemy in the future. This event is also popularly known as Operation Hummingbird in history. This purge took place from 30 June to 2 July 1934. On an estimation, during the purge, 85 people died and the final death toll may have been reached in the hundreds. Many of the perceived opponents were arrested. The purge was helpful for Hitler to consolidate and strengthen the support of the military. 

Background of Night of the Long Knives

Hitler had been chancellor for a long time but he wanted to gain full control of Germany. He could not gain absolute power because of two obstacles. The first one was his old comrade Ernst Röhm who was chief of staff of the SA (Sturmabteilung) and the second was German President Paul von Hindenburg who had the power to stop all of the plans of Hitler by handing power over to the Reichswehr. Hitler was aware of the fact very well that strength of the military was helpful for his policy of foreign affairs and to make the generals unhappy could be dangerous to himself. So he decided to assassinate Ernst Rohm. Thus the idea of this bloody purge came to his mind.

(Image Will be Updated Soon)

The Sturmabteilung (SA)

The Sturmabteilung was a paramilitary organization that was formed to protect the Nazi party. It is also known as Storm Troopers. This was formed in 1921. Ernst Röhm was their leader. The SA played a vital role in the rise of power of Adolf Hitler during the 1920s and 1930s. The SA had increased to 2 million men by the summer of 1934. Ernst Rohm was controlling it who was a loyal companion of Hitler since the initial times of the Nazi Party. The SA helped the Nazi party by providing it with a fist of iron to disrupt other political parties’ meetings. In 1933, when Hitler became Chancellor it was also used to enforce the law. 

(Image Will be Updated Soon)

The SA became interested in power when the national power was obtained by Hitler and the Nazis. The number of the SA was increasing continuously by the end of 1933 they were more than 3 million men. The idea was Röhm was to absorb the army into the SA, which would be a new "people's army". This ideal triggered the leaders of the professional army and was a threat to goals of Hitler of co-opting the Reichswehr. The increasing power and ambitions of the SA were a threat to other Nazi leaders. Which became a cause of the night of the long knives.

The Formation of the Schutzstaffel (SS)

The Schutzstaffel (SS) was a paramilitary organization that was founded in 1925 under the leadership of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. After the purge of the SA through the Night of the Long Knives 1934, the SS gain most of the power of SA.initially it was serving as personal bodyguards. The SS emerged as one of the most powerful and feared organizations in all of Nazi Germany. Heinrich Himmler became the head of this organization in 1929 who was a fervent anti-Semite and expanded the size and role of the SS. He had recruited those who did not have any ancestors who were Jewish. The SS had more than 250,000 members and multiple subdivisions by the start of World War II. They were handling the activities that ranges from intelligence operations to running concentration camps of Nazis. 

The Bloody Purge

Hitler was feared with the increasing power of the SA. He wanted to crush the SA. Hence ordered his guards of the Schutzstaffel to murder the leaders of the organization. Ernst Rohm. was killed during the night of the long knives 1934 along with hundreds of other perceived opponents of Hitler. Members of Heinrich Himmler’s SS shot Rohm and other leaders of the SA on the Hitler also assassinated his enemies such as Kurt von Schleicher(the last chancellor of the Weimar Republic, ) and Gregor Strasser, who had been second only to Hitler in the Nazi Party until 1932; Gustav von Kahr(Bavarian ex-separatist ), Edgar Jung (conservative critic) and Erich Klausener (Catholic professor ). Who was killed in the night of the long knives was later announced and reported by the official radio and the newspaper.

Did You Know?

• The Sturmabteilung (SA) were addressed as Brownshirt because of their uniform’s colour as it was brown. The official uniform was contain a brown shirt with a brown tie and brown pants.

• Hitler tried to wipe out unemployment rates from his nation. The economy was in an abyss as more than 6 million Germans were unemployed. Because of the attempts, the rate of unemployment was almost zero by 1939.

Hence we get to know about the cruelty and greed of power of Adolf Hitler through what happened on the night of the long knives. After successfully assassinating his enemy he eventually became the most powerful person of Germany because no one was able to stand against him because of the bloody purge.