Assassinating a King in Marseille, 1934 with Dr. Chris Millington

In this episode of The French History Podcast, host Bethany Cameron interviews Dr. Chris Millington about his new book, *Murder in Marseille: Right-Wing Terrorism in 1930s Europe*, which examines the 1934 assassination of King Alexander I of Yugoslavia and French Foreign Minister Louis Barthou in Marseille. The episode delves into the geopolitical tensions of interwar Europe, particularly France’s strategic alliance with Yugoslavia through the Little Entente as a counterweight to rising fascist powers like Italy and revisionist states such as Hungary. Millington explores the internal fragility of Yugoslavia—a multi-ethnic state built on uneasy compromises—fueled by Serbian dominance and the suppression of Croatian and other nationalist movements. This repression led to the rise of extremist groups like the Ustasha, backed by Italy and Hungary, who trained in paramilitary 'murder farms' and orchestrated the assassination. Despite warnings from Belgrade, French security failed to act decisively, partly due to bureaucratic inertia and racialized assumptions about colonial troops. The assassination, while a propaganda victory for the Ustasha, ultimately failed to destabilize Yugoslavia and instead exposed the hypocrisy of Western diplomacy, as France shielded Italy’s involvement to pursue a rapprochement with Mussolini. The trial of the perpetrators became a media spectacle, with the defendants using it as a platform to advocate for Croatian independence, and the jury’s granting of extenuating circumstances spared them the death penalty—a symbolic win for their cause. Millington argues that this event marks a crucial, often overlooked chapter in the history of modern terrorism: the emergence of sophisticated, state-supported right-wing violence long before the post-1945 era.