orces, the Reichswehr, to be subordinated to the SA.

It was almost a declaration of war on the

traditional armed forces of Germany. Not
surprisingly, officers in the German army like
Johann-Adolf Graf von Kielmansegg did not take kindly
to this. “One rejected the SA because of their
behaviour, the way they looked, they way they were. Well,
the SA were gradually, at the end they were, well, one
can almost say,they were hatedby most soldiers. On top
of this, on top of the rejection of the SA, I
would say, was the fact that it became ever more
clear, not just in the army,that Röhm, the highest
commander of the SA, was trying in some way to
take over the Reichswehr.”22 Blomberg and the rest of
the army leadership were equally opposed to this
attempt to sideline them.And since they recognised that
the final decision on this crucial question would
rest with one man—Adolf Hitler —they moved to
introduce changes to the Reichswehr that they knew
would make him happy. One such change was the
immediate instruction, just days after Röhm’s proposal, that
the Nazi emblem of an eagle holding a swastika
be incorporated on all uniforms. The fact that every
member of the German armed forces would
now carry a swastika on their uniform was a
symbolic step towards the politicisation of the
Reichswehr. This was coupled with the decision to
enforce an “Aryan” clause whichmeant that members
of the Reichswehr had to provethat they were of
“Aryan” descent or risk expulsion. Hitler madehis own
position clear at a conference on 28 February
1934,attended by the leaders of the SA and the
Reichswehr, when he rejected Röhm’s proposal. The SA
was not to take over the army,but be subordinate to
it in matters of national defence. He also
outlined in general termsthe futuretasks that he wanted
 the new Reichswehr to perform. Since“living space”
needed to be created and “the Western Powers
would not let us do this” as a consequence
“shortdecisive blows to the West and then to the East
could be necessary.”23 This was an astonishingadmission
for Hitler to make openly at such a conference and,
as Field Marshal Weichs later wrote, “it is
almost miraculous that this prophecy of 1934 has never
become known.”24 But Weichsbelieved that since “the
soldier was accustomed neverto take the words of
politicians too seriously” these “warlike prophecies” were
not taken at “face value” at the time. Thereis, of
course, another possible interpretation of the
army’s quiescence at the 28 February conference—
whichis that Hitler’s coupling of his decision to curb the
SA’s ambitions with the announcement of his broader
military ambitions was a deliberate attempt to stifle
any potential opposition withinthe army to his long- term
goals. For the leaders of the German army
would find it hard to object to Hitler’s vague
futureplans for expansion at the same time as they
welcomed his suppression of the SA. Röhm, predictably,
was extremely unhappy with Hitler’s decision to place
the SA underthe control of the army in the event
of future conflict. And over the next few months there
were rumours that the SA might even be planning to
take matters into their own hands—perhaps via a coup.
After a meeting with Hitler on 7 June 1934 Röhm
announced that he was taking sick leave and that the
stormtroopers should take a holiday as well, readyto
return to service on 1 August. He ended
the missive with the words “The SA is and remains
Germany’s destiny.”25 This was most certainly not a view
that Adolf Hitler shared. The SA was by now a
divisive force and one that wasn’t helping Hitler in
his attempt to leap from mere leadership of the Nazi party
to capturing the hearts of all “true” Germans as the
 leader of the whole nation. And for Hitler there
was a particular urgency to the Röhm problem,
since it was clear that President Hindenburg did not
have long to live. On Hindenburg’s deathHitler wanted to
combine the offices of Reich Chancellor and president
and so become both the political leader of
Germany and the head of state, but opposition from the
traditional German elite—especially the Reichswehr—might
well prevent that transition happening smoothly. This
danger was all too apparent from a public
statement in June 1934 made by Franzvon Papen. In
a speech at Marburg University he said that “the
government must represent the people as a
whole, and must on noaccount be the exponent only
of particular groups; otherwise it would fail in its
attempt to construct the national community.”26 He
warned against a “second wave” of revolution and
stated that “The government is well aware of the
selfishness, the lack of principle, the insincerity, the
unchivalrous behaviour, the arrogance whichis on the
increase under the guise of the German revolution.” He
said that people would follow the Führer but not
if “every word of criticism” was “immediately
interpreted as malicious.” Hitler’s reaction to Papen’s
speech was predictable. The distribution of thespeech
was banned, and the co-author of Papen’s words
of warning and criticism, Edgar Jung, was later
arrested and killed.But Hitler knew that von Papen was
also vocalising the concerns of a large segment of the
German population. Almost more importantly, he was
expressing the