The atmosphere of terror that had followed the Reichstag Fire, and Hindenburgs and von Papens support, made the proposal seem legitimate and, to some, necessary. These acts removed peoples ability to oppose the Nazi Party, in any form. [73] Hitler's speech was not reported in the German press, but the army was appeased by the speech. He lifted his arm in the Nazi salute and called out "Heil Hitler, I love Germany. On the night of June 30, 1934, Rhm and many more leaders of the SA were shot by members of Heinrich Himmlers SS (Schutzstaffeln; German: Protective Echelon). The Night of the Long Knives was extremely significant in the establishment of the Nazi dictatorship and ultimately Hitler's power. Each resource gives suggested teaching strategies and are differentiated . By early 1934, this vision directly conflicted with Hitler's plan to consolidate power and expand the Reichswehr. A poster from the March 1933 elections. Many of those killed in the purge were leaders of the SA, the best-known being Rhm himself, the SA's chief of staff and one of Hitler's longtime supporters and allies. 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. The Enabling Law allowed them to do this under the guise of legality. [21] Brning fled to the Netherlands while Schleicher dismissed the tip-off as a bad practical joke. On the 23 March 1933, Hitler proposed the Enabling Law to the Reichstag. Zanu PF's Night of the Long Knives - Nehanda Radio President Hindenburg died at the age of 87 on 2 August 1934. Night of the Long Knives - Cunning History Teacher They used any space they could get their hands on to create temporary camps. Its membership plummeted from 2.9 million in August 1934 to 1.2 million in April 1938. With Hitler's arrival in Bad Wiessee between 06:00 and 07:00, the SA leadership, still in bed, were taken by surprise. We were close personal friends; we often dined together in Berlin. The Nazis aimed to increase their share of the vote so that they would have a majority in the Reichstag. The Nazis immediately used the Enabling Law to remove civil rights. In the judicial system specifically, this act removed any judges that were deemed non-compliant with Nazi laws or principles. The leaders of the SA were ordered to attend a meeting at a hotel in Bad Wiesse, Bavaria. 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. Tes paid licenceHow can I reuse this? The Night of the Long Knives (in addition to Hindenburgs deatha few months later) helped Hitler and the Nazi Party to consolidate absolute power in Germany by removing their political opposition. [12] Although nicknamed the "Rubber Lion" by some of his critics in the army for his devotion to Hitler, Blomberg was not a Nazi, and therefore represented a bridge between the army and the party. Although President Hindenburg and the Reichstag continued to exist, Hitler could now govern by decree. For new Germany unit - 1890-1945. 4 terms. [4] The violent confrontations between the two contributed to the destabilization of the Weimar Republic. It established Hitler as "the supreme leader of the German people", as he put it in his 13 July speech to the Reichstag. We want to wait till Papa Hindenburg is dead, and then the SA will march against the army. One of the men Gring recruited to assist him was Willi Lehmann, a Gestapo official and NKVD spy. The trial of Van der Lubbe following the Reichstag fire. But with the Night of the Long Knives, it's . , was then given the choice of suicide or murder. However, it did so under the guise of legality, and protecting the German people and their democracy. Most officers are too old and have to be replaced by young ones. [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. As a result, a political struggle within the party grew, with those closest to Hitler, including Prussian premier Hermann Gring, Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels, Reichsfhrer-SS Heinrich Himmler, and Hitler's deputy Rudolf Hess, positioning themselves against Rhm. Rhm was a potential rival to Hitler's position. Night of the Long Knives | Date, Victims, Summary, & Facts Also killed that night were hundreds of other perceived opponents of Hitler. In conclusion, this lesson plan on Night of the Long Knives Rohm Source Investigation, provides an in-depth examination of one of the most controversial events in modern history. Gring instructed police stations to burn "all documents concerning the action of the past two days". Germany feared revolution. Home Explore. , who had previously been a separate organisation, now swore a personal allegiance to Hitler. In reality, the laws that the Nazis put forward secured their future as the sole ruling party in Germany. It would become known in Welsh as "twyll y cyllyll hirion" (English: Deceit of the long knives) (first recorded around 1587) and in English as the "Treachery/Plot/Treason of the long knives" (recorded around 1604). On the 30 January 1933 Hitler was appointed as chancellor of the Weimar Republic. By June 1934 this had grown to over 3,000,000 members. [32] Blomberg and General Walther von Reichenau, the army's liaison to the party, gave it to him by expelling Rhm from the German Officers' League. