WI Rohm found out about his planned purge?

King Thomas

Banned
What if someone had tipped off Ernst Rohm about the Night of the Long Knives a couple of days in advance? Do we get an SS V SA fight in the streets? Who will the SA side with-Hitler, or their own Stabschief?
 
Now the SS is just a small force at this point of time. The million of SA men would spend more time searching for them than actually fighting.

I doubt that Röhm the time would be sufficient for Röhm to stage a coup. Hitler only had to go up against a few individuals (in the SA plus a few VIP personal enemies); the SA would need to actually topple the government and go up against the regular military; with dubious chances of success. I don't think that Röhm could pull anything ressembling such a comparativly cunning plan as "Valkyrie" out of his desk drawer in order to deceit pro-Nazi forces to move where they should against den Führer.

If bloodbath ensues, it might however taint the 3rd Reich rule of "new ORDER" (Germans want ORDER!) that much that the Reichswehr and the reactionaries (which are still in the government coalition) rather decide to get rid of that inefficient Reichskanzler from Austria asap.

If Röhm is smart, he gets on a plane out of Germany, or if that feels too unsafe, leaves Berlin at night with a well-armed loyal escort bringing him to the Czech border.
 
Interesting.

As far as I know, SA was a mixed bag of criminals, former soldiers, deserters, war heroes and anything in-between. However, SA Berlin was bigger than the entire 100,000 man army. And some were rather heroic characters, coming out of the "Freikorps" having fought against the Poles after 1919. It was not just rabble.

Further, the army was not happy with SA's boasts of replacing the army and especially not with Rohm's leadership and is cohorts.

After all, the army "suggested" to Hitler (according to Shirer) that SA's "sell-by" date was up, but also that they did not want to get their hands dirty.

So, the task fell to SS and Himmler.

Now, Rohm would only have two options:

1) Coup
2) Get out of Germany

Insofar as the army was still a factor and a military regime could have been implemented if Papen really had wanted it, Rohm would have to recognise this threat.

So, he could have aligned himself with the army to kick out Hitler

or

he could have kicked Hitler out in a "blitz attack"with SA only.

... and then (my opinioin) the army would have taken over.

Again, my reading is that the German population was rather sick of these eternal street brawls and wanted "order". If that is so, the army is the only other option if Hitler cannot get rid of the SA and its "2nd revolution".

Ivan
 
What if someone had tipped off Ernst Rohm about the Night of the Long Knives a couple of days in advance? Do we get an SS V SA fight in the streets? Who will the SA side with-Hitler, or their own Stabschief?


He is not totally stupid, most likely he would get out of Germany and provide an anti-Hitler voice outside of Germany
 
Italy, probably. Mussolini would have loved to host him.

Just to piss off Hitler? Could that impact any hopes for a German-Italian axis? After all, that wasn't really created till the late 1930s, well after the purge of Rohm.

Cheers,
Ganesha
 
Just to piss off Hitler? Could that impact any hopes for a German-Italian axis? After all, that wasn't really created till the late 1930s, well after the purge of Rohm.

Cheers,
Ganesha

As you suggest, the axis wasn't inevitable. Rohm might fade to irrelevance in a few years but equally the butterflies from his Lord Haw-Haw routine could mean Italy stays neutral or even aligns against Germany.
 
Italy, probably. Mussolini would have loved to host him.

Hmm, he'd probably cause a lot of trouble with the Tyrolians, and his leftist tendencies would tire his prospective host's patience before long.

Maybe Spain, having spent some time in Bolivia he'd probably speak the lingo.

Maybe Italy then Spain. Instead of sinking god knows how much of the national budget into Spain he could send is own version of an International Brigade with Roehm at its head. Hmm, the Tyrolian Legion.
 
He is not totally stupid, most likely he would get out of Germany and provide an anti-Hitler voice outside of Germany

An anti-Nazi fascist ey? No there's an interesting proposition. Not that it would raise my opinion of Rohm, brutish thug that he is, but it could have interesting repercussions on the far right.
 
Would the SA follow Rohm in a coup against Hitler himself?

