All language subtitles for H-B.03of13.Kill.the.New.Chancellor.x264.AC3.MVGroup.org_track6_[eng]

Powell: Adolf Hitler caused
the deaths of 50 million people.

An entire nation
followed him to ruin.

He was hated by those
he persecuted

and even by some of
his own commanders,

yet in 25 years,

no one managed to kill him.

Winston Churchill had
very few bodyguards,

whilst Hitler had thousands.

He needed them.

During his travels
across Europe,

there were over
40 attempts on his life.

Now with access to captured
original SS records,

the producers
of "Churchill's Bodyguard"

can reveal for the first time
in this new series

how fate and a small number
of handpicked bodyguards

helped this evil genius
to cheat death

on so many occasions.

Why did no-one manage
to kill Adolf Hitler?

Enough people wanted to.

But as this series shows,
it was not as simple

as it sounds.

The challenge for his
bodyguard intensified

when he became
Chancellor of Germany

on January 30, 1933.

The Nazis had won over 30% of
the vote in the previous year

and were the largest party
in the Reichstag.

Ruthless political bargaining
behind the scenes

made Hitler the leader
of a coalition government.

He had won the battle
of the ballot box.

Would he also win

the battle of the streets?

His main rivals in the Reichstag
were the Communists,

and Hitler set his thuggish
brownshirts on them,

fighting them wherever
they found them.

There was a shocking
outburst of violence,

but German citizens
hoped it would end,

once and for all,
the anarchy

that had plagued
the Weimar Republic.

Hitler's brutal rise to power
had won him many enemies,

some of whom were only
too willing to kill him.

Communists, Jews, and Catholics
feared even greater persecution

by the Nazis
now they were in power.

Previous chancellors
had received death threats.

In April 1931, Heinrich Bruning

received a small parcel bomb

made of a cardboard tube
containing gunpowder.

When the deeply loathed Nazi
head of propaganda,

Joseph Goebbels also
received a letter bomb

similar to that sent
to Bruning,

he blamed it on the Communists.

Such a heightened sense of fear

played into the hands
of the Nazis,

who pledged stricter security
against ultra-left forces.

Just two months before
Hitler took the job,

his predecessor, von Papen,

was walking through
the corridors

of the Berlin Chancellery
when he was attacked

by a knife-wielding woman
who had slipped past security.

But the new Chancellor, Hitler,
received more threats

than all these German leaders
put together.

In his first year in power,

the police listed over a dozen
serious attempts on his life,

and tip-offs of other plots
came in on a weekly basis.

As leader of his country,

Hitler could call upon
the full security apparatus

of the state -- police
and intelligence agents --

as well as his own dedicated
Nazi Party bodyguards,

but that couldn't stop

the attentions of
the lone fanatic.

Ludwig Assner, an enraged
former Communist and Nazi,

dared to send a letter

threatening to shoot Hitler
unless President Hindenburg

dismissed the new Chancellor
from office.

He said he knew
that Hitler was mad

and that if left in power,

he would bring destruction
to his country.

He wasn't far wrong.

[Cheering ]

Very aware of
the ever-present threat

to his life
from a lone assassin,

Hitler confided in
a Nazi police chief.

Man: "One day,
an average-looking man

"will establish himself
in an attic apartment

"along Wilhelmstrasse.

"Neighbors will think he
is a retired schoolmaster,

"a man with horn-rimmed
spectacles and a little beard,

"but he will not allow anyone

"into his shabby room.

"He will quietly and patiently
equip himself with rifle

"and telescopic sight

"and will aim the gun
day after day,

"hour after hour,

"at the balcony of
the Reich Chancellery.

"Then, one day,

he will pull the trigger."

[Gunshot]

Powell: Government security
staff did their best

to limit the chances
of attacks on Hitler,

but sometimes their efforts
descended into farce.

On one occasion, Hitler was due

to attend an official ceremony
at a church in Potsdam

with President Hindenburg.

