The Virtual Pub
Come Inside... => The Commons => Topic started by: Snoopy on March 26, 2008, 11:57:21 AM
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A contributor to my magazine has sent me this for publication and I felt others here would also appreciate the sentiments.
He attached it to an email which read "Let's see how much trouble this gets US into"
Cry God! For Harry Wales (that’s his enlisted name you know!)
You can find out some remarkable things from people you least expect. Take former Times editor Andrew Neil for instance: emphatically not my sort of guy but he chairs one of the more revelatory TV discussion programs. His regular guests, Michael Portillo and Diane Abbott, are a revelation too, a pair of complete opposites who have a great rapport and just ooze bonhomie and mutual respect: now they are my sort of people, each of them equally. Another surprise is how often the two of them agree. As they were discussing the matter of Prince Harry in Afghanistan, or more accurately the way in which the press kept it under wraps for so long despite its having been disclosed to all of them (sotto voce: Does that include the “Morning Star”?) Neil mentioned something I didn’t know – that the certification of a story as “D-list” does not mean that the press are banned from reporting it, merely that they are “expected” not to. The suppression of the story, he said, happens because the editor of any paper that broke the tacit agreement would be a pariah thereafter. Can we believe that, and if so what’s in it for them? Questions for another day, although I think they should be asked – and answered.
Today, though, I want to address the question the panel went on to discuss, that of whether Harry should have been “allowed”to go. There are arguments to be had about whether the war or indeed any war is justified. Cards on table, I’m a pacifist for the reasons advanced by the communists before they revealed themselves to be warmongers too, but that is not today’s discussion either. The fact is, the Army is over there, and Harry is a serving soldier, so why is it “not in the public interest” to send him?
The objection raised before he went, and the reason he was finally withdrawn after the story broke, was the risk of negative propaganda: if the enemy became aware of it they’d specifically target him, putting the rest of his unit at additional risk. Excuse me?? If you don’t want shot at, don’t join up! Here’s another thought though. The last time a member of the Royal Family died in a conflict was 1942. His death was kept secret for a while - mainly, it seems, for security reasons related to his mission but also to prevent loss of morale. In these times of the “where’s Harry?” media circus, however, in the event of misfortune befalling him there is no way that that would be an option. Inevitably there would follow a hullaballoo of a similar magnitude to that surrounding the death of his mother. Not only the feared propaganda gift to the enemy, but also, and much less recoverable, an insult to the memory of every other not-so-feted soldier to have lost his or her life in the Middle East. The Great British Public would not have the stomach for that, nor should it be expected to. That is why Harry should have stayed at home – a bad outcome would have destroyed the British will. The “we survived Hitler” spirit that defines Britishness for so many would have died with Harry, for the true worth the Government – any Government – places on its citizens would have been revealed. Abbott and Portillo (good name for a comedy act?) understand that, and wisely choose to tread a path of goodwill through the media spotlight arguing the case.
Though not essentially pro-Royal I like and admire Harry a lot, not least because as this story shows he will not ask his men to do anything he is not prepared to do himself. I’m sure it must hurt him that he has been shown as not free to make his own decisions. It hurts me too, for even though we are told he wanted to go, I’m sure he’d be a better decision maker than the people who fudged the process of keeping him here. Indeed, already and despite his youth, he would make a better leader of this country.
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Interesting…
The problem with these stories tho is that you never really know what is the true story… Now he is a hero because ‘he will not ask his men to do anything he is not prepared to do himself’ but was he really in the front line fighting – with his camera crew in tow (toe?)? - or was he in the desert riding around on a motorbike for the whole period?
Sadly most of us will probably be gone when the ’25 Year Rule’ reveals that he was dragged kicking and screaming to Afghanistan, shat himself at the first sound of gunfire and the story of him being there was leaked by his commanders to ensure his quick return home so they could get on with the job… noooo: