German Leadership

Old Comrades, 1933.

Leni Riefenstahl.

Still from Leni Riefenstahl's documentary of the 1933 (5th) National Socialist National Rally, Nurnburg, 1933, entitled "Der Sieg des Glaubens" (Victory of Faith). It shows the "Tribute to the Fallen" scene, with Hitler and Ernst Rohm proceeding with solmnity between the massed rank of the SA. "Der Sieg des Glaubens" can be regarded as a sort of dress rehersal for the much more ambitious "Triumph of the Will", covering the 6th National Rally of 1934, which it structurally resembles. Much had changed by then, however; Rohm and much of the SA leadership had been liquidated in the "Night of the Long Knives" purge. In the equivalent scene in "Triumph of the Will", Hitler is accompanied between the ranks by Rohm's tame successor as SA leader, Viktor Lutze on one side, and Heinrich Himmler, Reichsfuhrer-SS, on the other. Best regards, JR.