A zealous security agent

spotted a tunnel dug
beneath the building.

He immediately jumped
to the conclusion

that dynamite
would be placed there

to blow up the whole
government in a new

Guy Fawkes gunpowder plot.

On closer examination,
it was revealed

that the tunnel had been dug
by the radio company

which would be broadcasting
the ceremony.

On another occasion,
Hitler was warned by police

that he was to be handed
a bouquet of flowers

when he appeared in public.

When the Chancellor took them,
the alleged assassin

would squirt poison at him
through the perfumed petals.

Faced with such
farfetched ideas,

it is not surprising
that Hitler quickly became

fatalistic about his own safety.

"What will happen will happen,"
he frequently said.

Nothing would stop him
from appearing

before the vast
crowds of voters,

who still, at this stage,
adored him.

Although Hitler was now
in a position of power,

it did not mean
he could exert it easily.

The complex coalition

of politicians and parties
that had raised him up

also stood in his way.

His immediate aim

was to call another election

to increase the number
of Nazi seats

in the Reichstag and gain
an overall majority.

The perfect opportunity
came in February 1933.

On the 27th, the Reichstag
was set on fire.

It could not have been
a more symbolic target.

This was Germany's seat of
government, its parliament,

the heart of German democracy.

Both the aged president,
von Hindenburg,

and the new chancellor came
to visit the burned-out remains.

Hitler's message was clear --

such an assault on German values
would never have happened

if he had been given total power

to defeat the enemies
of the state.

A feebleminded young Dutchman
named Marinus van der Lubbe,

was found inside the building
and arrested.

Other suspects
were also pulled in.

They all had connections
to the Communist Party.

It was a political gift
for Hitler.

All the leading newspapers

were with him as he declared
a state of siege.

And the message was
reinforced on March 3rd,

when a ship's carpenter,
Karl Lutter, was arrested

with other Communists
as they planned to kill Hitler

with a bomb during an election
rally in Königsberg.

Hermann Göring,

who now controlled
the Prussian police force,

ordered an immediate crackdown
on the left wing in Berlin.

It was the perfect opportunity
to silence political enemies,

and all the Communist members
of the Reichstag were arrested.

It was all for the good
of Germany, Hitler declared,

but it certainly did the Nazis
a lot of favors, too.

Within a week,
in another election,

the Nazis won 44%
of the total vote

and increased their seats
in the Reichstag to 288.

With the support
of some Nationalists,

they now had
an overall majority.

Hitler could do
whatever he wanted.

And he moved swiftly to protect
himself and his party.

By the end of March,
an Enabling Act had been passed.

This was a charter
for dictatorship.

It took power away
from the Reichstag

and gave it to Hitler
and his Nazi cabinet.

All political crimes,

including attempted
assassinations,

were to be punished by death.

[Hitler speaking German]

By the summer of 1933,

all other political parties
had been banned,

their leaders arrested, beaten
up by Hitler's brownshirts,

or in exile.

A dictatorship had been born.

But even as the Nazis
celebrated --

appropriately,
with a torchlight parade --

rumors were spreading
that it was actually

the brownshirts who had crept
into the parliament

and filled it with
inflammable material.

They then forced the
simpleminded Lubbe to light it.

To quash such cynical talk,

the Nazis put the Communists
accused of burning the Reichstag

on trial in September.

Hermann Göring
even took the stand

to rail against the accused.

Although the evidence
against them was slight,

it was assumed that they
would be found guilty.

But in an amazing but doomed
act of courage,

the court acquitted

all the accused
except van der Lubbe,

who made no attempt to deny
that he had started the fire.

He was quickly guillotined.

The truth of what really
happened on that night

died with him.

Hitler was so infuriated by
the independence of the court

that he decreed
that, henceforth,

all treason cases would be tried
by special Nazi courts.

All: Sieg Heil!

The last flickers
of independence

were now extinguished.

With Hitler's assumption
of total power,

the Weimar Republic
was finished.

The Third Reich had begun.

If anyone wanted
to get rid of Hitler,

they could no longer
vote him out.

They would have to kill him.

At the heart of Hitler's
personal security

during the dangerous
period of transition

from political activist
to Nazi head of government

was the SS-Begleitkommando --

Hitler's SS escort.

This was the latest incarnation
of his close bodyguard unit,

formerly known as the Stabswache
and then the Stosstrupp.

As Chancellor of Germany,

Hitler had access to regular
police bodyguards,

but he preferred to trust
the elite personnel

drawn from the SS.

Hitler's SS escort was
officially established

on February 29, 1932.

12 young SS men were
interviewed by Hitler

and Heinrich Himmler,
head of the SS,

at Berlin's Kaiserhof hotel.

A palatial building situated
on the Wilhelmsplatz,

the hotel was directly opposite
the old Reich Chancellery,

Hitler's future home.

In 1932,

he had rented the entire
second floor of the hotel

for himself and his entourage.

Hitler and Himmler
picked the final eight.

These men would be the elite
of the SS, an elite itself.

The heart of the Fuhrer's
security day and night.

They included Bruno Gesche,

a 27-year-old former clerk

who had lost his job at a bank

because he preferred to be
fighting for the Nazis.

Erich Kempka.

At 22, one of Hitler's
youngest bodyguards,

who would become his most
trusted chauffeur,

driving the Fuhrer throughout
the life of the Third Reich.

Kurt Gildisch, a 28-year-old
trained teacher

who failed to find
a classroom job

and ended up in
the Prussian police force.

Like Gesche, he was sacked

because of his Nazi affiliations
and joined the SA in 1931.

Later that year,
he was transferred to the SS.

While traveling with Hitler's
bodyguards by air from Berlin

to Pomerania,

British journalist Sefton Delmer

gave an intimate
portrait of them.

"Some of them looked strangely
delicate for bodyguards,

"almost effeminate.

"When they took photographs
out of their wallets

"and started showing them
round with remarks like,

"Isn't he sweet"
I began to wonder whether

"the Stabschef Röhm had had
a hand in their selection.

"But delicate
though they looked,

"they were tough all right,

as they showed us a few hours
later that evening."

SA leader Ernst Röhm
was famously homosexual,

but Delmer soon
witnessed how brutal

Hitler's security could be

when his car was stopped
by protestors at Elbing.

Hitler's bodyguard
leapt out of the car

and ferociously battered
the protestors

with their rubber truncheons
and whips until they ran away.

The SS-Begleitkommando

served Hitler well during
the elections of 1932.

Their zealous devotion
to his protection

sometimes brought
its members into conflict

with Heinrich Himmler
and the rest of the SS.

On October 14th at Selb,
a town in southern Germany,

Hitler was due to give
a rabble-rousing speech.

SS escort bodyguard Bruno Gesche

inspected
the security arrangements

made by another SS unit
and was unimpressed.

He told the SS
and SA troopers present

that their organization
was a failure

and that the protection of
the rally itself was a shambles.

His remarks ended up
in the press.

[Hitler speaking German]

Himmler was furious.

He got one of his minions

to write a letter condemning
Gesche's comments,

saying they brought
the entire SS into disrepute.

Its reputation
had been undermined,

and he wanted Gesche
instantly demoted.

But Gesche was close to Hitler,

and the Fuhrer did not want
Himmler and the rest of the SS

meddling with his chosen men.

He liked the fact
that Gesche had the courage

to speak out against the SS
in order to protect him.

Hitler refused to endorse
Himmler's punishment

and Gesche was given
a mere reprimand

in front of the SS escort.

Himmler was not happy
with the outcome,

and it was the beginning

of his vendetta against
the Begleitkommando.