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. On 7 April 1943, the SS shut down the Chemno death camp for the first time. A copy of the original film, before Rhm was edited out, was found in the 1980s in the German Democratic Republic's film archives. 95.7% of the population voted. The Nazis used the SA and the newly expanded SS to harass and imprison any potential opponents of the Nazi Party. [82] However, the term was soon adopted by the Nazis themselves to invoke what they saw as justifiable and necessary measures taken by Germanic peoples against an enemy. Updates? [79] This story would be popularized across western Europe in the 12th century as part of the History of the Britons by Geoffrey of Monmouth, which introduced many of the Arthurian legends to Germany.[80][81]. AQA 8145 - Night of the Long Knives | Teaching Resources Within weeks of Rhms death, Hitler made an attempt to settle the question of union with Austria through simple violence. [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, the SA at times outnumbering the military in manpower.[10]. On 11 April 1945, the US army liberated Buchenwald camp. Hitler and Himmler unleashed the Gestapo against old enemies, as well. Grtner also declared in cabinet that the measure did not in fact create any new law, but simply confirmed the existing law. [i] Rhm, as one of the earliest members of the Nazi Party, had participated in the Munich Beer Hall Putsch, an attempt by Hitler to seize power by force in 1923. Conservatives in the army, industry and politics placed Hitler under increasing pressure to reduce the influence of the SA and to move against Rhm. Paul von Hindenburg was the president of the Weimar Republic from the 12 May 1925 until his death on the 2 August 1934. Plenary: Form a circle of 6-8 students and paraphrase passport everything you have learnt about the Night of the Long Knives. The Nazi Party used the atmosphere of panic to their advantage, encouraging anti-communism. How Night Of Long Knives Affected Hitler's Rise To Power It followed a secret deal between himself and units of his personal bodyguard, the SS. Additionally, Hitler was uncomfortable with Rhm's outspoken support for a "second revolution" to redistribute wealth. Night of the Long Knives, (June 30, 1934) Purge of Nazi leaders by Adolf Hitler. info)), or the Rhm purge (German: Rhm-Putsch), also called Operation Hummingbird (German: Unternehmen Kolibri), was a purge that took place in Nazi Germany from 30 June to 2 July 1934. Shortly after Hindenburgs death, Hitler announced that offices of the chancellor and the president were to be combined to create one position, the Fhrer and chancellor. The Night of Long Knives was the purge of the SA leadership and other political opponents from the 30 June 1934 to the 2 July 1934. Rhm is pictured here on the left next to Rudolf Hess, who was the deputy Fhrer from 1933-1941. The Nazis started with the He also wanted to appease leaders of the Reichswehr, the German military, who feared and despised the SA as a potential rival, in particular because of Rhm's ambition to merge the army and the SA under his own leadership. Thus from June 30 to July 2, 1934, which the chancellor later titled the Night of the Long Knives, Hitler purged any and all opposition in his way to a dictatorship. By 1935, over 1,600 newspapers had been closed. [1] More than a thousand perceived opponents were arrested. Gring's personal police battalion also took part in the killings. . [45][41] As Himmler's adjutant Karl Wolff later explained, friendship and personal loyalty were not allowed to stand in the way: Among others, a charming fellow [named] Karl von Spreti, Rhm's personal adjutant. Politics latest updates: NHS 'on the brink' says nursing union as The strike, which will end just before midnight, comes after a High Court . leaders knew consequences of questioning Hitler - role of SA was reduced - membership dropped from 2.9 million to 1.6 million. The Night of the Long Knives is a harrowingif little knownevent in the history of the Troubles, but it served as an important link in the torturously slow process of transitioning from . He held the same position with Rhm as I held with Himmler. [29] On 29 June, a signed article in Vlkischer Beobachter by Blomberg appeared in which Blomberg stated with great fervour that the Reichswehr stood behind Hitler. Both Kurt von Schleicher, Hitler's predecessor as Chancellor, and his wife were murdered at their home. Lippert was convicted and sentenced to 18 months in prison.[50]. 