Night of the Long Knives: Directed by Paul Stanley. Political instability in the Weimar Republic, Hyperinflation and the invasion of the Ruhr, Strength and weaknesses of the Weimar Republic. ", "But in origin the National Socialists had been a radical anti-capitalist party, and this part of the National Socialist programme was not only taken seriously by many loyal Party members but was of increasing importance in a period of economic depression. It's Friday Cartoon Images67,818 Happy Friday Stock Photos and Images. 95.7% of the population voted. Reset Your Hosts File. President Hindenburg died at the age of 87 on 2 August 1934. [45] Then, on 13 July 1934,[52] Hitler justified the purge in a nationally broadcast speech to the Reichstag: If anyone reproaches me and asks why I did not resort to the regular courts of justice, then all I can say is this. [69] The memo went on to demand that Hindenburg punish those responsible, and criticized Blomberg for his outspoken support of the murders of Schleicher and Bredow. It's been called "the night of the long knives in the tropics.". Over the next two days, most of the SA leadership were placed under arrest and murdered without trial. The army's support for the purge, however, would have far-reaching consequences for the institution. On the 28 February 1933, President Hindenburg signed the Emergency Decree for the Protection of the German People. [h], The action Hitler took would not only defang Rhm and the SA as a potential threat to Hitler's personal control of the Nazi Party, but would also serve to strengthen his relationship with the Wehrmacht the German armed forces which had long considered the SA to be their primary rival, and which at times outnumbered the military in manpower.[10]. The faction headed by Hermann Gring and also . [21] At the end of May, Brning and Schleicher, two former chancellors, received warnings from friends in the Reichswehr that their lives were in danger and they should leave Germany at once. The Nazis also took several more steps to reduce their political opposition legally. [40] Those not immediately executed were taken back to the Leibstandarte barracks at Lichterfelde, given one-minute "trials", and shot by a firing squad. This new law gave Hitler the power to rule by decree rather than passing laws through the Reichstag and the president. In 1933, up to 200,000 people were seized and imprisoned by the SA and the SS. [69] The memo asked that Hindenburg instead create a directorate to rule Germany, comprising the Chancellor (who was not named), General Werner von Fritsch as Vice-Chancellor, Hammerstein as Minister of Defense, the Minister for National Economy (also unnamed), and Rudolf Nadolny as Foreign Minister. The Nazis had the support of the DNVP, and had banned the communist party, the KPD, from attending. Hitler formally adopted this title in April 1942, thus placing himself above the reach of the law de jure and de facto. A poster from the March 1933 elections. Most of those killed were members of the "Storm Troopers" (SA) (German: Sturmabteilung). Enraged, Hitler tore the epaulets off the shirt of Obergruppenfhrer August Schneidhuber, the chief of the Munich police, for failing to keep order in the city the previous night. Having earlier imprisoned or exiled prominent Social Democrats and Communists, Hitler used the occasion to move against conservatives he considered unreliable. [20] Although Schleicher was in fact unimportant by 1934, increasingly wild rumours that he was scheming with Rhm to re-enter the corridors of power helped stoke the sense of crisis. The elections were neither free or fair. [70] It is noteworthy that even those officers who were most offended by the killings, like Hammerstein and Mackensen, did not blame the purge on Hitler, whom they wanted to see continue as Chancellor; they at most wanted a reorganization of the Cabinet to remove some of Hitler's more radical followers. The German Army generals, by condoning the unprecedented events of the Night of the Long Knives, effectively cast their lot with Hitler and began the long journey with him that would eventually lead them to the brink of world conquest and later to the hanging docks at Nuremberg after the war. He wrote about the cartoon in his book, Years of Wrath (1949): "Nazi Party members and S.S. men got out of hand, clamouring for jobs in a Nazified industry and in an army under Nazi control; but Hitler had promised the . Its membership plummeted from 2.9 million in August 1934 to 1.2 million in April 1938. While many officers were impressed by Hitler's promises of an expanded army, a return to conscription, and a more aggressive foreign policy, the army continued to guard its traditions of independence during the early years of the Nazi regime. Conservatives in the army, industry and politics placed Hitler under increasing pressure to reduce the influence of the SA and to move against Rhm. These acts removed peoples ability to oppose the Nazi Party, in any form. What were Hitler's and the Nazi Party's ideas? By mid-1934, Hitler seemed to be master of all Germany. By the end of May 1934, Hitler had been chancellor for 16 . Opposition from outside the Nazi party was being strangled Communists were banned and concentration camps set up. [25] During the summit in Venice, Mussolini upbraided Hitler for tolerating the violence, hooliganism and homosexuality of the SA, which Mussolini stated were ruining Hitler's good reputation all over the world. However, following Hitler being elected chancellor, the SA, and particularly Rhm, were keen to continue the revolution and replace