Gesche in particular
would discover

that he was not a good man
to have as an enemy.

Hitler's triumph
as Chancellor of Germany

in January 1933 changed forever

the arrangements
made for his safety.

As party leader as well
as head of government,

he needed more than the eight
men of the SS Begleitkommando

for his close protection.

So he turned to a close comrade
from his early days of struggle

to organize a much larger
private army.

Sepp Dietrich was 41 years old,
a rugged aggressive man

with a coarse manner who took
no nonsense from anyone.

A veteran of the World War I
trenches,

he was in the Munich police

when he first heard
Hitler speaking.

Inspired, he took part

in the Beer Hall Putsch of 1923

and was sacked
when it collapsed.

After drifting through
a series of jobs,

Dietrich finally joined
the Nazis in 1928.

His fearless
leadership qualities

ensured he was quickly
promoted within the SS.

Dietrich organized
Hitler's security

during the 1932
election campaign,

preceding him to public meetings

and supervising
local SS detachments.

He was nicknamed "Chauffeureska"

because he rode so frequently
with Hitler in his car.

Hitler took a particular
liking to Dietrich

and praised him to his friends.

Man: "The role of Sepp Dietrich
is unique.

"I've always seen him
as a troubleshooter.

"He's a man who is cunning,
energetic, and brutal.

"But under his
swashbuckling appearance,

"Dietrich is a serious,
conscientious,

"and honest character.

"For me, personally,

"there's also the fact
that he was a companion

in my early struggle."

Powell: In March 1933,

the new chancellor
entrusted Dietrich

with the task of raising a force
from the ranks of the SS

to protect
the Reich Chancellery.

It was to be
the Fuhrer's palace guard,

and by the end of the year,
it was given the name

Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler.

On the anniversary of
the Beer Hall Putsch in Munich,

in November 1933,
the whole Leibstandarte,

numbering 1,000 officers
and men,

assembled to make a solemn oath
of personal loyalty.

[Men speaking German]

Man: "We swear to you,
Adolf Hitler,

"loyalty and bravery.

"We pledge to you,

"and to the superiors
appointed by you,

"obedience unto death.

So help us God."

Powell:
Hitler's elite palace guard,

the Leibstandarte-SS
Adolf Hitler,

was based at a barracks
of the former imperial army

in Lichterfelde,
south of Berlin.

Its tasks swiftly grew
from guard duty

at the Reich Chancellery

to maintaining detachments
at Hitler's mountain retreat

at the Berghof in Bavaria,
his apartment in Munich,

and any other place where
the Fuhrer might be staying

during his travels.

Of all the new units in Hitler's
rapidly expanding bodyguard,

the Leibstandarte
saw the swiftest

and most extraordinary growth.

In late 1934,
following its key role

in curbing the SA during
the Night of the Long Knives,

the guard battalion's loyalty
was rewarded,

and it was expanded to become
a motorized regiment,

equipped with armored cars,
motorcycles, and trucks.

Hitler increasingly saw it
as his own private army

and further regiments
were raised.

These became the foundation
of the Waffen-SS,

the armed fist
of the Nazi party.

Some 39 divisions
would eventually be recruited

from nationalities
throughout the Nazi empire,

always selected for their
fanatical support of Hitler

and their physical prowess.

From the outset in 1933,

Sepp Dietrich
concentrated on setting

a supremely high entry level
for his troops.

All of them were between
17 and 22 years old

and had to have
a minimum height of 5'11".

This was later raised

to just over six feet.

In addition to this,

they had to be perfectly
proportioned and, it was said,

if they had one tooth filling,
they would be out.

Himmler, as head of the SS,
insisted on a racial dimension

in the recruitment
of the Leibstandarte.

Applicants had to be

authentically Nordic
in appearance

and demonstrate
pure Aryan ancestry

going back over
100 years to 1800.

The officers had
to be even purer,

having Aryan roots
going back to 1750.