9. Night of the Long Knives - SlideShare Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. By the end of May 1934, Hitler had been chancellor for 16 months and dictator for 14 (under the Enabling Act of March 24, 1933), but two obstacles to his absolute power remained. How did the Night of the Long Knives help to create a dictatorship out of a democracy? [37] Meanwhile, the SS arrested the other SA leaders as they left their train for the planned meeting with Rhm and Hitler. SA violence in Prussia gravely concerned Gring. On 19 April 1943, the beginning of the liquidation of the Warsaw ghetto was met with organised armed resistance by its residents. [41] Several leaders of the disbanded Catholic Centre Party were also murdered in the purge. He then told Hitler that Hindenburg was close to declaring martial law and turning the government over to the Reichswehr if Hitler did not take immediate steps against Rhm and his brownshirts. Corrections? Following the purge, the Nazis sculpted the media coverage to portray the event as a preventative measure against a revolutionary, violent, and uncontrollable force, rather than a series of political murders. [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. The news of it was received with consternation and disgust in the other European capitals, but the shock was greatest in Rome. The Nazis improvised. In addition to this, there was a mutual dislike between the traditional conservative elite who maintained many key positions in the government and the army during the first years of the Third Reich and the SA. Once inside Rhm's cell, they handed him a Browning pistol loaded with a single cartridge and told him he had ten minutes to kill himself or they would do it for him. [23] Himmler envied the independence and power of the SA, although by this time he and Heydrich had already begun restructuring the SS from a bodyguard formation for Nazi leaders (and a subset of the SA) into its own independent elite corps, one loyal to both himself and Hitler. concentration camp Rhm was very critical of Hitler's policies of working with rich businessmen and the army. [73] However, despite the rehabilitation of the two murdered officers, the Nazis continued in private to accuse Schleicher of high treason. As such the Nazis justified this measure as implementing necessary security measures, rather than revealing their true motive to remove opposition. In 1928, the popular Nazi song "Wetzt die langen Messer" (English: Sharpen the long knives) encourages the mass murder of Jewish people and the desecration of Synagogues. Both Himmler and Gring welcomed Hitler's decision, since both had much to gain by Rhm's downfall the independence of the SS for Himmler and the removal of a rival for the future command of the army for Gring. As the SA were known for being violent and unruly, many saw this as a legitimate move by the government to ensure public order. As such, the Nazis consolidation of power relied on maintaining the illusion of a stable democracy. by Gring and Himmler, who gave Hitler news of Rhm organising a potential On 17 June 1934, conservative demands for Hitler to act came to a head when Vice-Chancellor Franz von Papen, confidant of the ailing Hindenburg, gave a speech at Marburg University warning of the threat of a "second revolution. There were 4 main reasons why the Night of the Long Knives occurred: Ernst Rhm had become too powerful with 3 million SA loyal to him. [68] Besides working for the rehabilitation of Schleicher and Bredow, Hammerstein and Mackensen sent a memo to Hindenburg on 18 July setting out in considerable detail the circumstances of the murders of the two generals and noted that Papen had barely escaped. [42] The Gestapo also murdered Erich Klausener, the leader of Catholic Action, and a close Papen associate. 15 Apr 2023. "[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. Hitler's Purge: The Night of the Long Knives Explained [69], Hindenburg never responded to the memo, and it remains unclear whether he even saw it, as Otto Meiner, who decided that his future was aligned with the Nazis, may not have passed it along. Hitler claimed that 61 had been executed while 13 had been shot resisting arrest and three had committed suicide. 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. [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. [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. [35] Goebbels emphasised this aspect in subsequent propaganda justifying the purge as a crackdown on moral turpitude. Whilst the pseudo-legal measures were one factor that helped the Nazis to consolidate power, another was terror and intimidation. To a lesser extent, the Sturmabteilung (SA), a Nazi paramilitary organization, remained somewhat autonomous within the party. From 20 August onwards, the On the 4 October 1933, it was declared that all editors must be Aryan. However, this power was limited, as the Nazis were just one party in a three party Hitler ordered him, as one prominent historian described it, to put an end to "homosexuality, debauchery, drunkenness, and high living" in the SA. Leading members of the leftist-leaning Strasserist faction of the Nazi Party, including its leader Gregor Strasser, were also killed, as were establishment conservatives and anti-Nazis, such as former Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher and Bavarian politician Gustav Ritter von Kahr, who had helped suppress Hitler's Munich Beer Hall Putsch in 1923. [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. On 19 August 1934, the German people were asked to vote on whether or not they approved of the merging of the two offices and Hitlers