Kings, Princes, Dukes and Earls, all in ages past have seen their fair shares of military action. From William the Conqueror and George VI, to Prince Andrew the Duke of York and the 7th Earl of Derby, all have engaged in some kind of warfare. The news in recent days that for the past 10 weeks Prince Harry has been fighting in Afghanistan has come as a surprise to many, considering he was prevented from serving in Iraq early last year. The 23 year old is said to have arrived in the country on Christmas Eve, before moving on to serve with a Gurkha regiment in the southern Afghan province of Helmand, where the majority of British forces are based. The news today is that the Prince is being withdrawn from Afghanistan after a news blackout deal with media companies was broken; a decision by the MoD taken to ensure the continued safety of the Prince and the rest of his regiment.
From the point of view of a Royalist through and through, I see no problem with members of the Royal family or the Nobility serving on the front line with the rest. It is in our History as a nation to have such high standing members of society on the battlefield, fighting along-side their fellow countrymen. The difference here from a battlefield somewhere in 14th century Europe, is that the Taliban consider God to be their commander in chief, not a physical social being equal to that of Queen Elizabeth II. Had they have discovered the whereabouts, if not the existence all together, of Prince Harry, I'm sure they would have expected a man on some sort of elaborately decorated gold podium, rather than the typical officer he was soon shown to be seen as.
The decision to prevent him from going to Iraq, seemed to me, to be the correct one. British forces now have a limited presence in Iraq, while the influx of American troops there continues to grow. I think our promise to invade Iraq as part of a coalition has been fulfilled, and our duty has more or less been done in terms of securing the areas that we were given to control; the handing over of a now stable Basra having been a prime example of this. In Afghanistan, the fleeing Taliban are losing, their retreat into the desert regions of the country, away from the madrassas and mosques of the cities has ensured that Afghanistan is now far safer for a soldier than Iraq. Foreign Islamist fighters prefer Baghdad to Kabul, seeing Al-Qaeda in Iraq an easier organisation to find and join, than the simple, often farming, fighters of Afghanistan's Taliban.
For doing his part in support of the democratic Government and people of Afghanistan, the Prince is to be commended. His determined attitude towards potentially serving with his regiment has ensured he has succeeded in doing so, completing a tour and the job he has been trained to do. Participating in military service of this practical kind is an acknowledgement which I hope will stay with the Prince for many years to come; an acknowledgement which deserves respect in a time where Kings and Queens are seen by many as nothing more than mere figure-heads in the modern world.
Three cheers for Harry...
(Picture: Prince Harry in Helmand province, Afghanistan.)
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