Himmler's racial demand
greatly irritated Dietrich,

who claimed he was denied at
least 40 good recruits a year

because of doubtful ancestry.

It would not be
the first point of conflict

between the two commanders.

Although the Leibstandarte
was part of the SS

and officially came under
the control of Himmler,

the reality was that
Sepp Dietrich took his orders

directly from Hitler.

Distrustful of everyone,

Hitler would never
allow his black guards

to be controlled
by anyone but himself.

Even Himmler
had to defer to Dietrich

when dealing with
the Fuhrer's palace guard.

When Himmler tried
to impose his will

on Hitler’s SS escort
by withholding its wages,

chief bodyguard Bruno Gesche
went to Sepp Dietrich.

It was Dietrich who
outmaneuvered Himmler

by going direct to Hitler

and got the money flowing again.

Later, Dietrich went
on the attack,

accusing Himmler
of financial corruption.

Man: "His appetite for power
just could not be satisfied.

"On top of this,

"he was a great hand
at hoarding and scrounging

"He received money from
everywhere and everybody.

"Every SS leader, starting from
the rank of corporal,

"was made to pay monthly dues
to the Lebensborn organization.

"This took care of the pregnant
wives and girlfriends of SS men.

"These dues were withheld
from all salaries.

"For this swindle, they deducted

"120 Reichsmarks out of my
monthly salary of 1,500 marks.

I had quite a number
of rows with Himmler."

Powell: Dietrich believed
that the climate of fear

created by Himmler's SS also
helped to obscure the truth

of what was going on
in the Third Reich.

Man: "The Fuhrer was kept
misinformed all the time.

"Of course,

"you couldn't say anything,
you had to be careful.

"The Gestapo were everywhere.

"If you only dared
open your mouth,

"you risked your head.

"It was maddening.

"There was only one way in which
to get away from these people --

you had to play
the role of a madman."

Powell: Sometimes
Himmler's Nazi demands

for racial purity impacted on
Hitler’s personal bodyguards.

Emil Maurice, one of his oldest
and closest protectors,

fell foul of these rules
when he wanted to get married.

He had to submit details of his
own racial background to the SS.

Despite being
SS member number two --

Hitler was SS member
number one --

it turned out that Maurice
had Jewish ancestry.

It was a devastating
family secret

for a man so close
to the Führer.

The devious Himmler was
delighted by this news,

always keen
to split away bodyguards

he deemed too close
to the Führer.

He recommended that Maurice
be expelled from the SS.

But to Himmler's annoyance,

the virulently
anti-Semitic Hitler

stood by his close comrade.

In a secret letter written
on August 31, 1935,

Himmler was compelled to make
an exception of Maurice.

Man: "Emil Maurice
is without doubt,

"as shown in his family tree,
not of Aryan descent.

"The Fuhrer has decided that
in this one exceptional case,

"Maurice,
along with his brothers,

"can stay in the SS.

"This is because Maurice has
been his very first companion,

"and because his brothers
and the entire Maurice family

"have served the movement with
remarkable bravery and loyalty

in the earliest and most
difficult months and years."

Powell:
Despite his Jewish blood,

and despite his affair
with Hitler's young niece,

Geli Raubal, the object of
Hitler's early desire,

Maurice was first and foremost
a loyal companion to the Fuhrer,

and the Fuhrer
would not forget that.

Other members of Hitler's
personal bodyguard

also had, in Himmler's eyes,
personal traits

that made them not wholly
suitable for their task.

Kurt Gildisch became commander
of Hitler's SS escort

in April 1933,
but he had a drink problem,

and within months,
it had got the better of him.

In June 1934, Himmler had him
removed from his post.

On this occasion,

Hitler did nothing to stop him.

For Gildisch, the warning
was not sufficient,

and he continued to drink
heavily while on duty.

In 1936, this led
to his expulsion

from both the SS
and the Nazi Party.

