Sturmabteilung

Sturmabteilung 

The Sturmabteilung, the paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party, was formed in 1921. It initially comprised mainly German World War I veterans, militia members, and others opposed to both the democratic Weimer Republic and to the Communist Party. Its terror tactics against opponents increased the public visibility of the Nazi movement, both before and after Adolf Hitlers’s rise to power. Once the Nazi regime was established, it began to perceive the disruptive tactics of the SA as a threat. Hitler agree to the murder of the SA’s top leadership in the Röhm Purge, or, ‘the night of the long knives’, in 1934-05, carried out primarily by the SS.