Was there any backlash from the night of long knives?

Question

I realize Germans didn't have much choice at the time, but surely at least some SA members/Strasserites must have resented Hitler for purging Rohm? Why didn't the average German realize how vicious Hitler was after the long knives purge?

Answer 1

Nobody liked the SA or Rohm, they were the swaggering, street-fighting "unacceptable" face of the Nazi party and half of them were homosexual too - it was seen as "good riddance to bad rubbish" and a praiseworthy thing for Hitler to have done. Now the country and the party could settle down to "respectability."

Anyone who might have protested was cowed by the thought that they might be next.

Also German society between the wars was very violent, and political murders (though not usually on that scale) were more or less commonplace.

Answer 2

Nazi-propaganda disguised the purge as the suppression of " Röhm-Putsch" or an attempted a of Röhm against Hitler. Hitler was seen to supress violance, and the Reichswehr were never very popular, so it seemed liek he did a good thing. He killed every supporter - strange times were they not!