new role as Fhrer. On 13 July 1934 the Reichstag The SS found Breslau SA leader Edmund Heines in bed with an unidentified eighteen-year-old male SA senior troop leader. The long term impact brought forth by the consequences or legacy of the Nazi party included a population decrease and an increase in deaths. Give Hitler four years to rebuild it! In this photo, Rhm is talking to a group of SA men, who appear to be listening intently. Night Of The Long Knives: What Happened & Why? | HistoryExtra The Night of the Long Knives, in June 1934, saw the wiping out of the SA's leadership and others who had angered Hitler in the recent past in Nazi Germany. In response, Hitler met Blomberg and the leadership of the SA and SS on 28 February 1934. "[9], Hitler's speech signalled his intention to rein in the SA, whose ranks had grown rapidly in the early 1930s. Many of the prisoners were tortured and abused. The Foreign Office even complained of instances where brownshirts manhandled foreign diplomats. They will . (29-30 June 1934) The name coined by Hitler for a weekend of murders throughout Germany. Despite this improvement, the Nazis still did not command a majority in the Reichstag. Night of the Long Knives - Achieving Total Power - July 1933 - August With instructions from Berlin and with active help from the German legation in Vienna, Austrian Nazis on July 25, 1934, tried to take over their countrys government by an insurrectionary putsch. 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. The consolidation of power that had begun barely a month before with the purge of Rhm and the SA was complete. [78], The term "long knives" as a metonym for treachery and violence had been used to describe the Treason of the Long Knives since this incident was recorded in the 9th century Historia Brittonum. "[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. [51] Meanwhile, Goebbels tried to prevent newspapers from publishing lists of the dead, but at the same time used a 2 July radio address to describe how Hitler had narrowly prevented Rhm and Schleicher from overthrowing the government and throwing the country into turmoil. Upon returning to Berlin, Goebbels telephoned Gring at 10:00 with the codeword Kolibri to let loose the execution squads on the rest of their unsuspecting victims. Goebbels soon radicalised each of these areas, ensuring that they advocated Nazi ideas. For all the power the Enabling Act . This photograph shows the SA as they marched victoriously through the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin the same day. "[46], Some SA members died saying "Heil Hitler" because they believed that an anti-Hitler SS plot had led to their execution. Civil Service SS men stormed the hotel, and Hitler personally placed Rhm and other high-ranking SA leaders under arrest. The Nazis also took steps to ensure they couldnt be openly opposed in the press. This fear was It also provided a legal grounding for the Nazis, as the German courts and cabinet quickly swept aside centuries of legal prohibition against extrajudicial killings to demonstrate their loyalty to the regime. ", "After the 'Night of the Long Knives,' [Reich Minister for Justice Franz Grtner] nipped in the bud the attempts of some local state prosecutors to initiate proceedings against the killers. 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]. Rhm was given the nickname "The Machine Gun King of Bavaria" in the early 1920s, since he was responsible for storing and issuing illegal machine guns to the Bavarian Freikorps units. The 'Night of the Long Knives' is a name given to an internal purge within the National Socialist movement in mid-1934. In this hour I was responsible for the fate of the German people, and thereby I became the supreme judge of the German people. The Centre Partys vote was crucial. The Party had generally been aligned with the Social Democrats and Catholic Church during the rise of Nazism, being critical of Nazi ideology, but voting nonetheless for the Enabling Act of 1933 which granted Hitler dictatorial authority. However getting rid of the SA did get the support of the army which was very helpful for Hitler. By the end of it, Hitler's party had been shaken by a major crisis, and the long knives were put quietly back in their box while all the Fhrer kept out was a wary ear. info)), or the Rhm purge (German: Rhm-Putsch), also called Operation Hummingbird (German: Unternehmen Kolibri), was a purge that took place in Nazi Germany from 30 June to 2 July 1934. The Nazi adoption of the phrase for an upcoming violent event was well known even to the foreign press, with the 2 August 1932 issue of The Times reporting that: Prominent Nazi leaders have played upon the imaginations of their followers..with such phrases as the night of the long knives and a vengeance for every Nazi killed.[79]. approved a bill legalising the purge as emergency defence measures. On 1 April 1933, the Nazi Party led a nationwide boycott of Jewish-owned businesses across Germany. Many members of the SA, including its leader Ernst Rhm, were demanding that the Nazi party carry out its socialist agenda and that the SA take over the army. [66], Rumours about the Night of the Long Knives rapidly spread. 