Royalty and the armed forces

Its a long time since our Monarchs and their offspring would lead the troops personally into battle with cries like 'For Harry, England and St. George'...and that certainly won't happen for the current Prince Harry. Of course no one expects the direct heirs of our monarchs to stick their noses down the barrel of an Iraqi tank but still the Royals continue the age old tradition of sending young Princes to officer training school where they can become leaders of men.



Well after all, Prince Andrew was an intrepid helicopter pilot during the Falklands War risking life and limb just like his men, his courage and.....yeah, yeah, yeah I don't believe it either. But at least he went and showed his face.

What has now happened to the young Prince Harry is, frankly, humiliating. He follows the family tradition, goes to Sandhurst, leads how to command the lower ranks and then....his regiment goes off to Iraq without him because he is too precious and might get killed. The army is of course doing the right thing because if Harry was targeted for kidnap or assassination a lot of other soldiers, who should be concentrating on doing their own jobs, would be deployed saving his ass, possibly at risk to themselves and could draw fire because Harry was there.

I feel sorry for the young lad. I believe he was genuine about wanting to be seen leading his men, and he must be gutted to be told he is to be left at home like some milksop. He must wonder what the real hard boiled soldiers are saying about him.

We are in a changed and dangerous world where there are few safe postings for the Royal family to hang around for a few years and 'make men' of themselves.

Isn't it about time the Royal family, and its advisors, sat down and worked out an alternative career path for the young royal males, because this situation with Harry has to be a watershed in relations between monarchy and the army. The British Army should not, stretched as it is, be put in the awkward situation of training would be monarchs as officers only to let them stew around on parade grounds for 5 years while they are learning to be real men. For goodness sake lets give them some kind of civvy career they can succeed at and cease to be an embarrassment to the armed forces.