Bruno Gesche succeeded Gildisch

as commander
of Hitler's SS escort,

but he too was a heavy drinker.

He had already clashed with
Himmler over his criticism

of SS security arrangements
for the Führer.

And now the Reichsfuhrer-SS

was able to use
Gesche's drink problem

as a means to harass him,

but unlike Gildisch, he could
not get rid of Gesche so easily.

For even though Hitler was at
the height of his popularity,

there were storm clouds
gathering within his own party,

and he needed as many loyal
followers around him

as possible.

In the gold rush
for political power

in Nazi Germany in 1933,

Heinrich Himmler,
head of the SS,

was in danger of losing out.

As police chief of Bavaria,

Himmler was based in Munich.

This did not suit his ambitions

since all the grabbing of
departments and positions

by other Nazis
was happening in Berlin.

Hermann Göring,

Hitler's obese, ruthless,
and egotistical right-hand man,

now held several
important posts,

including Minister of
the Interior for Prussia,

by far the largest of
the German provinces.

This put him charge

of the formidable Prussian
police force.

In April 1933, the popular
former-air-ace-turned-thug

expanded the political
surveillance department

of the Prussian force into
the Geheime Staatspolizei,

the Gestapo
or Secret State Police.

He seemed to be in direct
competition with Himmler.

To make matters worse,
it was an SS officer,

theoretically
one of Himmler's men,

who had been plucked from
obscurity by Göring

to become chief
of the Prussian police.

Basking in Göring's patronage,

the 36-year-old Kurt Daluege

had no need
to take orders from Himmler

and severed any
connection with him.

This was the final straw
for Himmler,

and he sent his deputy,
Reinhard Heydrich,

an ice-cold sadist,
to Berlin to sort out Daluege.

The 29-year-old Heydrich

was later dubbed
the perfect Nazi

for his athletic blond good
looks.

He personified
the Teutonic hero,

the ideal of Aryan purity.

A keen fencer and musician,

he had been an officer
in the German navy

until he was dismissed,
officially for failing to marry

the daughter of a senior officer
who he had got pregnant,

but in reality because of

his arrogant attitude
towards his superiors.

Heydrich joined the SS in 1932,
having impressed Himmler

with his proposal
for building up a security

and intelligence department
within the SS.

He was rapidly
promoted by Himmler,

who recognized his steely
attention to detail

and ruthless efficiency.

Heydrich arrived in Berlin
in March 1933,

but Police Chief Daluege
refused even to see

the lowly SS-Standartenfuhrer,
saying he was far too busy.

When Heydrich protested
at this behavior,

Göring sent his Gestapo agents

to threaten him with arrest

if he persisted
in harassing Daluege.

It was a naked display
of the loathing felt

by top Nazis towards each other.

Göring knew
he had the upper hand

when it came
to contact with Hitler

and he possessed
the police apparatus

to enforce his rule
within the Nazi Party.

It was a humiliating lesson
for Heydrich and Himmler.

Heydrich was forced to flee
Berlin to avoid arrest.

The cold-blooded Himmler knew
that he would have to work fast

to justify his own position
as Hitler's protector before --

in a classic display of Nazi
survival of the fittest --

he was elbowed out.

He chose to do this

by inventing threats
to Hitler's life.

Shortly after
his rebuff by Göring,

Himmler arrested
Count Arco-Valley.

An extreme nationalist,

the count had fought alongside
Himmler in the Freikorps

during the chaos in Bavaria
after World War I.

But now Himmler turned
on the count and told Hitler

that he was planning
a coup d'état against him.

Two weeks later, Himmler
uncovered another supposed plot

against Hitler.

This time it was three
Soviet agents

who were planning to hurl
hand grenades at the Fuhrer

as his car drove past

the Richard Wagner memorial
in Berlin.

