GERMAN SINGING
..with elections, parliament, and the rule of law.
Just four years later,
freedom of speech is over.
Most of the political opposition is in jail
and the government is in the hands of murderers.
This is the story of how democracy died.
To piece together how it happened,
historians and experts have examined those four years,
each from a different individual perspective.
You cajole, you influence, you...manipulate.
They'll take us inside the minds of those that fought fascism...
They've realised that these people are after your heads.
They want to annihilate you from existence altogether.
..and the Nazis themselves.
Himmler genuinely believed that he would create a racially pure Germany
where the Aryan race would reign supreme.
The moments when history hung in the balance
and the world's worst atrocities could have been prevented.
Mass murder was no problem.
But it was important to be socially acceptable.
Do people care about the truth?
There's a black hole in the heart of Europe.
Germany, a once-great nation, is on its knees.
The people, having endured years of economic hardship,
are looking for change.
But no-one knows what kind of change they will choose.
NEWSREEL: Another milestone is marked
in Germany's political history.
The 1930 general election should have brought clarity.
But it didn't.
It's a total mess,
the vote split between 14 different parties.
The Communists.
The Social Democrats.
The Centre Party is just about able
to put together a moderate coalition government, but it's a weak one.
The only party who are happy, who make substantial gains,
are the Nazis.
Just a few years ago, the Nazis were violent revolutionaries.
But their revolution failed...
..and Hitler was sent to prison.
But out of that failure,
Hitler devised a new strategy for the Nazis -
to pretend to be a legitimate political party
and destroy democracy from within.
For years, though, they were seen as the lunatic fringe.
Until now.
In 1930, the Nazis have 18% of the vote...
MUSIC: Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven
..and that captures the interest of this man.
Germany's ultimate political operative -
a right-wing aristocratic general,
Kurt von Schleicher.
It has been noted by many people that "Schleicher"...
Schleichen in German means to sneak, to creep.
So in English he would be the creeper or the sneaker,
which strangely is a very accurate denomination for what he did...
..and for what he was.
If you see politics as a game,
a schleicher is a master in the play of power.
GERMAN SINGING
Von Schleicher's profession is to observe...
..everybody.
And the Nazis appear like deus ex machina,
or like a jack in the box.
It's something which was not foreseen,
it's saying, "We offer you this."
"Here we are, and we offer you a part
"of the German working class on a silver plate."
The Nazis have a kind of street cred.
And Schleicher is cynical enough
and he thinks to be clever enough to say,
"This is a horse that we are going to ride."
Schleicher wants to use the Nazis to solve a big problem -
the threat posed to the aristocratic elite
from the increasingly powerful forces of the left.
So Schleicher cooks up a plan.
He wants to replace the current chancellor,
supported by a moderate coalition,
with his own right-wing choice.
But to do this he needs two things -
the backing of the Nazis in the Reichstag...
..and the support of Germany's head of state.
The man who has the power to hire and fire a chancellor.
So Schleicher has to persuade President Hindenburg,
an 82-year-old war hero,
to work with the Nazis.
Hindenburg was trying to...
make sense of this rather chaotic and complex situation.
You want the book? Yeah.
He's not really a politician at all,
is my reading on his character.
Soldiering, er,
particularly in wartime conditions,
is an exercise - amongst other things - in command.
Politics are somewhat different,
particularly in a democracy.
And I could see him saying,
"Oh, God, I wish for the simplicities of military command."
Which, of course, were not open to him.
He had to do the best he could.
Others tried to manipulate him, of course.
If we look at politics as a game,
as Schleicher does,
Hindenburg simply is what in chess would be the king.
Everything comes down to who is close to Hindenburg,
who is close to the king, is close to power.
So Schleicher was one of the closest persons,
if not the closest person to the president,
is trying to influence
and to engineer meeting with the Nazis.
So Schleicher persuades the president
to take a meeting with Adolf Hitler.
Neither of them have any idea who they're dealing with.
TRAD JAZZ MUSIC
Hitler is living with his niece,
Geli Raubal,
who it's rumoured he was having sex with.
Right.
Yep.
Hitler was a...a narcissist.
Obsessed with power.
Belief that he was a man of destiny.
And all of these things grew over time.
He was increasingly ruthless.
He was filled with hate, particularly against the Jews.
He was, in the end, a man of violence.
Hitler's niece Geli is found dead.
She's shot herself in the chest with Hitler's revolver.
There are moments in Hitler's life when he completely loses control.
You can think, for example, of towards the end of his life,
in the bunker in 1945,
when he completely goes to pieces.
And this also happens with the death of his half-niece, Geli Raubal,
his girlfriend of the time.
Not necessarily because he loved her and he was shocked and so on
but because he thinks his whole political career is finished.
But just as he thinks it might all be over,
only three weeks after her suicide...
..Schleicher has organized an audience for Hitler
with President Hindenburg.
The key question is to sell the concept
that Hitler could be used to build a right-wing coalition
which is based on a common hatred
and on common enemies that they have.
For Hitler, this is a moment when he realises
that he has arrived.
He's now become part of the political game.
Hitler no doubt had his own personal feelings.
But I suspect Hindenburg's looking down his nose at Hitler.
Now, mind you, being a somewhat snobbish dimension to this.
Von Hindenburg is an aristocrat,
he is a general,
indeed, he is the president of his country.
Hitler fought in the first war as a corporal.
And Hitler's time in the German army
was not marked by any particular distinction.
He was rather dismissive
of what he called "this Austrian corporal".
Hitler thinks it's gone pretty well, really.
He comes away from it thinking that Hindenburg now knows
who he is, for one thing, and that in due course,
Hindenburg would be prepared under some circumstances
to appoint him as Reich-Chancellor.
Hindenburg concludes Hitler is best suited
for the office of postmaster, quote,
"so that he can lick me from behind on my stamps," unquote.
So it wasn't...a very deep impression that Hitler made.
This is not how things are. An upstart.
Schleicher at this moment is annoyed.
"These people are very precious. We need them."
We would like to do politics only with, you know,
general staff-trained officers like in the good old times,
but unfortunately we do live in a republican democratic reality.
So Schleicher thinks if plan A goes wrong,
you should have a plan B.
DRUMMING
GERMAN SINGING
While Hitler is the leader of the Nazis' political party,
they also have a paramilitary wing called the Stormtroopers.
These disenfranchised men are used
to dish out violence on the streets to their enemies.
But in a way that the Nazi Party can deny involvement in.
All part of Hitler's secret agenda to wage war
against the Nazis' political rivals.
In this too, Schleicher sees an opportunity.
Maybe he can persuade Hindenburg to work with the Nazis
as a way of harnessing these Stormtroopers.
For Schleicher,
the Stormtroopers are precious elements,
as he calls the Stormtroopers,
because the left-wing insurgency -
which is communism, socialism, the unions -
probably has to be broken with force
and these people represent this force and they have this power.
The German army is weak and depleted,
an issue that the old man cares about.
Maybe they could use the Stormtroopers to bolster the ranks.
Schleicher definitely knows which buttons
to press with Hindenburg.
Hindenburg regards it as his duty as president
to see Germany back as a great power.
So Schleicher is saying to Hindenburg,
the Nazis, with the Stormtroopers, represent a fresh start.
I mean, as a soldier,
that would have resounded with him without doubt,
in my view.
With the president on board,
he now needs to persuade Hitler
to join his right-wing coalition government as the junior partner.
Hitler really is not somebody who's going to enter
any kind of coalition government unless he's at its head.
That would violate the leadership principle.
It would kind of undermine his charisma, his image
and his self-image as the man who is in charge.
So Hitler says no.
What Hitler wants is another election,
in which he hopes to do even better.
So Schleicher offers another deal.
He'll bring elections forward
on condition Hitler doesn't vote down his right-wing coalition.
In this moment he perceives him as a servant,
someone who was going to play a supporting role
in the system which would be run by aristocrats like himself.
He thinks he can somehow blackmail the Nazis,
he can put pressure on the Nazis,
and that sooner or later, they are going to eat from his hand.
Whatever he thinks Hitler's extracted as a condition
of the support of the Nazis, that elections should be held,
Schleicher imagined he was manipulating Hitler,
whereas in fact, it's the other way round.
So while Schleicher plots his next chancellor,
Hitler sets about winning the hearts and minds
of the German people.
He portrayed himself as a man of the people.
He wasn't a toff, he wasn't a member of the elites.
He was a man who projected himself as an ordinary bloke,
as it were, and that, I think,
managed to unite many different kinds of people.
While Hitler's support grows,
some realise that he's not the respectable politician he seems.
And one man tries to prove it in court.
GERMAN OPERATIC MUSIC
Hans Litten is anxious.
He saw the rise of what he believes
is going to be a very dangerous movement.
Litten is a lawyer who is powered by the idea that law is important.
He doesn't see law as just a set of rules.
He sees it as being the thing that will make the difference
in creating a better society -
a foundation, a rock on which it can be built.
He is talking about human rights at a time when very few people did.
And he takes on his cases as though life depended on it.
Litten sees what the Stormtroopers are doing on the streets.
When they attack a nightclub full of communists,
dozens are injured, and four Stormtroopers are charged.
GAVEL BANGS
Litten wants to join the dots back to the Nazi Party itself.
Hitler is saying that he believes in law,
he believes in a rules-based society,
and he would never himself speak of violence, or using violence.
But Hans Litten, he understood what fascism was about,
he understood what Nazism was about.
And so he thinks, "How do we make this case
"of use in a bigger struggle?"
And he decides that a summons should be issued
to get Hitler before the court.
When Hitler enters the court,
the Stormtroopers who are on trial stand up in the dock
and raise their hands in the Hitler salute.
And they show their dedication to their leader.
Hitler is absolutely in control.
Hitler went there prepared to say something very well-rehearsed,
and says that he had no knowledge at all
of what these Stormtroopers would do.
