Government-sanctioned violence under both Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s Soviet Union represented extreme forms of state control, yet they manifested differently based on ideological and political contexts.
In Nazi Germany, violence was a tool for consolidating power and enforcing ideological purity. The SA and SS paramilitary organizations were instrumental in this, carrying out waves of violence against political opponents and Jews following Hitler’s rise to power in 1933. This included the Night of Long Knives, where the SS purged the SA’s leadership, and Kristallnacht, a coordinated attack against Jewish people and their properties. The violence was both targeted and indiscriminate, aiming to eliminate perceived threats to Nazi ideology and to intimidate the population into submission.
