WI Rohm as head of the NSDAP?

[MRig]

A friend and I are kicking around ideas for an axis victory timeline (I know, I know...) and we were thinking of a PoD in 1923 with Hitler's death at Odeonsplatz during the Beer Hall Putsch.

So: what chance does Ernst Rohm have of taking over the Nazi party and how does that change its structure, and the structure of Germany if and when the Nazis take over?

I think the SA will end up looking like the SS in OTL, and the SS may be purged in an equivalent to the night of long knives. Hitler will be martyred and deified, especially by Rohm. Rohm's national socialism is also rather leftist. Will that change relations with the USSR? And is, dare I say it, an alliance possible?

 

[Trotsky]

Why would there be an SS if the SA ends up taking over its functions?

 

[Don Draper]

Rohm did not have the charisma to win over the German public, and the big-business and traditional conservatives would not support someone as left-leaning as Rohm. The army also hated Rohm as they feared that he wanted to replace them with the SA.

Though Rohm wouldn't have insisted on taking power legally. With Rohm as NSDAP chief you'd probably see an attempt by the SA to seize power in a coup.

 

[CanadianGoose]

Rohm's national socialism is also rather leftist. Will that change relations with the USSR? And is, dare I say it, an alliance possible?

I've read an AH novel in Russian where Rohm seizes power from Hitler in 1934 and it bring "national-bolshevik" alliance between USSR in Germany (more leftist than Nazi, but Germans kinda sorta dominate the union). It did look pretty ASB to me, though, more of reflection of author's biases than a honest attempt to see how a world would progress after certain POD.

 

[Dathi THorfinnsson]

Am I misremembering, or was Rohm gay? I doubt a gay leader could rule any country at that time.

 

[Berra]

I think he was but he was in the closet so that might not matter.

 

[Lautréamont]

For the alliance with the Soviets, there is still the racial issue. The Nazis considered bolshevism "Jewish" and thus doomed, and Röhm was as much of an anti-Semite as the others.

 

[Blue Max]

Am I misremembering, or was Rohm gay? I doubt a gay leader could rule any country at that time.

Worse, he was a Pedophile.

Kept a secret, of course...

 

[black angel]

Worse, he was a Pedophile.

Kept a secret, of course...

i've never heard that, he liked younger men (but what fat 40 something doesn't) but Pedophile? i've never hear it told that way.

any way Rohm, saw the SA like the old greeks, IE male bonding part of why the SA got suppressed in 1936

 

[CanadianGoose]

For the alliance with the Soviets, there is still the racial issue. The Nazis considered bolshevism "Jewish" and thus doomed, and Röhm was as much of an anti-Semite as the others.

There was Strasserism and Jews were rapidly losing their position in Stalin's inner circle, so an alliance isn't all that ASBish. At least, Jews aren't the biggest hurdle there.

 

[carlton_bach]

I think he was but he was in the closet so that might not matter.

It was pretty much an open secret, so as long as he has to contest elections, it would be an issue ("Arsch an die Wand! Roehm geht durchs Land.") But more importantly, he doesn't have the fanaticism and tenacity. Hitler didn't know when he was beaten, whereas Roehm knew, and would likely have quit in the mid-20s. He did emigrate at one point. It is likely that if he took over the NSDAP after the Putsch and Hitler is out of the picture, he would at best make it a regionally influential völkisch party.

Making him a greater power within the party after 1930, on the other hand, could get interesting.