the traditional conservative elite with Nazis. They understood the need to appear moderate and take over slowly by democratic means where possible, maintaining the stability and illusion of a democracy. "[74], Hitler named Viktor Lutze to replace Rhm as head of the SA. In his speech to the Reichstag on 13 July justifying his actions, Hitler denounced Schleicher for conspiring with Rhm to overthrow the government; Hitler alleged both were traitors working in the pay of France. The support of respected individuals such as von Papen and Hindenburgs son, Oskar von Hindenburg, gave the Nazis further legitimacy for these actions. However, this power was limited, as the Nazis were just one party in a three party The Peoples Court, a court created by the Nazis in April 1934 with judges chosen specifically for their Nazi beliefs, replaced the Supreme Court. This hysteria helped to turn the public against the communists, one of the Nazis main opponents, and 4000 people were imprisoned. It shows the Nazis using violenc. When the Nazi regime did not take such steps, those who had expected an economic as well as a political revolution were disillusioned. It's helped us to become more accustomed to acts of grim self-interested political butchery; but for those witnessing these events as they happened, they were simply unprecedented. "[9], Hitler's speech signalled his intention to rein in the SA, whose ranks had grown rapidly in the early 1930s. 7 Night of the Long Knives - 30 June 1934 . [k] Signed into law by Hitler, Grtner, and Minister of the Interior Wilhelm Frick, the "Law Regarding Measures of State Self-Defence" retroactively legalized the murders committed during the purge. of democracy. by Roy Morris Jr. 8/20/2018. Although Hitler ordered him released days later, Papen no longer dared to criticize the regime and was sent off to Vienna as German ambassador.[43]. With the army limited by the Treaty of Versailles to one hundred thousand soldiers, its leaders watched anxiously as membership in the SA surpassed three million men by the beginning of 1934. President Paul von Hindenburg appointed Hitler chancellor on 30 January 1933. [25] While Mussolini's criticism did not win Hitler over to acting against the SA, it helped push him in that direction.[25]. , 2. By June 1934 this had grown to over 3,000,000 members. "[55] Reich Justice Minister Franz Grtner, a conservative who had been Bavarian Justice Minister in the years of the Weimar Republic, demonstrated his loyalty to the new regime by drafting the statute, which added a legal veneer to the purge. On the 4 October 1933, it was declared that all editors must be Aryan. Then came the day he didn't need them anymore. Reorganisation and the Bamberg Conference, The role of economic instability in the Nazi rise to power, The role of political instability in the Nazi rise to power, The role of the conservative elite in the Nazi rise to power. 3. [44] The murdered included at least one accidental victim: Willi Schmid, the music critic of the Mnchner Neuste Nachrichten newspaper, whose name was confused with one of the Gestapo's intended targets. And let it be known for all time to come that if anyone raises his hand to strike the State, then certain death is his lot. Following Hitlers appointment as chancellor the Nazis were finally in a position of power. The Gestapo arrested and later executed Papen's close associate Edgar Jung, the author of Papen's Marburg speech, and disposed of his body by dumping it in a ditch. Once the Enabling Law was in place, the Nazis could bypass the Reichstag and rule by decree seemingly creating laws that stabilised Germany and got rid of its internal enemies. In this photo, Rhm is talking to a group of SA men, who appear to be listening intently. . "[26] According to his memoirs, von Papen, a Catholic aristocrat with ties to army and industry, privately threatened to resign if Hitler did not act. The novella is now in the public domain, so you can get it free on Kindle, but I want to recommend the audio version which is 3 hours and 17 . [75] Hitler expressly told him to stop SA funds from being spent on limousines and banquets, which he considered evidence of SA extravagance. Chancellor Adolf Hitler, urged on by Hermann Gring and Heinrich Himmler, ordered a series of political extrajudicial executions . The first concentration camp, Dachau, opened in a broken-down munitions factory on the 20 March 1933, imprisoning primarily political prisoners. Moreover, it was not just the Reichswehr that viewed the SA as a threat. [29], In preparation for the purge, both Himmler and Heydrich assembled a dossier of manufactured evidence to suggest that Rhm had been paid 12 million (EUR 29.1million in 2023) by France to overthrow Hitler. 2. [28] Hitler had hesitated for months in moving against Rhm, in part due to Rhm's visibility as the leader of a national militia with millions of members. Hitler had become a chancellor in 1933 henceforth he had the power to establish his power. [18], Finally, in early 1934, the growing rift between Rhm and Hitler over the role of the SA in the Nazi state led former chancellor General Kurt von Schleicher to start playing politics again. [27] While von Papen's resignation as vice-chancellor would not have threatened Hitler's position, it would have nonetheless been an embarrassing display of independence from a leading conservative. 