After this, Himmler revealed
that his SS agents

were collecting information
from Switzerland

about further attacks
on the new chancellor

that the Communists
were plotting.

All this fed into Hitler's
growing sense of paranoia.

Coming soon after
the burning of the Reichstag,

Hitler believed in any and every

assassination attempt
against him, real or not.

It was one of the main reasons
for the establishment

of the Leibstandarte
palace guard.

Hitler rewarded Himmler
for his apparent diligence

in safeguarding him by allowing
him to start taking control

of other regional police forces.

The callous Himmler

swiftly applied
his new powers to a new end.

In the Munich suburb of Dachau,

he established a prison camp
to hold Communists

and other Nazi rivals.

It was the first concentration
camp in Nazi Germany

and soon became a terrifying
weapon in the SS armory.

Propaganda films at the time
portrayed Dachau

as a place where
prisoners were reformed

through healthy living
and exercise.

Inside the camp,

however, the reality was
horrendously different.

Thousands of prisoners
were beaten, tortured,

and worked to death.

Josef Felder, a Social Democrat
member of the Reichstag

later described the horrors
of the regime.

[Speaking German]

Powell: As Himmler
stretched his SS empire

across southern Germany,

he still faced the problem of
his old rival Göring in Prussia,

with his complete control

of the country's
largest police force.

When Göring heard that Himmler

had opened another concentration
camp near Osnabruck,

he sent Diels
and the Gestapo to investigate.

Such was the mutual hostility

between the Nazi
security agencies

that SS guards actually
shot at the Gestapo agents

when they arrived
to inspect the camp.

Göring informed Hitler,

who ordered Himmler to shut
the camp down immediately.

So bad were the rumors
of ill treatment in Dachau

that Hitler had
to authorize an amnesty

at Christmas 1933.

Diels himself announced this

before releasing 27,000
prisoners from the camp.

However, Hitler was impressed

by Himmler's extreme
punishment of party enemies,

and Göring was forced
to follow suit.

Soon, more concentration camps

opened across Germany.

The rules for incarceration
became more draconian.

Man: "The following offenders,
considered as agitators,

"will be hanged.

"Anyone who makes provocative
speeches and holds meetings,

"forms groups,

or loiters around with others."

Powell: The message was clear.

Anyone who even dared speak out
against Hitler and his regime

could be thrown
into a concentration camp

and executed.

Real fear now dominated
the Third Reich,

and Himmler was proving
himself an even more

ruthless and evil monster
than Göring.

Hitler's first year in power
as Chancellor of Germany

was highly successful.

Against the backdrop
of the Great Depression

and mass unemployment,
he had promised

to get Germany
back to work again.

On May 1, 1933,
at the National Labor Day rally

at the Tempelhof Field
in Berlin,

hundreds of thousands of Germans
gathered to hear

a major announcement
by the chancellor.

The slogan for the day was,

"Honor Work
and respect the Worker."

To get people off the streets,
Hitler told the crowd

he was going to introduce

a program
of compulsory labor service.

The first great task

would be to construct
a massive new network

of high-speed roads across
Germany -- the Reich Autobahns.

It was to be
a seven-year project

that would completely modernize

Germany's transport network,

creating over 6,000
miles of new roads.

It was a sensational pledge

and ensured a giant flow
of public money

into creating work for Germans,

but it came at a price.

The very next day
after the labor rally,

all trade unions
were closed down,

their funds seized
and their leaders imprisoned.

Loudspeakers and radios were
installed in every factory.

When the sirens sounded,
every worker had to listen

attentively to the Fuhrer’s
latest announcements

under the cold gaze
of Gestapo informers.

As the Nazis took over,
the economy,

wages were fixed.

But massive job-creation
programs meant

that most Germans enjoyed

a boost to their
living standards.

It may have seemed that everyone
in Germany now basked

in the sun of Hitler's
economic miracle,

but beneath the surface,
the country

had rapidly been turned
into a brutal dictatorship.