This was a rogue group.
How often have we heard great leaders
saying that somehow this was an out-of-control group
and that this has nothing to do with THEM?
And Litten slowly but surely starts to unpick that.
Hitler is cross-examined for three hours.
Who are the Stormtroopers?
What is expected of them?
Tell me the truth.
As Hitler continues to deny Stormtrooper violence
is official Nazi policy, Litten produces a pamphlet.
It's a quick guide to Nazi ideology for new Stormtrooper recruits.
In it, there's a line that says
if the Nazis can't come to power by democratic means...
Litten plays his trump card,
and he presents it to Hitler.
"Look at this.
"You're telling us you are a democrat?
"That you're running a democratic party?
"Look what your pamphlets say."
It must have been so exhilarating.
You know, there's nothing more satisfying than
a good cross-examination, if you're a lawyer.
SHOUTING IN GERMAN
And then he gets angry.
From this position of calm leadership,
he becomes the rather frothing man
that we know he was capable of being.
By keeping at it, slowly and patiently,
he wore down the veneer.
And although, you know, this was not about, you know,
a witness saying, "I'm guilty,"
you just know that someone has been reduced in size.
And I think Hitler was.
A reporter secretly takes this photograph.
The sense you have in looking at the photograph...
Hitler knows that his performance was not good.
That Litten had exposed to the public
what this man was really like.
Hans Litten, he was exactly the sort of man who Hitler rather despised.
A Jewish lawyer, a clever man, an intellectual.
They were traitors. They were tools of a world Jewish conspiracy.
Vermin, they were less than nothing.
And so it was a great victory for Litten,
but by God had he made an enemy in the Fuhrer.
Back in the halls of power,
Schleicher goes to work to bring down the chancellor.
Schleicher's political game operates on different levels at once.
He conspires with the military elite.
He uses his influence with media and big business.
He spreads gossip to weaken the chancellor's standing
in political circles...
..telling everyone the Chancellor has failed to get Germany
out of its political and economic mess.
And all the while, he continues to work on Hindenburg...
..the only man who can fire a chancellor...
..convincing him that to keep the current chancellor in power
is bad for his reputation.
Schleicher knows about how much Hindenburg likes his own reputation.
This is another button that he can push.
The chancellor is a failure,
too much under the spell of the socialists.
He should go.
Well, I think the evidence is clear,
the chancellor cannot go on.
It could be very important for the future stability of Germany.
This is Schleicher at his best.
These are ways to rule a country
which are based on conspiracy, intrigue.
This is not what a republic is meant to be.
And so within weeks of his deal with Hitler,
Schleicher has persuaded the President
to fire the Chancellor and accept Schleicher's choice
for a new chancellor.
JAUNTY MUSIC PLAYING
What sort of person is Franz von Papen?
Well, he claims he's completely surprised
that anyone should imagine him becoming Chancellor of the Reich.
But on the other hand, I find that quite hard to believe,
that he hasn't imagined himself in that position.
You get the impression of a little bit of a popinjay.
He's always terribly well-dressed.
He always has a flower in his buttonhole.
He's always immaculately turned out.
And outwardly very charming.
You know, he knew how to play... in a very Germanic way,
he knew how to play the gentleman,
although he has the reputation of someone
with a degree of incompetence.
Schleicher, at this point, is looking for a man
who would basically do what he tells him to do,
someone that he could manipulate.
Well, if we try to think with Schleicher's mind
in this moment, this is a very, very understandable choice.
I would even say it was a very good choice.
The idea that Papen is sort of useful idiot
for other people around him is clearly nonsense.
It's Schleicher's men, it's Schleicher's cabinet.
It's going to be Schleicher's politics.
Kurt von Schleicher thought he could exploit him.
Of course, the reality is that he is...
..for want of a better word, prone to subterfuge.
He is cunning.
And because they need the Nazis' support,
they turn a blind eye to the Stormtroopers' violence.
GUNSHOTS
I certainly don't get the impression that Papen is particularly moved
by what's happening on the streets.
You know, he is a man who...
..does not see the morality of his position.
And as far as he's concerned,
if there's a brawl between the Nazis and the communists,
the people he wants to lose in that brawl
will be the communists and not the Nazis.
For Papen, the Nazis are the ticket to power.
So Schleicher finally has what he wants -
a right-wing government,
a malleable chancellor,
and his political opponents on the run.
The destiny of Germany is in his hands.
I do think that in this moment he is...
..full of himself, and he likes what he does.
And I think he's quite proud and he feels this is going well.
I think he feels this is successful.
And where he goes wrong, Schleicher,
is to not see that the Nazis, and particularly Hitler,
were playing their own game,
and were not going to accept
the rules set out by General Schleicher.
CHEERING THROUGHOUT
Sieg! CROWD: Heil!
On Election Day, 1932,
all the key players cast their vote.
Hitler, von Papen,
and President Hindenburg.
Hitler realises that if he tells a very simple message,
it doesn't matter if they're true or not.
The point is that you have to keep repeating them,
keep hammering them in.
Make Germany great again.
Restore the economy.
They are empty slogans,
but they're carrying a message that,
although vague, is very powerful.
Heil!
Heil! Heil!
The results send shock waves through Germany.
The Nazis' vote has gone from 18 to 37%.
Now, with the largest party in the Reichstag,
suddenly Hitler is too big for even Schleicher to control.
So Hitler thinks now's the time to strike.
Now Hitler makes his big move and demands to be Chancellor.
Schleicher is worried Hitler
is simply not playing by the rules
that Schleicher has foreseen.
Hitler was a gambler.
As he said, "I always go for broke."
And the more he believed in himself,
the more he was encouraged by his media followers
to believe in himself,
the more he was disinclined to compromise.
Talking to Hitler, which at the beginning
was like talking to a servant,
now becomes talking to someone who comes with his own claims.
So Schleicher's position starts to weaken
and things start to become shaky and slippery.
So Schleicher responds with an even bigger move.
He knows that in the German constitution
there is a clause that says the President can suspend parliament
and rule by presidential decree.
Schleicher and Papen now persuade Hindenburg
to pull that lever and exercise his emergency powers.
Hindenburg is rather horrified by the idea
of Hitler as Chancellor.
The jumped-up little corporal from somewhere in Austria.
So Chancellor Papen heads to the Reichstag
with the authority of the president to suspend Parliament.
He just has to get the Speaker's attention
and then dissolve the Reichstag.
That is all he needs to do, in theory.
But there's a new Speaker who has just been appointed.
Goering is very keen to be Hitler's fixer...
..because it makes him an important political figure.
But to be Hitler's fixer you've got, in the end,
to deliver what Hitler wants.
And in a moment captured in this photograph...
..when Papen tries to get the Speaker's attention
to dissolve the Reichstag,
Goering looks the other way,
and instead calls a vote of no confidence in Papen's government.
Goering looks at them, reads them, laughs, and says,
"Sorry, your government's finished."
But Papen has no intention of leaving,
and decides to try to cling to power.
Papen can rely on certain people.
After all, it is Schleicher who makes Papen Chancellor.
Papen thought very highly of Schleicher.
Schleicher is ruthless when it comes to...political loyalties.
And he has the capacity to change coalitions,
to change people as other people would change shoes or socks,
when the situation forces it, needs it.
He persuades the President they need a new chancellor.
It is a disaster for us.
Papen is a very stupid man. And that he simply should go.
So...marching orders.
Which Hindenburg, I suspect,
would have found quite difficult.
But there's one thing Schleicher
hasn't quite factored into his calculations
that will come back to bite him.
When Hindenburg as President
sacks von Papen as Chancellor,
Hindenburg gives him a photograph.
And the superscription to the photograph, in German,
"Ich hatt' einen Kameraden."
"I had a comrade."
And I find the use of the past tense rather poignant there.
It meant an awful lot to Papen,
because it was a gauge of the sympathy of the President.
That Hindenburg was not entirely in his heart,
he was not happy at what had happened.
Of course, everybody could see that Hindenburg developed an almost...
..romantic feeling of love for him, for Papen.
I think that's going a little far.
Hindenburg is not that demonstrative a man in my view.
But certainly a degree of comradeship.
So despite the fact that he was sent packing by Hindenburg,
Papen believes that this is a monstrous betrayal.
And from that moment onwards, Papen will do anything
in order to bring down Schleicher and bring himself back to power.
For lawyer Hans Litten, the fight against the Nazis goes on.
After the case where he cross-examined Hitler,
he became, you know, public enemy number one.
It's the classic thing that happens
to somebody who stands up to be counted.
People distanced themselves from him,
death threats, he's viciously assaulted.
Litten is feeling, I think,
what all lawyers feel when they suddenly find themselves
at the hard end of society's criticisms.
And yet at the same time, he knows that this is something that matters.
Despite the harassment, Litten is winning.
He gets Stormtroopers convicted
for the killing of a communist activist.
He successfully defends anti-fascists
against charges of murder.
Litten did enjoy successes.
There is no doubt that Litten is a thorn in the side of the Nazis.
It's his persistence, it's his determination,
his sense that he is not going to give up on this.
He keeps trying to call Nazism to book through the courts,
because he feels that to succumb and to quietly skulk off
would be to allow, somehow, Nazism to win.
And so he keeps going.
Now, Litten's investigations begin to reveal a conspiracy
between the Nazis and the police.
In one incident, Stormtroopers clash with anti-fascists
in a neighbourhood called Felseneck.
When a communist called Fritz Klemke is shot dead,
the Stormtroopers responsible are brought to trial,
claiming self-defence.
What Litten uncovers is explosive.
A policeman went into a tavern
and deliberately left his gun on the bar.
A Stormtrooper picked it up, carried out the murder,
and then slipped it back to the policeman.
When you have the collusion of police providing weaponry
and in fact being involved themselves
in the commission of crime,
bringing that to light was very important.
