Heinrich Himmler, in a speech to Gestapo
officials, makes reference to the Night of the Long Knives on the previous June[i].
In April under pressure from Hitler, Hermann Goering had placed the Prussian Gestapo
under Himmler’s control[ii],
as a preliminary to the events, which he and Goering had persuaded Hitler to
approve.
The hypocritical Himmler spoke of the
struggle to
‘Shoot one’s own comrades, with whom one has stood side by side
for eight or ten years in the struggle for an ideal and who had then failed, is
the bitterest thing that can happen to a man.’[iii]
Himmler had struggled for several years
to free the SS[iv]
from the control of the SA. His mentor Ernst Rohm had returned from exile to
run the SA in January 1931. Almost immediately Rohm had contradicted Himmler’s
statement of the previous autumn; that the SS was no longer under the control
of the SA leadership.
 |
| Goering in SA uniform |
In December 1933 Himmler and his
sidekick Reinhard Heydrich, started giving Goering, Minister-President of
Prussia and in charge of the fledgling Aviation Ministry, the hard sell on
Rohm. They persuaded Goering that Rohm wanted the SA to take over the defence
of the nation and become Defence Minister, a post that Goering desired for
himself.
Himmler’s diligence in undermining the
SA was rewarded on 20th July, when Hitler removed the subsidiary
status of the SS, making it an independent arm of the Nazi party. One week
later Himmler took on responsibility for Wewelsburg Castle from the local
council. Now he had a location central to his romantic vision of the SS as a
modern revival of the Teutonic knights.Himmler blamed the June purge on Jews, Catholics and freemasons who had
‘Sent numerous individuals into the SA and the entourage of the
former chief of staff and drove him to catastrophe.’[v]
The result would have been chaos; the
enemy sought nothing less than the eradication of the Nazi state. The Gestapo
were to concentrate on searching for the Jewish enemy who lies behind all subversion.
Those detectives who operated with an understanding of the racial conspiracy
would be the most successful.
Himmler was also concerned about the
Gestapo’s relations with the public.
'The Volk must hold the conviction that the most just authority.......is
the dreaded Gestapo. The Volk must come to the view that, if someone has been
seized, he had been seized with right.'[vi]
The public must feel that their problems
will be dealt with courteously and sociably and that those seized by the
Gestapo have been taken for a reason, rather than whim. The public must realise
that the Gestapo consists of the most absolutely useful loyal & obedient
people; an organisation to be trusted by the German people.
Himmler informed his audience that he
personally signed orders & reports for which he was responsible & that
his staff should do likewise. The Gestapo was to handle its business with
soldierly speed and avoid bureaucratic red tape. Himmler and Heydrich would
create a sense of soldierly camaraderie within the organisation. The Gestapo
officers were to view Himmler as a father to his staff and to feel free to
bring their problems to him.
‘You will always find my door open if you come to me with a
request which you wish to make in connection with yourself or a colleague,
which has something to do with official business, or whether it’s a personal
request.’[vii]
Bibliography
Foundation of the Nazi Police State –
George C Browder, 2004 University Press of Kentucky
Hitler’s Enforcers – George C Browder,
Oxford University Press 1996
The Third Reich – Michael Burleigh, Pan
Books 2001
Master Race – Catrine Clay & Michael
Leapman, BCA 1995
Heinrich Himmler – Peter Longerich,
Oxford University Press 2012
Reichsfuhrer SS – Peter Padfield
The Devil’s Disciples – Anthony Read,
Pimlico 2004
En.wikipedia.org
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