“Possession of the streets is the key to power in the state—for this reason the SA marched and fought. The public would have never received knowledge from the agitative speeches of the little Reichstag faction and its propaganda or from the desires and aims of the Party, if the martial tread and battle song of the SA companies had not beat the measure for the truth of a relentless criticism of the state of affairs in the governmental system. * * *
“The SA conquered for itself a place in public opinion and the leadership of the National Socialist Movement dictated to its opponents the law for quarrels. The SA was already a state within a state; a part of the future in a sad present.” (2168-PS; for further material concerning the SA, see Section 4 of Chapter XV.)
2. The Nazi conspirators constantly used physical violence and terror to break up meetings of political opponents, and to suppress opposition in their own meetings. The following facts are indicative of the methods constantly used by the Nazi conspirators during this period: On numerous occasions meetings of the Deutsche Friedensgesellschaft (Peace Society) were broken up and terrorized by shock troops and SA units. Groups of National Socialists invaded meetings of the society, interrupted the speaker, attempted to attack him, and endeavored to make sufficient disturbance so that the meetings would have to be cancelled. (L-83)
To quote once again from the official SA pamphlet:
“* * * As an example of a seemingly impossible deed, the 11th of February 1927 should be firmly preserved. It is the day on which the SA broke the Red Terror, with heavy sacrifice, in the hall battle at the Pharoah’s Hall (Pharussaelen) in Berlin, the stronghold of the Communists, and thereby established itself decisively in the capitol city of the Reich. In considering the badly wounded SA men, Dr. Goebbels coined the phrase “unknown SA Man”, who silently fights and bleeds, obeying only his duty.” (2168-PS)
In Berlin, under the leadership of Goebbels, so-called Rollkommandos, were organized for the purpose of disrupting political meetings of all non-Nazi groups. These Rollkommandos were charged with interrupting, making noise, and unnerving the speaker. Finally the Nazis broke up meetings by Rollkommando raids. In many cases, fights resulted, during which furniture was destroyed and a number of persons hurt. The Nazis armed themselves with blackjacks, brass knuckles, rubber truncheons, walking sticks, and beer bottles. After the Reichstag election of 1930, Nazi terrorism became more overt, and from then on scarcely a day went by when the Chief of the Security Police in Berlin did not receive a minimum of five to ten reports, and often more, of riots instigated by Nazis. (2955-PS)
During the campaign for the Reichstag election of 14 September 1930, Nazi conspirators made it a practice to send speakers accompanied by many Storm Troopers to meetings of other political parties, often physically taking over the meetings. On one such occasion a large detachment of Storm Troopers, some of whom were armed with pistols and clubs, attended a meeting called by the Social Democratic Party, succeeded in forcibly excluding everybody not in sympathy with their views, and concluded the meeting as their own. Such violent tactics, repeated many times, were an integral part of the political creed of the Nazi. (L-83)
Ultimately, in Berlin, just before the Nazis seized power, it was necessary to devote the entire Police Force to the job of fighting the Nazis, thus leaving little time for other Police duties. (2955-PS)
3. The Nazi conspirators constantly threatened their opponents with organized reprisals and terror. During the course of the trial of three officers of the Reichswehr for high treason in Leipzig in September 1931, Hitler said:
“But I may assure you that if the Nazi movement’s struggle is successful, then there will be a Nazi Court of Law too, the November 1918 revolution will be atoned, and there’ll be some heads chopped off.” (2512-PS)