Having plotted the removal of two chancellors in less than a year,
Kurt von Schleicher feels back in control.
Now, in his boldest move yet,
Schleicher persuades Hindenburg that the next chancellor
should be himself.
His first objective -
end Hitler's political ambitions.
At this moment, Schleicher starts to consider different options.
Even plans, it seems, to arrest Nazi leaders, to strike against them.
So he is considering options.
He's always considering options.
His career, at this point, requires it.
The fall of Chancellor Papen
coincides with yet another general election.
And with the German economy picking up, the Nazi vote falls back.
It looks like Hitler got close to being Chancellor,
but not close enough.
And years of constant campaigning
has left the Nazi Party close to bankruptcy.
By late 1932, Goering clearly feels the Nazi Party
is facing something of a crisis.
He knows that this is a leader
who's stubbornly committed to becoming Chancellor or nothing.
And for Goering, I think that's,
you know, it's a difficult circle to square.
And I think there are moments when Goering is really thinking,
"How the hell am I going to do this?"
Is Hitler's stubbornness going to make the party fall apart?
Hitler has always refused to join any coalition
unless HE is Chancellor.
But many in the Nazi Party are getting impatient
and want a slice of power.
Schleicher sees this
and offers rebel Nazis a part in his government,
weakening Hitler further.
So at this moment, it seems that this is successful.
He feels that he starts having all the tools in his hand
to open the doors to the Nazi castle.
And to get into it, or to get...
Actually, he tries to steal from Hitler.
He tries to get a part of the support
that Hitler has from the German people.
By the end of 1932...
..Hitler was at his wits' end as to what to do.
He didn't seem to be able to get any more votes.
The Nazis began to run out of money.
People began to desert them.
The Nazi Party is weak, it's declining,
so there's general feeling of crisis.
It should have been the beginning of the end for the Nazi Party.
With his chances of power slipping away,
Hitler makes a clandestine journey...
..in a desperate last throw of the dice.
He definitely looks down on Hitler.
Hitler is another sort of animal, as far as he's concerned.
Papen is looking at Hitler to see if this man can be useful
in getting his revenge against Schleicher.
Papen offers Hitler a deal to join forces,
using Hitler's parliamentary strength
and Papen's friendship with President Hindenburg
to find a way to power.
He sees Hitler as his means of getting back into power.
Hitler does not represent to him the ideal form of government.
Franz von Papen finds the ideal form of government Franz von Papen.
For the first time in his political career, Hitler makes a compromise.
An agreement is made that the Nazis and Papen
will form a coalition government.
Compromise wasn't really in his repertory.
It was either total victory or total defeat.
But I think he was convinced that the von Papen deal
would bring the legitimacy with which he could then take over power.
Between Papen and Hitler,
at least one thing is agreed -
Schleicher must go.
This famous meeting, which is supposed to be a secret meeting,
but it's not that secret, because it leaks out immediately
and Schleicher has knowledge of it.
And strangely, he reacts in a manner
where he does not really feel threatened by it
and it seems that he even thinks,
"Oh, this is little Franz doing something for me,
"trying to negotiate with the Nazis
"to bring Nazi support to my government."
He does not yet understand
to what extent Papen has turned against him.
Now, Franz von Papen shows his true colours
as a cunning political player in his own right...
..using his position as Hindenburg's new favourite
to present a radical idea.
He should be Vice Chancellor.
And the Chancellor should be Adolf Hitler.
It's an idea he has
that the only way to destroy the National Socialists
is to give them a bit of power.
"Let's give them a chance in government
"to show how dreadful they are,
"and then the people will lose their interest in them."
These are desperate times,
and desperate schemes are dreamed up.
The decision rests with Hindenburg.
How is it that Hindenburg,
from his initial, rather lofty position regarding Hitler -
the upstart, the Austrian corporal -
to contemplating Hitler as a potential chancellor?
How do you explain the volte face?
It's quite a journey, that one.
Schleicher and von Papen and "my reputation".
The rise of the Communists.
Eventually, Hindenburg comes to the conclusion that von Papen is right.
There was no other answer.
He'd run out of options at this point.
Schleicher is out.
He has no remaining cards to play.
Hindenburg dismisses Schleicher at the end of January, 1933.
What he says to him as a last sentence is,
"General, and now let's see how the hare is going to run
"with God's help."
The hare is Hitler.
The Nazis are close to power.
Hans Litten is starting to realise
that Germany's legal system is riddled with Nazi sympathisers.
As his case against the police and the Stormtroopers comes together,
the system begins to shut him down.
Crucial evidence mysteriously disappears.
The Nazi conspiracy is wider than Litten realised.
Here we have state collusion in murder.
He presents it to the judge,
and the judge accuses Litten of lying.
Hans Litten is seeing how the rule of law is now a pretence.
It becomes the ultimate evidence to him
that the whole system is becoming Nazified.
Berlin's chief prosecutor informs him that
the case against the Stormtroopers is being dropped
for lack of evidence.
For Litten, watching this is hell.
He sees that the destruction of democracy
is taking place before his eyes,
and no-one is stopping it.
CROWD CHEERING
NEWSREEL: An excited crowd gathers outside the presidential palace on
learning that Hindenburg has sent for Hitler to form a government.
HE SPEAKS GERMAN
And so Hitler has, for the first time,
power.
On that evening, Hitler has this unshakeable self-belief.
One way or another, he is going to become Germany's dictator.
People like Schleicher, Papen and Hindenburg
thought that they could use him, that he'd be easily manipulated.
They were, of course, wrong.
We go back to this time over and over and again,
because it informs our current world.
It informs our current world on a number of planes,
but particularly it is a warning to us
to prevent things like this from happening again.
And we ask, why was it that there were no people around
who could actually prevent this terrible descent?
Here we are in the '30s.
Violence is taking place and society becoming divided.
Do people see what's really happening?
The story of German politics between 1930 and 1933
is the story of the decline and fall of a democracy.
And that's why we're so fascinated,
because we know what happened afterwards.
Germans at the time didn't know what was going to happen.
But we know now, looking back,
what a terrible turning point it was.
And of course, democracy is under challenge and under threat
in many countries at the moment.
We're looking for parallels.
That period does have lessons for us
if we want to preserve and defend democracy in our own day.
The moment when his murderer points the gun on him
and asks him, "Are you General Schleicher?",
he might have realised that he created a monster.
And whatever was going to come,
it would finish everything which was there before.
GUNSHOTS
Hitler still doesn't have supreme power.
4,000 communists arrested in one night.
Himmler gives a press conference
announcing the opening of this concentration camp.
What kind of people ARE these?
The camp's in the small town of Dachau.
It's January 1933
and Germany has a new Chancellor.
He refuses to engage in the boring day-to-day detail
of running a country.
He has no interest in the opinions of experts and refuses
to read briefings.
Instead, he tasks his team with a simple assignment.
Destroy democracy and make him dictator.
Destroying democracy will take just six months.
To piece together how it happened, historians and experts have examined
this period, each from a different individual perspective.
You cajole, you influence, you manipulate.
They'll take us inside the minds of those that fought fascism...
They realised these people are after your head.
They want to annihilate you from existence altogether.
..and the Nazis themselves.
Himmler genuinely believed that he would create a racially pure
Germany, where the Aryan race would reign supreme.
The moments when history hung in the balance and the world's worst
atrocities could have been prevented.
Mass murder was no problem.
But it was important to be socially acceptable.
Do people care about the truth?
At the start of 1933,
Hitler is the Chancellor of Germany,
the equivalent of Prime Minister.
But he still has a Parliament beneath him that could block him...
..a head of state who could fire him...
..and a legal system that could prosecute the Nazis
if they break the law.
So, Hitler now wants those below him to dismantle the German state,
pitting senior Nazis against each other.
Hitler allowed his subordinates to fight it out amongst themselves,
even encouraged it, because he believed in a Darwinian principle,
or what he understood as the Darwinian principle,
of the survival of the fittest.
Hitler's regime was a mass of competing individuals,
and competing centres of power, which Hitler deliberately kept
competing with one another.
He believed that if he appointed three people to do the same job,
the most ruthless, the most Nazi, the most able one
would come to the top.
Hermann Goring has ambitions to be a big wheel,
second, perhaps, to Hitler.
He needs to be noticed.
People often ask me, "You've written a biography
"of Goring, did you ever fall in love with your subject?"
You know, people who write biographies generally do.
And I always say, "No, I never fell in love with my subject."
He's so different from the other leading Nazis.
You know, he is jovial, amusing, flamboyant,
likes the good life.
He'll have a good joke, he has a drink, his picture is often
in popular magazines.
He is the kind of person who nowadays would invite
Hello Magazine in to look at his house.
But, on the other hand,
he is callous, brutal, ambitious.
This is a man, who, at the end,
signs the order in July 1941
for the Final Solution to the Jewish question.
The Nazis' first move appears democratic.
Hitler calls a general election to try to get
more seats in Parliament.
Goring sees an opportunity to impress Hitler
by delivering victory.
But, to do that, he'll need to take on the Social Democrats
and the Communists.
The Communist leader is Ernst Thalmann.
Ernst Thalmann is definitely a charismatic guy and he's a leader
of the German Communist Party,
which was the largest communist party outside of Soviet Russia.
And he is red as hell.
He speaks to a deep sense of resentment and anger
amongst the German working classes.
Goring hates Marxism and everything it represents.
He's a German patriot.
He's very committed to Germany, with a capital G.
He thinks the left will destroy Germany,
it will do to Germany what the Bolsheviks did to Russia.
While the communists are preparing to fight an election,
Goring has other ideas.
He wants to arrest them and lock them up.
But to arrest the democratically elected opposition,
Goring will need a very good reason.
So, he plays on public fears,
casting the communists as enemies of the people.
Then he raids the Communist Party HQ, looking for evidence
of a violent uprising.
