The
'Night of Long Knives' or so called 'Röhm Putsch' in which the leaders of
the SA including Ernst Röhm, an early supporter of the Nazi party, were assasinated
by the SS on Hitler's orders. The SA had grown into a huge organisation and
Röhm intended that they would combine with the regular armed forces under
his command. Hitler and Himmler saw Röhm as a potential threat to the authority
of their leadership and so eliminated him from the political scene.