Night of the Long Knives

Propaganda article about the Night of the Long Knives on the front page of the Pennsylvanian newspaper "The Bethlehem Globe-Times", 2 July 1934.

The Night of the Long Knives (also known as Operation Hummingbird, but also as the Blood or Röhm Purge; German: Nacht der langen Messer, officially Röhm-Putsch) occurred in National Socialist Germany between 30 June and 2 July 1934.

History

Purge

At least eighty-five individuals were executed, among them Ernst Röhm (he was shot in a cell after refusing to take his own life), Gregor Strasser, Kurt von Schleicher as well as Gustav Ritter von Kahr, and more than a thousand arrested. The Schutzstaffel (SS), an elite German corps, and secret police under the command of Heinrich Himmler are said to have carried out most of the killings. Regular German soldiers of Heer and Luftwaffe were led personally by Hermann Göring against the Berlin SA headquarters on 30 June 1934. Karl Ernst (de), Berlin SA commander, was pulled off a cruise ship on which he was about to set out on a honeymoon. Journalist Fritz Gerlicht, who was against the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch and with whom Göring also had a personal score to settle, was also arrested.

The politically correct view is that this was a National Socialist purge of the paramilitary Sturmabteilung organization, that was seen as a possible threat, of internal NSDAP dissidents such as of the "left-wing" Strasserist faction, of alleged homosexuals such as the SA leader Ernst Röhm, of external critics such as some conservatives, and to settle scores with old enemies. The purge strengthened and consolidated the support of the army leaders for Hitler. Hitler and the generals opposed Röhm's desire to have the SA, a force of over three million men, absorb the much smaller German Army (Reichswehr) into its ranks under his leadership.

After hashing out a tentative plan with his top cronies at Hermann Goering's villa Carinhall on 20 June, Hitler flew to Munich on 29 June. He was there ostensibly to accept an invitation by Röhm to an SA conference at Bad Wiessee, but there was a heightened sense of fear that the invitation was a trap. There, Hitler was supported by both local troops and the elite SS Leibstandarte "Adolf Hitler" honor guard. Ernst Röhm and other SA leaders were known to be staying at the nearby Bad Wiessee, a resort spa south of Munich. Local Party leaders told Hitler that Röhm's men had been taking over the city, which was Hitler's original base. Himmler owned his own villa near Bad Wiessee and, dining with Ribbentrop that night, mentioned off-handedly that Röhm "was as good as dead." The final order, though, had not yet been given. [...] Strangely enough, the entire affair was completely legal under German law of the time. The Enabling Act of 1933 had empowered Hitler to take whatever actions he deemed necessary for the good of the state.

A less politically correct view is, that the evidence supports that Röhm and others were in fact (and as stated by Hitler) planning a coup, the Röhm Putsch, with the German word "putsch" meaning "coup", in order to create another Government with General der Infanterie Kurt von Schleicher (de), rumored to be plotting against Hitler with French authorities, at it's head. Franz von Papen was arrested and held for some time on Göring's personal orders, an armed SS unit stormed the Vice-Chancellery. Hitler ordered him released days later.

Terminology

Before its execution, its planners sometimes referred to it as "Hummingbird" (German: Kolibri), as that was the codeword used to set the execution squads in motion on the day of the purge. The codeword appears to have been chosen arbitrarily.

The phrase "Night of the Long Knives" in the German language predates the massacre itself. It is a reference to the massacre of Vortigern's men by Angle, Jute, and Saxon mercenaries in Arthurian myth. Until it became synonymous with the events of 1934, the phrase referred generally to acts of vengeance. Hitler argued that in 1934 it was actually Röhm who first used the phrase, as a name or codeword for his planned coup.

Hitler's 13 July speech

About the SA leader Röhm:

However, the end of May brought even more alarming facts to light. Chief of Staff Röhm began to depart, not only inwardly, but with his entire outward behavior, from the Party. All of the principles with which we had become great lost their validity. The life which the Chief of Staff-and with him, a certain circle of others-began to lead was intolerable from any National Socialist point of view. As if it were not terrible enough that he himself and his circle of devotees broke every single law of decency and modesty, still worse, this poison now began to spread in ever increasing circles. But worst of all was the fact that, out of a certain common predisposition, a sect gradually began to form in the SA which made up the nucleus of a conspiracy directed not only against the normal conceptions of a healthy Volk but against the security of the State as well. [...] It would never have been objectively or humanly possible for me to have given my consent to a personnel change in the Reich Ministry of Defense and to have appointed Chief of Staff Röhm to the vacant post. First of all, for objective reasons: For fourteen years, I have consistently upheld that the fighting organizations of the Party are political organizations which have nothing to do with the Army. In my eyes, it would constitute a disavowal of my view and my policies of fourteen years to appoint the leader of the SA to head the Army.

—Berlin, 13 July 1934

About the term:

[...] in other words, while the members of the inner sect made systematic preparations for the action itself, the second large circle of SA leaders were given only general information to the effect that a second revolution was knocking at the door, that this revolution had the single aim of restoring to me my freedom of action; that hence the new and, this time, bloody uprising, the "Night of the Long Knives", as it was gruesomely called-corresponded to my own aim. The necessity for action on the part of the SA was explained by drawing attention to my inability to make a decision; this situation could be remedied only by a fait accompli.

—Berlin, 13 July 1934

External links

• The Night of the Long Knives (1934) by Leon Degrelle
• Hitler's 13 July speech (text)
• List (incomplete) of those killed and arrested