Well, of course, they find plenty of Marxist literature
which is about the revolution.
That's what Marxism is, it's about having a revolution.
But there isn't any hard and fast evidence of a Communist coup
or revolutionary plan.
And they don't find the smoking gun.
Even though he'd put in all this work to demonising communists,
presenting them as an existential threat,
he can't say he's found evidence that an armed uprising is imminent.
He's got to say the armed uprising has started,
and that's where the Reichstag Fire comes in.
Goring's working late in his office when, suddenly, people
rush in and tell him, "The Reichstag's on fire."
Goring gets up and rushes to the building.
In fact, he tries to enter the building until he's restrained.
Here's the Reichstag, where he holds office,
if you like, is going up in flames.
A photographer captures Hitler and Goring
after they rush to the scene.
Goring knows this is exactly the opportunity he needs.
"Communists, they've done this, I've told you they were going
"to do it. If you wanted proof of the threat posed by communism,
"here it is, the flames in front of you."
Hitler finally endorses completely what it is that Goring is doing.
We're going to wipe out these vermin.
Communists have had it.
For Goring, it's a moment of real political excitement.
He makes the most of it.
He is the one who is going to act, boldly,
decisively, he's going to be Hitler's fixer.
Goring has the green light to round up the Nazis' political opponents.
To provide the muscle, he teams up with the Nazis'
paramilitary wing, the Storm Troopers.
Commanded by the brawling, brutal adventurer, Ernst Rohm.
Ernst Rohm was a trained officer.
Very stern and very rough.
Rohm was a ruthless fighter against democracy.
We have to get rid of this kind of political system
to fight these, what they called, inner enemies -
communists, social democrats.
It was quick.
Immediate.
The scale of this operation...
..is insane.
4,000 communists arrested in one night.
And it was traumatic.
Suddenly, the communists realised these people are after your heads,
and they don't just want to squeeze you out of the electoral terrain,
they want to annihilate you from existence altogether.
For Goring, the violence he unleashes doesn't seem
to worry him very much.
There's that famous Goring comment,
"You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs.
You don't have a normal moral compass.
You know, you can't do this to people.
He has an inverted moral compass.
What the communists are doing is wicked,
and what they're doing is restoring order and protecting Germany.
And that's moral.
Social networks, political networks, networks of publishing
were evaporated overnight.
Bear in mind, this is all still happening during
an election campaign.
The next day, the arrests continue.
Hitler moves to make them appear legal.
He goes to the head of state, President Hindenburg,
convincing him to sign the Reichstag Fire Decree.
It gives the Nazis emergency powers...
..to arrest and imprison without charge,
to restrict civil liberties, ban free speech,
and the right to protest.
Within weeks, over 25,000 arrests made.
Many are beaten and tortured.
Ernst Thalmann escapes.
But one of his comrades is captured and is tortured,
and his hiding place is given up.
Your leadership is being arrested.
Your active campaigners, your activists are all being
taken up by the state.
Where do you go?
In a climate of fear,
just under 44% of Germans vote Nazi.
Less than three weeks later,
the Nazis push the Enabling Act through Parliament,
a law that suspends democracy,
allowing Hitler to govern
without needing approval from Parliament.
HE SPEAKS IN GERMAN
CHEERING
SINGING OF THE GERMAN NATIONAL ANTHEM
All this is signed off by President Hindenburg.
I suspect Hindenburg is feeling he's getting backed into a corner.
The Reichstag burns,
Hitler is able to persuade not only Hindenburg,
but a large proportion of the German population
that this is the first sign of communist insurrection.
I mean, it was, if you like,
almost the birth certificate of the Nazi regime,
with all its horrors.
With the Reichstag suspended, the first laws are passed
to restrict the freedoms of Jews.
A Jewish baker is found dead,
a swastika carved into his chest.
Goring gets his reward.
More power and more prestige.
He is Prussia Minister of the Interior,
Germany's most powerful state.
He's given control of the Air Force and becomes master
of the German forests.
He'll get new uniforms,
a country estate and a pet lion.
HE SPEAKS IN GERMAN TO LION
But, whilst Goring has managed to lock up
the Nazis' political rivals...
..the next step of Germany's moral dissent is taken by someone
further down the pecking order.
In a regional office in Munich
is the relatively unknown Heinrich Himmler.
In early 1933, Himmler wants to cultivate links with Hitler
to get known by Hitler more and more.
Himmler wants power,
but, in early 1933,
it doesn't look likely at all that Himmler will ever rise
to the top of the Nazi party.
Himmler looked completely boring, unmanly.
Uncharismatic, dull, pedantic, bespectacled nerd.
This photograph is really emblematic of Himmler's personality
as a really insecure man who feels that he doesn't have much
of a soldierly, masculine face,
so he needs to cover his chin.
Himmler's view of Goring was initially quite negative,
because he thought that Goring was old guard,
that Goring was baroque,
that Goring was the direct rival.
For Goring, Himmler's not somebody he is yet going to be aware of
as a potential rival or a threat.
He becomes a very big figure, of course,
later on in the dictatorship.
Himmler is head of the SS, a paramilitary group of fanatical
Nazis who see themselves as Hitler's most loyal soldiers.
The black-shirted, jack-booted SS
is very much a product of Himmler's ideas.
Aryan supremacy, hatred of parliamentary democracy,
the dispensation of violence against anyone standing in the way
of the Nazis.
Extreme anti-Semitism.
He was a micro-manager.
SS members had to seek Himmler's permission if they wanted to marry.
His ambition is to make the SS the central institution
in Nazi Germany in charge of political repression.
More conservative Nazis believed that the best way to control
political opponents was by using the law to lock them up.
Himmler thought that even more radical measures were required.
Himmler now follows Goring's lead,
and he uses new laws to start arresting Nazi opponents.
The instrument Himmler used was called, euphemistically,
protective police custody.
Protective police custody meant that prisoners could be locked up
in the hundreds of thousands over the course of 1933,
without having the chance to speak to a judge,
without having the chance to speak to a lawyer.
Himmler used protective police custody quite indiscriminately
to extend his power, to extend the power of the SS.
Then Himmler needs somewhere to put all these prisoners.
And he's found a solution to that, too.
Himmler gives a press conference.
In his dull voice, the topic of this press conference
is the opening of a camp where political prisoners
can be re-educated.
He says that this camp has a capacity of about 5,000.
He claims that rabble-rousers who are subverting the power
of the state would be housed there.
Especially communists, social democrats, trade unionists.
He says that law and order will reign supreme within this camp.
The camp's in the small town of Dachau.
Himmler and the SS are quickly taking control
of Bavaria's justice system.
But right at the bottom of that system is someone
who is about to fight back.
Josef Hartinger was a 39-year-old deputy prosecutor.
Part of this generation that was going to make
a strong, democratic Germany.
People talk about Oskar Schindler, he saved 1,000 lives.
And if there'd been 1,000 people like Schindler,
there never would have been a Holocaust.
Well, had there been 100 people like Josef Hartinger,
not only would there not have been a Holocaust,
there may not have been a Third Reich.
Hartinger is sitting at his desk, shortly after 9:00 in the morning.
His phone rings.
There's a call from the concentration camp in Dachau,
that four detainees have been shot trying to escape.
Under Germany's criminal code, it is Hartinger's job
as deputy state prosecutor to investigate the deaths.
So, he sets off to Dachau,
with medical examiner, Moritz Flamm.
Hartinger knows there's a detention centre there.
The fact that someone tried to escape is certainly
a possibility.
But he's not going to assume anything, let's see
what it looks like when we get there.
There's a big wall there with an iron gate
in front of it.
He sees several Storm Troopers,
these brown uniforms,
with black SS kepis on.
And firearms.
What he doesn't see is actually more important.
He doesn't see any Bavarian police.
They wear these green uniforms, and the SS had been assigned
as auxiliaries to the Bavarian police.
So, SS men there, but no police.
The camp itself is a former munitions facility,
overgrown, boarded up buildings.
Fairly desolate.
And he sees these prisoners being marched around in groups.
They drive up to the commandant's headquarters,
and the camp commandant is there.
Wackerle, he's a poster boy SS man.
Blonde-haired, blue-eyed, black uniform, shiny boots.
And here you have Josef Hartinger, this slightly paunchy,
middle-aged, balding guy.
The commandant leads Hartinger and Flamm
to where the prisoners died.
He explains that the four men were on a work detail,
but they tried to escape, running for the trees.
They were shot from a distance
after ignoring the guards' commands to stop.
He's taken to a shed, where the bodies have simply
been thrown on the ground like slaughtered animals.
And Hartinger looks at this and just says...
.."This is not the way you treat a human being."
What kind of people are these, that would do this to someone?
Hartinger and Flamm, as they are going back,
are kind of reviewing everything that was there.
The treatment of these three bodies,
of these dead young people,
Wackerle himself.
And, then, as Hartinger said was most troubling of all,
he said, "How is it that all four of these men were Jews?"
And he says, "There is something very wrong here.
"And we are going to fix it.
"We will set this right."
Hartinger vows to bring murder charges against the Dachau SS.
But this means going up against Himmler,
just as his power is growing.
Because, for Himmler, Dachau is only the beginning.
And he's slowly bringing every state in Germany under SS control.
Himmler takes up a considerable amount of his time to travel,
to schmooze.
He knew how to flatter them.
He would talk in a soft voice, he would appear polite.
He offers them an honorary rank in the SS, which gave them the right
to wear a smart SS uniform.
Many Nazi and state leaders at that time are extremely vain,
so, they are more than pleased when someone like Himmler makes them
an honorary member of what is turning out to be the elite corps
of the National Socialist state.
He would place people into his debt by giving them expensive gifts.
To win people over for his cause, he believed that he had to be
a decent human being.
Being decent meant, for example, to kiss the hand of a woman.
But being decent could also mean the mass murder of millions of Jews.
Himmler is extremely methodical...
..calculating...
..and patient.
Himmler is amassing a police empire controlled by the SS...
..turning the SS into one of the most powerful institutions
in the Nazi state.
At Dachau, Hartinger is doing some detective work.
Examining the bodies, he discovers the prisoners were shot
in the back of the head.
It's clear the men have been systematically murdered
because they are Jews.
Dr Flamm looks at Wackerle and he says,
"Your guards are very good shots with their pistols."
And Hartinger expands his inquiries,
investigating reported suicides,
and other failed escape attempts at Dachau.
Hartinger and Flamm keep driving back out to Dachau,
collecting evidence...
..taking depositions in a very careful, methodical way.
Forensic details, name, age,
profession, the SS men responsible.
Hartinger said, "I could see the hatred
"in the SS officers' eyes."
One of the detainees allegedly had committed suicide
by hanging himself.
But when Flamm does the autopsy,
it turns out that the man in fact had been beaten to death
and then his corpse was hanged.
Another one, the SS guard had shot allegedly from eight to ten metres.
But, when Flamm conducts the autopsy,
it turns out he had been shot point-blank.
This is late May.
He finally has two cases
that can demonstrate
that these people were murdered.
Hartinger has the evidence to implicate
the Commandant of Dachau in the murders.
Charges that could ruin Himmler's plans.
But it's more than trying to bring a single SS man to justice.
He knows Wackerle is ordering these killings,
but Wackerle is ultimately a deputy of Heinrich Himmler.
And I think Hartinger is out to indict the entire system.
Himmler's fear is that investigations by the legal system,
by state prosecutors, will reveal the horrific truth about Dachau.
That Dachau is not a camp where political prisoners
are being detained, are being re-educated,
that Dachau is a place of murder, that Dachau is a place of savage
brutality and murderous violence.
This is Himmler's fear.
Now Hartinger takes the file to his boss.
"I finally have everything we need, the indictments are ready to sign."
And his boss looks at him and says...
.."I'm not signing.
"I'm not signing anything."
And Hartinger's just stunned.
Hartinger's boss, the senior prosecutor...
..is under Himmler's spell.
Hartinger, at that moment, is left with a choice.
He has a wife and a five-year-old daughter, he has his whole career
ahead of him by simply doing what his boss says.
This is over.
Step back from it.
He knows what's right, and he knows what's wrong.
And that's what actually matters to him.
And he goes back to his office...
..and he starts writing.
It's an astonishing act.
And, at that moment, Hartinger is truly alone in the world.
Hartinger's file is taken to the investigating judge.
And it goes up the chain to the Governor of Bavaria.
But, at the same time, Hartinger's boss tips off Himmler
about what's going on.
Himmler is presented with evidence that Josef Hartinger has filed
investigations against Dachau SS guards.
If news of the murders at Dachau break,
Himmler is facing a huge problem.
The SS does not have the right, under German law,
to kill political opponents.
So, Himmler needs to find a strategy to ensure that these legal
investigations do not go anywhere.
The investigations started by Hartinger seem like a threat
to the SS, as its power base is rapidly increasing,
not only in Bavaria, but also across Germany.
Himmler has to react rather swiftly.
He must try even harder to give the concentration camps
under SS control an even stronger legal veneer.
As Hartinger's file heads up the chain of command,
Himmler tries to fix the problem.
Films like this one make people believe
that concentration camps are humanely run.
Whilst, in secret, the SS finds more elaborate ways
to cover up new murders.
And Dachau's commandant, Wackerle, is fired.
Hartinger's file goes all the way to Berlin.
Those at the top of the justice system can see that what's happening
at Dachau is illegal.
The astonishing thing is Hartinger expects that he could be killed.
And he isn't.
More astonishing is that the killings stop in Dachau
for the entire month of June,
for the entire month of July.
So, Hartinger, at that point,
assumes that he actually has scored a victory.
He's won this.
It was this fight between him and the Commandant,
between the power of the Nazis
and the power of the law,
and, ultimately, Hartinger won that battle.
Thanks to Hartinger, German law has a chance
to shut down Dachau.
But Himmler has one more lever to pull.
Hitler is not someone who is accustomed
to regular habits at work.
He doesn't have a systematic manner of governing.
Lunch was often served with a delay of two hours because the Nazi leader
had got out of bed so late.
It would have been, I think, pretty boring to be in his company.
Because he just went on, and on, and on, in endless monologues.
Hitler didn't like bureaucratic detail, to read too many files.
Hitler thought he was above the law.
The law was a series of artificial restrictions on his freedom
of action, on behalf of Germany.
He was expressing the soul and the inner wishes
of the German people.
Of course, as defined by himself.
Himmler found out very quickly how to read Hitler's personality,
how to please Hitler, how to work with Hitler.
Himmler would have very rarely dared to interrupt Hitler.
And, then, towards the end of their conversations,
which weren't really conversations but monologues by Hitler talking
at Himmler, Himmler would have made a proposal.
Himmler knows exactly which button to push with Hitler.
Himmler, cleverly, exploits Hitler's dislike
for the judiciary, disregard for legal norms
and values, legal constraints on Nazi power.
Himmler also knows that Hitler lives in fear of assassination,
even convinced his kitchen staff is trying to poison him.
Sensing an opportunity to impress Hitler,
Himmler provides him with hand-picked SS men to act
as a personal bodyguard,
showing Hitler there is now one man and one organisation
above all others that he can trust without question.
Himmler's main characteristic was his unconditional
loyalty to Hitler.
Remember, he's a very young man.
He's only in his early 30s when the Nazis come to power.
And Hitler used to refer to Heinrich Himmler
as "the loyal Heinrich," "der treue Heinrich."
He ran the SS as an organisation that was well structured
and well set up.
And this got the approval of Hitler.
He was very much inclined to give Himmler what he wanted.
Himmler managed to persuade Hitler to make sure that no SS member
would end up behind prison bars for torturing and killing
prisoners at Dachau.
And to block the legal investigations.
Hartinger, his plan has been compromised.
All the evidence that he has collected,
the forensic reports, eyewitness testimony,
the deposition.
All of this evidence is in the hands of the Nazis.
And Hartinger's lost all of it.
It ends up in Munich, they don't know what to do with it,
so, the head Nazi there literally just opens his desk drawer,
puts the files in there, closes it and locks it.
And that was that.
At Dachau, the killing of Jewish prisoners starts up again.
Except, now, no-one complains.
German law is becoming meaningless.
By managing the crisis created by the Dachau murders,
Himmler proves himself to be an extremely skilful operator.
He proves himself to be a brilliant Nazi, as perverse as this may sound,
and Hitler is almost certainly impressed by this.
Now Himmler and the SS feel emboldened to use utmost violence
to kill concentration camp prisoners.
Himmler and the SS know that what they are doing is not legal
under the prevailing German criminal code.
But the ultimate source of the law for Himmler and the SS,
what is right, what is wrong, is Hitler.
The Nazis are transforming German life.
Women are encouraged to abandon their careers
and become mothers and housewives.
Newspapers can no longer criticise the government.
A new ministry for propaganda sells Hitler's vision to the public.
Meanwhile, Himmler is now at top table.
And not everyone appreciates his rise.
For Goring, Himmler suddenly becomes a figure
that has to be taken seriously.
And, so, he's got to be pretty wary of Himmler.
Goring's grip may well be under threat.
But Goring is making some moves of his own,
designed to ensure that no-one can move against him
without him knowing.
Goring has created the Research Bureau,
a top-secret surveillance organisation that uses
new phone-tapping technology.
It starts with only a few men,
but it will go on to employ thousands.
Goring signs off on every wiretap, and reads the transcripts.
He gets a kind of pleasure from it.
He's amused by it, amused by what people say about him,
of course, and quite entertained.
But, at the same time, of course,
he's a reasonably vengeful politician,
he doesn't forget the kind of things people say about him.
There is one famous occasion where he calls in
a number of heads of big business and says,
"You know, I want you to do this."
And they say, "No, no, we don't want to do this."
And he says, "Well, you've got to do this,
"because I've got tape recordings here of your meetings,
"and these tape recordings are very incriminating.
"So, you either do what I tell you, or you're in trouble."
One politician who bad-mouths the Nazis is found dead.
To act on the information gathered by the Research Bureau,
a new branch of the secret police is created -
the Gestapo.
The Gestapo use a new measure -
preventative arrest -
to disappear Jewish people,
gay people, intellectuals,
and anyone suspected of anti-Nazi feeling.
Himmler feels that the Gestapo should be brought under his control.
Part of his plan to take over all German police.
But getting his hands on Goring's secret police won't be easy.
Himmler sees Goring as a rival to Himmler's master plan
to put all German police forces across all states under his control.
Himmler very much thinks that Goring is stepping onto SS territory,
onto Himmler's own territory, by setting up the Gestapo.
It is very difficult for Himmler to simply say to Goring,
"I want to take over the Gestapo" because Goring is not known
as someone who gives up power easily.
Imagine a scene where Himmler, trying to schmooze Goring
into giving him control over the Gestapo.
For Goring, control of the police force in Prussia and the Gestapo
is very important.
Goring doesn't really have any other roles
that are particularly significant, and so he's very keen
that he be able to retain this position.
Goring clearly communicates to Himmler
that Himmler should mind his own business.
Goring doesn't compromise.
So Himmler starts developing some personal animosity against Goring.
They do not agree at all.
Goring is going to be a very difficult person to dislodge.
And, so, Hitler's inner circle are at each other's throats,
whilst also trying to impress him.
This internal conflict within the Nazi party will soon
reach a bloody conclusion.
But, for Hitler, whilst his aims are being achieved,
this rivalry will seem insignificant.
And, with his team dismantling the system for him,
he can just sit back and watch.