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. This event reputedly occurred during the fifth century Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, when Vortigern and the British leaders were invited to discuss peace and the Saxon leader Hengist commanded his men to draw their Seax (the infamous long knives) and massacre the unarmed Britons. This also lead to the Oath Of Loyalty which was. For the full article, see Night of the Long Knives . Answer (1 of 5): if you were Ernst Rohm, or former conniving Chancellor Gen von Schleicher or his wife, the consequences were terminal. The speed and scale of the reshuffle caused it to be associated by its critics with the 1934 Night of the Long Knives in Nazi Germany . [40] Those not immediately executed were taken back to the Leibstandarte barracks at Lichterfelde, given one-minute "trials", and shot by a firing squad. [g] Many stormtroopers believed in the socialist promise of National Socialism and expected the Nazi regime to take more radical economic action, such as breaking up the vast landed estates of the aristocracy. The Night of the Long Knives: the bloody purge that secured Hitler's power. [He] died with words "Heil Hitler" on his lips. The Night of Long Knives - The Holocaust Explained This act legalised removing anyone of non-Ayran descent from the civil service. You were murdered June 30-July 2, 1934, the Night of the Long Knives. The atmosphere of uncertainty following the Reichstag Fire secured many voters for the Nazi party. Despite his earlier agreement with Hitler, Rhm still clung to his vision of a new German army with the SA at its core. Centuries of jurisprudence proscribing extrajudicial killings were swept aside. 25 terms. What were the consequences of the Night of the Long Knives? [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. Originally designed and developed by the London Jewish Cultural Centre. This continued when a young Dutchcommunist, Van der Lubbe was arrested for the crime. Max Heydebreck, an SA leader in Rummelsburg, denounced the army to his fellow brownshirts, telling them, "Some of the officers of the army are swine. [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. Omissions? persecution [75] Hitler expressly told him to stop SA funds from being spent on limousines and banquets, which he considered evidence of SA extravagance. With Hindenburg gone, there was no longer a limit to Hitlers power. [62] General von Reichenau went so far as to publicly give credence to the lie that Schleicher had been plotting to overthrow the government. "[74] Hearing of the murder of former Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher and his wife, he also commented, "We have ceased to live under the rule of law and everyone must be prepared for the possibility that the Nazis will push their way in and put them up against the wall! Moreover, it was not just the Reichswehr that viewed the SA as a threat. 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. Leading officers in the SS were shown falsified evidence on 24 June that Rhm planned to use the SA to launch a plot against the government (Rhm-Putsch). Hitler's desire to consolidate his power and settle old scores, Desire of Ernst Rhm and the SA to continue "the National Socialist revolution" versus Hitler's need for relative social stability so that the economy could be refocused to rearmament and the German people acclimated to the need for expansion and war, Hitler's need to bring the Reichswehr under his control, Significant reduction in the regime's opposition, Strengthening of relationship between Hitler and the military. Over 150 people were murdered and hundreds more were arrested. The Reichstag, the German lower house of parliament, was set on fire on the 27 February 1933. pardoned On 30 June 1934 these tensions came to a head. Night of the Long Knives, in German history, purge of Nazi leaders by Adolf Hitler on June 30, 1934. The humbling of the SA ended the threat it had posed to the army but, by standing by Hitler during the purge, the army bound itself more tightly to the Nazi regime. [15] In January 1934, Rhm presented Blomberg with a memorandum demanding that the SA replace the regular army as the nation's ground forces, and that the Reichswehr become a training adjunct to the SA.[16]. The Night of the Long Knives. Given that the purge claimed the lives of so many prominent Germans, it could hardly be kept secret. By May, lists of those to be "liquidated" started to circulate amongst Gring and Himmler's people, who engaged in a trade, adding enemies of one in exchange for sparing friends of the other. What were the consquence of the night of the long knives June - Answers I gave the order to shoot the ringleaders in this treason, and I further gave the order to cauterise down to the raw flesh the ulcers of this poisoning of the wells in our domestic life. Because their plans for the army conflicted, Rhm's success could come only at Hitler's expense.
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