https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Long_Knives

Photo: Kurt Daluege, chief of the Ordnungspolizei; Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS; and Ernst Röhm, head of the SA, August 1933

The Night of the Long Knives (German: Nacht der langen Messer, pronounced [ˈnaxt dɛɐ̯ ˈlaŋən ˈmɛsɐ] ⓘ), also called the Röhm purge or Operation Hummingbird (German: Aktion Kolibri), was a purge that took place in Nazi Germany from 30 June to 2 July 1934. Chancellor Adolf Hitler, urged on by Hermann Göring and Heinrich Himmler, ordered a series of political extrajudicial executions intended to consolidate his power and alleviate the concerns of the German military about the role of Ernst Röhm and the Sturmabteilung (SA), the Nazis’ paramilitary organization, known colloquially as “Brownshirts”. Nazi propaganda presented the murders as a preventive measure against an alleged imminent coup by the SA under Röhm – the so-called Röhm Putsch.