Hitler spends increasing amounts of time in his summer retreat
in the Alps, in Berchtesgaden.
He retreats there sometimes for weeks or even months on end.
He spends a lot of time, far into the night,
watching old movies, does not get up particularly early
in the morning.
And, of course, he has a relationship with Eva Braun,
whom he keeps absolutely secret from the rest of the world.
In just six months from becoming Chancellor...
..Hitler has destroyed the political opposition...
..opened Dachau...
..subverted the legal system...
..created the Gestapo...
..and begun to pollute the minds of the German people
with the Nazis' racist doctrine of anti-Semitism.
And there are lessons for us to learn from that crisis.
How easily you can move to a stage of totalitarian dictatorship.
Democracy is fragile, because in order for it to be truly
democratic, in the purest sense, it leaves itself open to being
taken over by fundamentally anti-democratic forces.
Democracies require, first of all, popular support and popular belief
in institutions, such as a free press, an independent judiciary,
and democratic elections.
The echoes that we find in our own time of the Nazis'
seizure of power are in a number of different areas.
Emergency powers, for example, emergency decrees,
state of emergency, that allowed them to put their own
plans into action without any serious opposition.
The rise of the Nazis was not inevitable.
There were many warning signs.
Democracy was a relatively new form of political rule
in the 1920s and 1930s.
People simply didn't know that the institutions of democracy,
that democracy, as such, was extremely frail,
that democracy constantly needed defending.
And this is a story that is still worth retelling,
a story that institutions, the institutions of democracy,
should not be taken for granted.
That democracy needs vigorous defence against forces
of the populist far right.
Hitler can't actually call himself the leader until Hindenburg,
the President, is dead.
Rohm was too powerful.
Hitler feared this kind of power.
Himmler hopes very much that Hitler will finally act and eliminate Rohm.
In late 1933,
Chancellor Adolf Hitler is one step away from total power.
Only Germany's elderly president, Paul von Hindenburg,
stands in his way -
the one man with the power to sack a Chancellor -
so it's vital for Hitler to keep him onside.
Believe it or not, Hitler can be charming...
..and he exercised this charm on Hindenburg,
I think, to probably quite good effect.
Von Hindenburg, he, perhaps against his better judgment,
becomes a little impressed by Hitler.
This is the story of how Hitler went from Chancellor
to all-powerful dictator.
To piece together how it happened, historians and experts have examined
this period - each from a different individual perspective.
You cajole, you influence,
you manipulate.
They'll take us inside the minds of those that fought fascism...
They realised that these people are after your heads.
They want to annihilate you from existence altogether.
..and the Nazis themselves.
Himmler genuinely believed that he would create a racially pure
Germany, where the Aryan race would reign supreme.
The moments when history hung in the balance
and the world's worst atrocities
could have been prevented.
Mass murder was no problem...
GUNSHOTS AND SCREAMS
..but it was important to be socially acceptable.
Do people care about the truth?
Adolf Hitler will go on to oversee the murder of millions of people.
But, in 1933,
he is the outwardly respectable Chancellor of Germany,
the equivalent of Prime Minister.
But, just under a year into the job,
he's finding being in government a difficult balancing act.
He has two very different audiences to please...
..the aristocratic elite,
the president,
the generals
and his Vice Chancellor.
They're uneasy about the Nazis, seeing them as thuggish
and worrying they could destabilise the whole system.
On the other hand, Hitler has his base,
the Stormtroopers, the paramilitary wing of the Nazis.
Over two million angry young men.
They're waiting for Hitler
to deliver the Nazi revolution he promised.
None more so than the leader of the Stormtroopers.
For Rohm, the aim was a revolution in Germany
to change the political system.
Ernst Rohm was a trained officer.
He was military and ruthless.
Rohm is an adventurer.
He is not really a politician.
Hitler owes Rohm a lot and he knows
that Rohm is one of his oldest comrades.
Hitler promised Rohm that they would get rid of the old elites,
that they would get rid of the rich
and they would change the whole system.
Hitler couldn't hold his promises.
Unleashing violence against their left wing enemies,
Rohm's Stormtroopers have been useful to Hitler -
but now they could become a threat.
Their violent attacks are upsetting the public.
As Chancellor, Hitler wants things to appear calm.
Rohm's actions pose a problem for Hitler because Hitler
needed to persuade the elites.
He needed to persuade the conservative establishment.
He needed to persuade Hindenburg that he was to be trusted,
that he was a solid bourgeois statesman.
Hitler got increasingly concerned about Rohm's discontent,
as it were, and about his whole kind of persona as a rough,
soldierly, violent type.
But Hitler needs to placate Rohm and,
in a move that risks upsetting the aristocratic elites,
he brings the revolutionary Rohm into the political fold,
giving him a job in the cabinet.
He's minister without portfolio.
But Rohm isn't satisfied.
He feels he and his millions of Stormtroopers were promised more.
Rohm doesn't want to command auxiliaries.
He wanted an army.
He saw himself as a commander, the commander of the new Nazi army.
These are promises Hitler made before he became Chancellor.
In his view, Hitler...
..betrays his friends.
So, running out of patience,
Rohm makes a wild and bold move.
He goes behind Hitler's back and tries to take control of the army
from the aristocratic generals,
men who report directly to the army supreme commander,
President Hindenburg.
I suspect Hindenburg is pretty horrified at this.
The armed forces are the servants of that state and of its people...
..on a apolitical basis,
and there is no room for political manoeuvring
by the armed forces of any state.
They were just a load of bully boys and were, by no means,
an army which could, for example, attack France and prevail.
I mean, it is unthinkable.
That was the job of the army proper.
So Hitler can't afford to upset the generals and the president.
But, with Rohm, it's more than politics -
it's personal.
Rohm opened gates for Hitler.
Rohm was the one who had influence.
Hitler is a frequent visitor to the Rohm family,
Rohm's mother and his sister, Eleonore,
so they became friends.
And therefore Rohm is someone who supports Hitler
not only politically, but, at the same time, personally.
And when Hitler's niece and rumoured lover killed herself,
it was Rohm he wanted with him at the graveside.
Hitler is stuck between the president and his friend.
When it comes to dealing with Rohm,
Hermann Goring has no such qualms.
For Goring, the problem with Rohm, I think,
is that Rohm has ambitions to be a second, perhaps,
to Hitler. You know, that's what Goring wants to be.
Is it possible, perhaps, that Rohm is thinking of launching some kind
of revolution, even putting Hitler to one side?
Now, for Goring, that would be unthinkable.
He's got to find a way of persuading Hitler that, you know,
this is a point at which he's got to break that friendship with Rohm.
He's got to recognise that Rohm is not just a companion
but he's a threat,
so all that Goring has got to do is to show Hitler evidence
that Rohm is not loyal.
So Goring orders his secret surveillance organisation,
the Research Bureau, to go after Rohm...
..building a file of everything Rohm says or does.
And Hitler publicly forces Rohm to back down from his demands
for the Stormtroopers to take over Germany's army.
He summons Rohm and the army leaders to a meeting,
where he makes it clear that the army,
and not the Stormtroopers,
are Germany's military force.
It's a devastating blow for Rohm.
He's even forced to shake hands
with the defence minister - General Blomberg.
Shaking hands with Blomberg meant nothing to Rohm.
He, er, saw...
..the Nazi Party, the Nazi militia,
now in the driver's seat.
Afterwards, Rohm makes a series of thinly veiled threats.
"Hitler is a ridiculous corporal
"and should go on leave."
Rohm very openly criticised Hitler
for his decision to go with an army,
therefore he was, kind of, a dangerous person
because Rohm didn't let go. He doesn't accept it.
And he was a danger to this whole notion of Hitler as Fuhrer.
Goring now makes a shrewd move in his plot against Rohm.
He enlists the help of his rival -
Heinrich Himmler.
Over the past year,
Himmler has taken over police forces across Germany,
but the biggest and most powerful remains outside his control.
In April, Goring gives Himmler the thing he wants most -
his Gestapo.
In exchange, Goring plans to harness Himmler's terror network
to bring down Rohm.
Himmler is pleased.
He's now inspector of the Gestapo, so he's almost there,
on his way to taking over control of all German police forces.
One character trait about Himmler that is the most important one
is his absolute careerism and his ruthlessness -
his ambition, his drive, to make it to the top.
Here is someone who prioritises rational procedures over emotions -
over human feelings.
As head of the Stormtroopers,
Rohm is Himmler's superior, a man he'd once hero worshipped.
But Himmler now dreams of destroying the Stormtroopers
and making his own SS Germany's only paramilitary force.
Himmler, in public, had to display some loyalty towards Rohm.
Behind the scenes,
Himmler had no qualms about getting rid of Rohm.
Himmler is collecting evidence against Rohm,
putting Rohm into a really bad light,
in terms of Rohm's private life,
in terms of Rohm's political activities.
Himmler makes sure that it reaches Hitler's desk.
Himmler hopes very much that Hitler will finally act
and eliminate Rohm.
Rohm has an Achilles heel
that Goring and Himmler are keen to exploit.
He is openly gay at a time when it's illegal.
He frequented Berlin's famous gay club, The Eldorado,
sipping cocktails with men dressed in drag.
Rohm lived a different life than all others.
He was a homosexual
and he lived this kind of life
more and more openly.
He met with male prostitutes.
In the view of his comrades,
he was not normal.
Since the Nazis came to power,
they have strictly enforced the socially conservative laws -
meaning Rohm could face imprisonment for his sexuality.
Defying his colleagues, Rohm has joined an organisation
campaigning for gay rights.
The Nazis wanted to transform society.
Everything should be clean, Aryan...
Er, no prostitutes.
No smoking, women...
..and Rohm...
..dismissed this.
It shows the stern character of Rohm that he openly
lived his homosexuality.
In a letter, he said, "I know it's a criminal act in Germany,
"but, then, I'm a criminal and they have to take me like this."
