“The members of the National Socialistic German Labor Party and the SA (including their subordinate organizations) as the leading and driving force of the National Socialist State will bear greater responsibility toward Fuehrer, people and State.” (1395-PS)
As the principal ideology bearers of the Nazi Party SA members were “the soldiers of an idea,” to use the expression employed by Nazi writers. Examples of the use of the SA as Nazi propagandist will be seen in the description of the other functions performed by the SA. For in each case the SA combined its propagandist responsibility instrument with the other functions which it performed in furtherance of the conspiracy.
(2) Strong-Arm Terrorization of Political Opponents. In the early stages of the Nazi Movement the SA combined propaganda with violence along the lines expressed by Hitler in Mein Kampf:
“The Young Movement from the first day, espoused the standpoint that its idea must be put forward spiritually but that the defense of this spiritual platform must, if necessary, be secured by strong-arm means.” (2760-PS)
So that the Nazis might better spread their philosophies, the SA was employed to gain possession and control of the streets for the Nazis. Its function was to beat up and terrorize all political opponents. The importance of this function is explained in a pamphlet written by SA Sturmfuehrer Bayer, upon orders from SA Headquarters (2168-PS):
“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. They wanted the young Movement to keep silent. Nothing was to be read in the press about the labor of the National Socialists, not to mention the basic aims of its platform. They simply did not want to awake any interest in it. However, the martial tread of the SA took care that even the drowsiest citizens had to see at least the existence of a fighting troop.” (2168-PS)
And in Mein Kampf Hitler defined the task of the SA as follows:
“We have to teach the Marxists that the master of the streets in the future is National Socialism, exactly as it will once be the Master of the State.” (2760-PS)
The importance of the work of SA in the early days of the Movement was indicated by Goebbels in a speech which appeared in Das Archiv in October 1935:
“* * * The inner-political opponents did not disappear due to mysterious unknown reasons but because the Movement possessed a strong-arm within its organization and the strongest strong-arm of the Movement is the SA * * *.” (3211-PS)