My general impression is yes, - so long as Rohm appeared to be winning, could win quickly and did not ask for the personal involvement (with associated personal risks) of too many SA men. At that time, Hitler was not the sole and undisputed super fuhrer, so Rohm's contention that Hitler was the one who needed purging would not have been seen as entirely insane.

The only trouble is what to do with Hitler should the SA capture him? Executing Hitler's non WWI veteran underlings (Himmler, Goebbels etc) following drumhead "trials" was one matter, but actually killing Hitler might cost Rohm alot popular support. Maybe medicate him into a stupor and place him in "retirement" at a guarded rest home?
 
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Röhm and Hitler had been friends before. Could Röhm be cold-blooded enough to kill a man he called a friend? I don't know.
 
Night of the Long Knives in reverse if it can be organised. Probably blaming the Jews or Communists. Could Himmler be persuaded to denounce himself as a Jewish Bolshevik spy?

Rohm would not kill Hitler, he has people for that sort of thing.

Success really depends on how comprehensive things get. If say Goring gets loose and starts giving orders in just about any capacity there will be streetfighting and the army likely to step in. If its a smoothish coup my guess is the army will sit in barracks waiting for orders until its too late then find itself as voenspetsy.
 
I guess the only way for Röhm* to survive would be to leave the country as quick as possible, maybe returning to Bolivia again. He doesn't really have enough support to effectively act against Hitler, who in turn was supported by pretty much the whole Reichswehr.

*It's 'Röhm', not 'Rohm'. Learn to write our letters, Americans! :mad:
 
I guess the only way for Röhm* to survive would be to leave the country as quick as possible, maybe returning to Bolivia again. He doesn't really have enough support to effectively act against Hitler, who in turn was supported by pretty much the whole Reichswehr.

*It's 'Röhm', not 'Rohm'. Learn to write our letters, Americans! :mad:

Well, it is pretty difficult for Americans if you don't know about the U.S. International Keyboard, which you can add in the Control Panel (at least on Vista and Windows 7). To type the umlaut with that keyboard, use Shift+Quote Mark and type a vowel. Now you can type Röhm all you want. ¡Español parece mejor que alemán! Las palabras alemanes son demasiados largos a veces. Pero, español no es mi idioma primero. :)

Now that the language discussion is out of the way, Röhm may be able to flee to Argentina. *AH.com throws fruit at me for the cliche*. Perón was friendly to displaced fascists, so he could appeal for aid maybe?
 
Well, it is pretty difficult for Americans if you don't know about the U.S. International Keyboard

A perfectly acceptable way to write German Umlaute would be to simply add an 'e' to the trema-less version of the letter. For example, 'ö' would become 'oe', 'ä' becomes 'ae', 'ü' becomes 'ue', and so on. Every German would accept and understand that under these circumstances, but leaving out the trema altogether and (e.g.) writing 'o' instead of 'ö' is just plain wrong.

Sorry if I sounded a little bit schoolmasterly on this one. ;)
 
A perfectly acceptable way to write German Umlaute would be to simply add an 'e' to the trema-less version of the letter. For example, 'ö' would become 'oe', 'ä' becomes 'ae', 'ü' becomes 'ue', and so on. Every German would accept and understand that under these circumstances, but leaving out the trema altogether and (e.g.) writing 'o' instead of 'ö' is just plain wrong.

Sorry if I sounded a little bit schoolmasterly on this one. ;)

Oh, that explains why I see stuff like "Göring" and "Goering" when referring to a certain Nazi. Thanks! As long as you don't insist on using that weird "B" looking letter you use for the double S. :D
 
Hmm, he'd probably cause a lot of trouble with the Tyrolians, and his leftist tendencies would tire his prospective host's patience before long.

Mussolini saw fascism not as that opposed to leaning-left; it was just not Socialism (remember, the Socialists had thrown him out...). I'd even say that Röhm or Strasser were closer to Mussolini ideologically than Hitler with his paramount obsession on race.

Hitler was in no good standing with Mussolini, not least because of this humbug. If Röhm's escape doesn't butterfly the events in Austria just weeks later, his arrival in Italy would be at the exact nadir of Nazi-Fascist-relations.
 
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