'The Night of the Long Knives' is now commony associated with a particularly violent political purge in Nazi Germany in 1934. He held the same position with Rhm as I held with Himmler. Germany feared revolution. SS men stormed the hotel, and Hitler personally placed Rhm and other high-ranking SA leaders under arrest. This meant, as well as removing other personal freedoms, that the Nazis could now imprison their political opposition for an indefinite period for any, or no, reason. On the 31 January 1933, Hitler, conscious of his lack of a majority in the Reichstag, immediately called for new elections to try and strengthen his position. [5] In June 1932, one of the worst months of political violence, there were more than 400 street battles, resulting in 82 deaths. The army almost unanimously applauded the Night of the Long Knives, even though the generals Kurt von Schleicher and Ferdinand von Bredow were among the victims. The Reichstag, the German lower house of parliament, was set on fire on the 27 February 1933. Also in 1932, the Nazi critic Carl von Ossietzky would use the term to describe the then unrealised plans for a violent uprising: At the beginning of 1932 the Nazis seemed on the verge of a dictatorship, and the air was full of the stretch of blood. The Freikorps were nationalistic organizations primarily composed of disaffected, disenchanted, and angry German combat veterans founded by the government in January 1919 to deal with the threat of a Communist revolution when it appeared that there was a lack of loyal troops. Over 150 people were murdered and hundreds more were arrested. ", Last edited on 28 February 2023, at 06:34, Night of the Long Knives (disambiguation), The History Place Triumph of Hitler Night of the Long Knives, German Culture The Third Reich Consolidation of Power, The German Embassy in the United States The Era of National Socialism, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Night_of_the_Long_Knives&oldid=1142048294, Operation Hummingbird, Rhm Putsch (by the Nazis), The Blood Purge. [73] However, despite the rehabilitation of the two murdered officers, the Nazis continued in private to accuse Schleicher of high treason. However, it did so under the guise of legality, and protecting the German people and their democracy. Night of the Long Knives 30 June 1934. By 1935, over 1,600 newspapers had been closed. Surrounding this scene, members of the Army and SS stand with their weapons pointing towards the SA members. The night was 29th June 1934, the Night of the Long Knives. The SS also murders several conservative critics of the Nazi regime including . Kurt von Schleicher's stepdaughter received 250 marks per month up to the age of 21, and the son of General von Bredow received a monthly allowance of 150 marks.[59]. On 30 June 1934 these tensions came to a head. "[63] The statements that Schleicher had been killed because he wanted to partition Poland with the Soviet Union were later published in the Polish White Book of 1939, which was a collection of diplomatic documents detailing GermanPolish relations up to the outbreak of the war. The Night of the Long Knives. A convoy of lorries moved quietly through the night. He stated that 61 people had been executed and 13 had committed suicide. "[14], Despite such hostility between the brownshirts and the regular army, Blomberg and others in the military saw the SA as a source of raw recruits for an enlarged and revitalized army. Although many Germans approached the official news of the events as described by Joseph Goebbels with a great deal of scepticism, many others took the regime at its word, and believed that Hitler had saved Germany from a descent into chaos. If that was indeed true then, as a legal matter, the law was entirely unnecessary and redundant. The message of the cartoon "They Salute with Both Hands Now" is that in the Night of the Long Knives, Hitler turned on his previously loyal supporters, the SA, in order to consolidate his position by eliminating the threat of Ernst Rohm and the SA and winning over the Army. [56] Germany's legal establishment further capitulated to the regime when the country's leading legal scholar, Carl Schmitt, wrote an article defending Hitler's 13 July speech. The Centre Partys vote was crucial. Because their plans for the army conflicted, Rhm's success could come only at Hitler's expense. One key example of an event posed as moderate was the Night of Long Knives. dutch tool chest pdf. In 1934, Hitler purged the SA, killed a bunch of its leaders to eliminate the Strasserist faction and made it a largely irrelevant organization. The primary instruments of Hitler's action, which carried out most of the killings, were the Schutzstaffel (SS) paramilitary force under Himmler and its Security Service (SD), and Gestapo (secret police) under Reinhard Heydrich. Night of the Long Knives: Directed by Lance Miccio, Grant Slawson. The Nazis used the SA and the newly expanded SS to harass and imprison any potential opponents of the Nazi Party. Gring instructed police stations to burn "all documents concerning the action of the past two days". He had banned opposition parties, taken control of the press, outlawed troublesome unions and thrown communists and other political dissidents into concentration camps. Hitler then ordered Himmler and Goering to eliminate the threat posed by the leaders of the SA. Give Hitler four years to rebuild it! info)) or "Operation Hummingbird" (Kolibri) was a purge that took place in Nazi Germany.It happened between 30 June and 2 July 1934 when the Nazi regime executed at least 90 people for political reasons. Hitler and Himmler unleashed the Gestapo against old enemies, as well. A combat veteran of World War I, Rhm had recently boasted that he would execute 12 men in retaliation for the killing of any stormtrooper.