Rohm obviously felt very secure
because he was such a close friend to Hitler.
For years, Rohm's sexuality has been an open secret.
Hitler even defended Rohm when the press tried to expose him.
Hitler wasn't particularly bothered by Rohm's homosexuality.
He, as it were, forgave him because of his services
to the movement and his obvious loyalty to Hitler.
Hitler didn't really want to know about people's private lives,
I think.
Hitler had a certain kind of loyalty to old comrades,
which he certainly felt towards Rohm.
But now Hitler sees that Rohm's sexuality
could be a way to bring him down.
Meanwhile, Rohm is making his own moves.
In early 1934,
Rohm stages Stormtrooper manoeuvres across Germany.
Stormtrooper membership is growing fast
and Rohm now commands around four million men.
He publicly calls for revolution.
Unable to bring Rohm to heel,
Hitler's ability to pass himself off as a respectable statesman
is under threat.
The elites that surround President Hindenburg are getting nervous.
The aristocratic Vice Chancellor Franz von Papen
helped Hitler get into power.
Now he's dealing with the consequences.
Papen has been uneasy...
..because of the...
..the general lawlessness
is now becoming the talking point of the civilised world.
These Stormtroopers are intimidating diplomats,
people who are going to report back to their own country.
It is a troubling thing for him to see that this will essentially
end up by damaging Germany's reputation in the outside world.
Then news comes through that the president is on his last legs
and won't live much longer.
Hitler wants President Hindenburg to name him successor before he dies
so he can take complete control of Germany.
If the ruling class wants to stop that from happening,
it's now or never.
And the next move comes from an unlikely player.
Inside the Vice Chancellor's office is Papen's speech writer,
Edgar Jung,
a right wing intellectual, who is secretly plotting Hitler's downfall.
Jung belongs to the educated upper bourgeois
and he grows up steeped in their values.
He sees himself as belonging to the class that should be ruling.
He sees himself as a potential Minister of the Interior,
if not a Chancellor of a future Germany.
So, when the Nazis first come in, Jung is absolutely delighted.
He sees them as a very convenient vehicle for change.
They are very strong leadership.
They are bringing a new authoritarian sense
of direction to Germany.
1933, '34 is a very bad year for Germany.
There is still huge amounts of violence,
with the Stormtroopers on the streets.
There isn't the immediate economic miracle they had hoped for.
The honeymoon period for the Nazis is over.
I think Jung feels a real sense of responsibility and guilt
for enabling someone like this to then entrench themselves
at the leadership, at the very highest levels
of his country's politics.
Deep within Papen's Vice Chancellery,
Jung and others have formed a resistance cell.
He's working with people who have got connections in intelligence.
They are trying to warn people before they get arrested,
they're trying to get people out of the country when possible,
they're trying to get people out of prison when they have been arrested.
Politically, they're manoeuvring inside the Reichstag,
so they're doing really quite important
and very dangerous political work.
Jung had even made a plan to assassinate Hitler...
..but abandoned it in case it damaged his own political ambitions.
Instead, Jung plans to get Hitler removed from power.
He'll write a high profile speech for Papen
that will expose the violent truth about Rohm,
the Stormtroopers and Nazi rule.
The speech should be enough to force Hindenburg to get rid of Hitler...
..but it all hinges on getting Papen to deliver it.
Jung realises that this is a good moment,
both because we have public discontent,
we have the threat of violence turning into something more,
perhaps a political putsch...
..and we have Hindenburg's deteriorating health.
It's the time to act and, conveniently, at this moment,
Papen gets an invitation from the University of Marburg
to give a speech, which is perfect.
Jung is an intellectual and he's a communicator,
and he puts pen to paper, and what he drafts is basically
his alternative manifesto,
or at least his alternative path for Germany.
Jung doesn't trust Papen to deliver the speech,
but he has some insurance policies.
He distributes advanced copies to the press...
..and gets Goebbels' propaganda ministry
to agree to a live radio broadcast
so that Hindenburg can listen from his estate.
And Jung doesn't give Papen the speech
until he is on his way to Marburg.
Papen is travelling towards Marburg in Hesse, in central Germany,
to give a speech to some 600 people.
Papen, as a leading representative, the Vice Chancellor,
is a representative of the government
sent out, essentially, to do...
..call it what you will, marketing or PR for the government.
And he reads the speech,
the words that are being put into his mouth, and he is alarmed.
He says that this speech could cost him his head.
But the speech has already been sent out, and therefore some members
of the press already have the speech. He can't go back on it,
so he reluctantly agrees to deliver the speech.
Jung knows that Papen...
..maybe he won't have the backbone to give the talk word-for-word,
as he's written it, but then also maybe he hasn't got the intellect
or the backbone to replace it with something else.
It's all very last-minute, so he's really on tenterhooks
to see what is delivered.
RADIO HISSES
Jung is listening to the radio, incredibly anxious.
"What's going to happen?"
PAPEN'S VOICE ON RADIO
And Papen begins to deliver the speech.
And he gives is pretty much as given.
Because he gets on a roll, he responds to his audience.
This is revolutionary stuff.
It is a very dramatic speech, as well.
He uses this incredibly strong language,
so he talks about it being time to silence the fanatics
and, er, make room for the work of serious men to do the serious work.
There's thunderous applause in the hall and Papen adores being adored,
and so he gets on a real roll
and he delivers the whole thing word for word.
Jung can hardly believe it.
He's banging his hand repeatedly on the table,
saying, "He bought it! He bought it!"
So he's absolutely delighted.
Some of the Stormtroopers quite pointedly walk out of the room,
but essentially it's a huge success.
Papen seems to be delighted.
There's a wonderful photograph of him walking down the steps
of the hall afterwards and he really looks like
the cat that's got the cream.
He was the object of the adulation of the crowd
and that sort of thing probably goes to his head a little bit.
The Marburg speech sent shock waves across Germany
and the public rally in support of Papen,
who sees an opportunity to become President himself.
To topple Hitler,
all Papen needs to do now is seize the momentum and get to Hindenburg.
But when the Nazis order news of the speech to be banned,
Papen's ego is bruised and he decides to first visit Hitler.
Papen is furious and goes to complain to Hitler,
threatening to resign as Vice Chancellor of the Reich.
That was a big problem for him.
There's a danger that Von Papen would go to see Hindenburg
and get his blessing to become his successor.
So this is not the moment Hitler wants to see a rebellion
within his own cabinet.
Danger was that the army would link up with Von Papen
and the Conservatives because they saw very much eye-to-eye.
The senior generals themselves are political conservatives,
they weren't Nazis at this stage,
and the danger was there'd be some kind of Conservative coup.
Hitler convinces Papen to delay his visit to see Hindenburg,
suggesting they make the trip together instead.
He manages to run rings around Papen because Papen suddenly loses
that ability to see the urgency of the situation -
that he needs to get to East Prussia to talk to Hindenburg.
If he moved at precisely that moment,
he might be able to do something.
But, as it is, he loses that chance and fails to seize the moment
which might have been actually instrumental
in bringing Hitler down.
Hitler has played Papen cleverly.
Going behind his back,
Hitler arranges to meet with the president at his country estate.
Hitler himself hotfoots it up to Neudeck, in East Prussia,
to go and see Hindenburg and find out what sort of state
his health's in and whether he's likely to fall off the perch quickly,
or whether they need to do something about it fast.
Hindenburg and his generals issue an ultimatum to Hitler to bring
the revolutionary troublemakers under control or face martial law
and the transfer of power to the army.
Hindenburg is pointing to the Stormtroopers and saying,
"Enough is enough."
Hitler, now seeing that he is slightly pinched on both sides,
both by the rebellious nature of Papen...
..and the fact that the President, who can dismiss him,
is looking angrily at him about the Stormtroopers,
Hitler then decides to act.
And now Jung has created the crisis and the man that capitalises
on the crisis is not Papen,
it's not Jung, it's Hitler.
And suddenly he realises that there is more to this man,
that there is a real potential problem here.
Papen has missed a historic opportunity to stop Hitler.
Realising his life may now be in danger, Jung starts planning
to flee the country.
Jung should have realised immediately
that his plan is unravelling
and that potentially he himself is personally in danger.
British intelligence has uncovered that he is likely to be arrested
and he is warned by a British journalist and a member
of the Reichstag that his arrest is likely to be imminent.
Eventually, he concedes that perhaps it is safer for him probably to get
to Switzerland at this point.
Hitler needs to now decide how to deal with the two impending
threats to his power,
Rohm and the Stormtroopers, and the aristocratic right
that could still yet persuade Hindenburg to get rid of him.
Ready for this moment,
Himmler and the SS have been busy inventing evidence...
..planting the seed of an idea that Rohm and the elites have in fact
joined forces to launch a coup against Hitler.
Himmler is working tirelessly in June 1934...
..cos Himmler knows that this is a now or never moment for himself,
for the SS, to win the upper hand against the Stormtroopers
and to retaliate against members of the conservative elite
who have expressed criticism of the Nazis -
people like Jung, people like Papen.
Himmler created this dossier about Rohm's alleged putsch plans
against Hitler. Rohm is planning a putsch aided by the former
German Chancellor, Von Schleicher, one of the archenemies of Hitler.
Himmler really manages to construct this image of a conspiracy,
of a coalition between the conservative right
and the Stormtroopers.
There was no such coalition.
All of these charges were completely trumped up.
All of these charges are completely trumped up.
Meanwhile, Himmler's Gestapo agents burst into Jung's apartment
just as his bags are packed for Switzerland.
When they arrest him, they do a thorough search of his apartment
and they discover papers negotiating the fee
he would get for writing that speech from Papen,
so that is their evidence.
It's now clear that he is the author of the Marburg speech.
He goes to the bathroom and he actually scribbles "Gestapo"
on the bathroom cabinet - to warn his friends what has happened.