Many thousands
of political prisoners

were suffering torture
and execution.

By the summer of 1933,
Göring was tiring

of his battle with Himmler

to control Hitler's
security forces.

He was, by nature,
a bon viveur

and was enjoying the other
government jobs Hitler gave him.

In contrast,

Himmler had nothing else
to divert him but his obsession

with grabbing control of the
national police force.

Step by methodical step,

he added regional police forces
to his SS empire.

But when he asked Hitler if he
could transfer SS headquarters

from Munich to Berlin,
he was turned down flat.

As far as Göring was concerned,

Himmler and Heydrich
would enter the German capital

only over his dead body.

But it was significant
that by the summer of 1933,

Daluege,
Göring's chief of police

and the man who had recently
snubbed Heydrich in Berlin,

started to make contact
with the SS in Munich,

perhaps sensing
a shift in power.

Göring had his own
problems in Berlin,

and these mostly involved
not the SS but the SA,

Ernst Röhm's brownshirts.

Ever since Hitler
had become Chancellor,

the SA had seen it

as a green light
to act openly and brutally

against any opposition.

Mobile squads of SA thugs
swept through the capital,

picking up any one suspected

of being anti-Nazi

and dragging them off to
improvised torture chambers.

It was a criminal
reign of terror

and undermined the rule
of the police.

Rudolf Diels, Göring's
chief of the Gestapo,

was ordered stamp this out.

But as Diels moved
against the SA,

Himmler and Heydrich
began gathering material

which suggested
that he had been an anti-Nazi

before his appointment
by Göring.

Having forced Göring
on the defensive,

Himmler played his master card.

Just as he had invented
a plot against Hitler,

he now invented one
against Göring.

Heydrich claimed
to have uncovered

Communist plans to kill him.

He arrested suspects,
beat confessions out of them,

and presented the evidence
to Hitler and Göring.

Himmler argued that such major
threats to the Nazi Party

could only be defeated through
the greater efficiency

of merging all local
police forces together

under the umbrella of the SS.

With this personal threat
on his life, real or otherwise,

Göring had had enough.

If he made peace with the SS,

then they could work together
against the SA.

So now he encouraged Hitler
to accept Himmler's advice.

In April 1934,
the Prussian police

were absorbed into the Nazi
Ministry of the Interior

and placed completely under
the control of Heinrich Himmler.

This included the Gestapo.

Himmler finally
had what he wanted.

He was chief of all Hitler's
security machinery

with Heydrich as his deputy.

To achieve this,

he had outmaneuvered Göring,

the most senior Nazi leader
after Hitler.

The titanic power struggle
had not gone unnoticed,

and a chill went through

the Nazi hierarchy.

They would all now have
to be wary of the SS.

Daluege was forgiven

for his arrogant behavior
towards Heydrich

and put in charge
of all uniformed police

in the Third Reich.

But Diels was the big loser.

The fearless crime buster,
who had saved many innocents

from the torture cells
of the SA,

was dismissed from the Gestapo.

He was given a provincial post
in Cologne,

never again to be in a position

to challenge Himmler
or Heydrich.

Himmler should have
been delighted,

but this malignantly obsessive
man had one more battle to win.

Ernst Röhm's SA was running riot
throughout the Third Reich,

and Himmler knew that it posed

the greatest threat to
the survival both of Hitler

and his regime.

Röhm's brownshirts were
revolutionary gangsters

and were growing tired of
Hitler's attempts

to cozy up to
the conservative establishment.

The momentum was with them,

and they wanted to create
a completely socialist paradise

in Nazi Germany.

If Hitler was with them,
fine, but if not,

then by fair means or foul,
he would have to go.

It was up to Himmler
and the SS to stop them.

The stakes could not
have been higher,

but so too was the prize.

Two of the most evil
organizations in the world

were about to go head to head
for the glory and prestige

of protecting the Führer.

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