With Jung in custody, Papen finally understands what's at stake
and just who he's dealing with.
Papen hears that Edgar Jung has been arrested and flies to Berlin
and demands an audience with Hitler.
Hitler refuses to see him.
At this point, Papen sees the urgency
of visiting Hindenburg and arranges to meet him
in Neudeck, in East Prussia.
This is a critical moment.
Hindenburg's health has taken a turn for the worse.
If Papen is to stop Hitler, he must get to Hindenburg immediately.
But news of Papen's meeting reaches Himmler, who is readying the SS
to strike against the aristocracy and the Stormtroopers.
Himmler summons SS leaders and he tells them that the Stormtroopers
are planning a putsch. Robust action must be taken swiftly, ruthlessly
and decisively, so Himmler and the SS are beginning to prepare lists
of Stormtroopers who are to be arrested, who are to be executed.
But even as the time to act draws near,
Hitler seems to remain loyal to Rohm.
And Rohm promises to lie low.
He takes leave at the Bavarian lakeside resort of Tegernsee.
Rohm leaves Berlin for Bavaria, Tegernsee,
where he stays in a nice hotel,
and Rohm feels...
..not very well.
He had has problems with his health and he is...
..very thoughtful during this time.
He is very, kind of, remote and this is definitely not a time for him
to party or to celebrate. He seems to think about his future.
Opposition inside and outside the Nazi Party
must now be annihilated...
..but Goring and Himmler still need word from Hitler
before they can move against their enemies.
On the 28th of June,
Hitler and Goring go to the wedding of a local Gauleiter.
It's a normal ceremony for Hitler to attend.
The conspirators have devised a plan
to psychologically prepare Hitler to take action.
In the middle of the wedding,
there's a moment of drama.
Himmler arrives and this is the point at which
they're going to tell Hitler about the dangers that he's facing.
Himmler comes in with the news that Papen...
..is about to see President von Hindenburg
on his estate in East Prussia.
This raises the alarm for Hitler.
Hitler is extremely concerned that, if he doesn't act swiftly
against the Stormtroopers, now that he knows that Papen
will be seen by Hindenburg, then Hindenburg might stop
supporting the Nazi regime, that Hitler might lose some of his power,
that the army might be given some more power.
To give him a final push, Hitler is shown documents that allege Rohm
and the Stormtroopers are plotting against him.
I think, for Hitler, it's a difficult moment, psychologically,
to confront the fact that Rohm could be...
..guilty of plotting against Hitler, plotting against the regime.
Having two people there prodding him, providing him with
what was in fact rather spurious evidence
about the possibility of a coup,
is, for Hitler, really necessary, you know?
He needs to have his indecision ended.
He needs somebody to prod him...
..but then it needs to be his decision.
So, he's prodded and prodded and prodded
and suddenly says, "Yes, that's it."
You know, "I've had enough."
And what follows is, you know, can be described only,
really, as mafia politics.
Hitler travels through the night to personally arrest Rohm at his hotel.
Rohm doesn't expect Hitler coming,
practically with all members of the inner circle,
to arrest him.
As far as we know, Rohm was really stunned.
He was very quiet during this time of arrest.
Rohm just sat there and it seems
as if Rohm still feels very confident...
..that there is no danger for him, personally.
Meanwhile, Goring and Himmler are poised for action in Berlin.
Goring and Himmler have returned to Berlin from Essen, from the wedding.
They lock themselves away in the Leipzig Palace,
they surround it with armed guards, just in case there really is
an attack from the Stormtroopers.
Himmler, in this situation, is very cool.
He's very calculated.
He is patient.
He knows that he needs to wait for the order
of the Fuhrer to come through.
At 10.00am, Goring and Himmler receive the code word.
Then, throughout Germany, sealed orders are opened by SS men -
revealing lists of their victims.
Goring is the kind of impresario of the drama and Himmler, once again,
is the obedient secretary,
carrying everything out that needs to be carried out.
Himmler is coordinating the arrests and executions in Berlin
together with Goring. They go through lists, they go through lists
of who's to be arrested, of who is to be shot.
The killing begins.
GUNSHOTS
Former Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher is murdered at home,
alongside his wife.
Rebel Nazis, who once threatened to split the party,
are also taken care of.
The men in Papen's office are also on the list.
Papen is arrested and placed under house arrest.
He can't do anything to act, to save the members
of his own department, and various people in his entourage
are, essentially, murdered. He is lucky, in many respects,
to survive with his life.
All we know with Jung is that he is executed.
The place of death is left unrecorded,
which is a mark of disrespect, as well,
and sometime later his family receive his ashes
and his empty wallet.
That is the end of Jung.
It sounds very bizarre to us, but Himmler is guided
by a different moral compass.
Himmler believes that it is necessary for the survival
of the Nazi regime to act so ruthlessly against the people
on the list of those to be arrested, of those to be executed.
For Himmler, it is an office job routine.
For at least 100 people who were murdered
in the aftermath of the Night of the Long Knives...
..this was the end of their lives.
By the evening of June the 30th,
dozens have been executed.
Any possible conservative or Stormtrooper rebellion
has been crushed.
Still alive, though, is Hitler's friend -
Ernst Rohm.
almost as if nothing had happened.
It curiously resembled, I think, the way that some murderers,
when they've murdered somebody, they wash their hands,
they change their clothes, they want to put all that behind them
and then they can walk out into the streets -
as if nothing had happened.
This is a really incongruous scene.
Imagine that some of the bloodiest murders in the history
of the Third Reich have taken place on the previous day.
Now, Hitler has invited members of the Reich cabinet
and their wives to a party.
Himmler and Goring learned that Rohm has not been executed.
He's an old companion, old fighter,
and he just can't bring himself to order Rohm to be murdered.
So it's one of those occasions where Hitler hesitates and he needs
other people to prod him again into making that decision.
And for Goring and Himmler, it's really important.
You know, the whole thing was to get rid of Rohm!
So they've got to get Hitler to make the decision
that Rohm must be executed, too.
As with other major decisions,
Hitler has waited for the crucial moment to play his hand.
Hitler was always prepared to use violent action in the end.
He didn't have any hesitation about having people shot, killed,
murdered, robbed, beaten up or tortured -
it didn't really matter to him.
In that sense, the so-called Rohm putsch,
the murder of scores of people
he regarded as traitors to the cause,
that wasn't particularly something that he felt was bad.
He felt, by this stage, he was above the law.
In a sense, he'd always felt he was above the law.
Hitler's decision is to offer Rohm
the honourable way out.
At Stadelheim Prison,
Rohm is forced to make a terrible choice.
For Rohm, it must have been astonishing, then,
to see Theodor Eicke, who is the
commander of the Dachau concentration camp.
A pistol is put into Rohm's cell,
together with a copy of the Volkischer Beobachter Nazi newspaper,
with stories about the Rohm purge,
about Rohm's alleged conspiracy.
I wouldn't see Rohm as a victim.
He himself, and he says this very openly,
he himself would kill people, would kill his enemies.
Killing was no problem for Rohm.
Rohm does not want to shoot himself.
So, after ten minutes,
the commander of the Dachau camp, Theodor Eicke,
storms into Rohm's cell and shoots him at close range.
GUNSHOT
This is the end of the Night of the Long Knives.
This is the end of Rohm.
This is the end of the leader of the Stormtroopers,
who was, until then, Hitler's closest ally,
Hitler's closest supporter.
Hitler was always relieved after he'd made up his mind
on a difficult issue and taken action -
that gave him a sense of relief and fulfilment.
He knew, he felt in his bones, that he had solved
a really difficult problem.
This is it.
This is the end of this period of seizing power
and establishing power.
Now we can move forward as one united government, state,
people under my command.
Goring finally achieves his ambition.
As a reward for his brutality,
Hitler promotes him and names him as his successor.
He will go on to oversee many of the Nazis' worst atrocities.
Later on, at Nuremberg, when Goring is on trial for war crimes,
he's asked about Rohm, "What did you think? Why did you do it?"
He said, "Well, he was in my way."
For Goring, you know, it wasn't a question
I think he would have understood.
You know, "Did you have a guilty conscience afterwards?"
"No, of course not."
After the Night of the Long Knives,
Hitler makes the SS a fully autonomous organisation.
Under Himmler's watch,
it becomes one of the most feared institutions in Germany,
presiding over the systematic murder of minorities,
homosexuals and Jews.
One of the keys to understanding Himmler's personality
and Himmler's career is by reflecting about the word "decency".
Himmler thought that he had always been acting decently,
that, in organising the Night of Long Knives
had been decent, that killing Jews during the Second World War
had been decent. This is abhorrent.
Himmler thought that he had done the right thing
for the survival of the Germanic race.
By crushing the Stormtroopers,
Hitler wins the support of most of the German public,
the army, the elites,
and President Hindenburg.
Hindenburg was always frightened of instability.
So, when action is taken in this way, erm...
..I suppose, I don't know, a fit of relief or something
and pens a letter to Hitler, saying, basically, "Well done."
Having won Hindenburg's approval,
Hitler presents a new piece of legislation
combining the offices of President and Chancellor
to take effect on Hindenburg's death.
A day later, Hindenburg is on his deathbed.
When Hitler goes to pay his respects,
he finds Hindenburg drifting in and out of consciousness,
addressing him as "Your Majesty".
I'm dubious about his ability to make rational judgment
as he approached his death.
Might explain some of the very difficult questions
regarding his shift
vis-a-vis Hitler and the Nazi Party.
In his last rational moments,
what did he think of when he thought about Germany's future?
Difficult to answer that one.
He would want to vindicate his own decisions,
but he may be disturbed by...
..what has happened since Hitler took office.
So he might have died a...
..rather troubled man.
And so Hitler now had nothing left to restrain him.
TRIUMPHANT MUSIC IS PLAYED
CANNONS FIRE