It cannot be overstated how much the British monarchy and British media absolutely hate Prince Harry’s willingness, time and time again, to speak for himself and tell his own story. They hate that Harry puts his business out there, on the record, and creates a historical record which can be used as a reference for years to come. They hate that he disrupts palace talking points and tabloid narratives. Well, King Charles and his courtiers are incandescent that Harry hopped in front of a BBC camera two seconds after he lost his High Court appeal. I can only imagine that a huge chunk of this rage is because the palace already had their “Harry is terrible for this and that” talking points for when he lost the case, and his BBC interview disrupted the already-set narrative.

So now they’ve had to create a new narrative out of thin air, one which conveniently side-steps the larger points made by Harry’s BBC interview, namely that the palace instructed Ravec to yank the Sussexes’ security in 2020, that the palace tried to force other governments to not keep the Sussexes safe, and that Charles could easily ensure the Sussexes’ security for visits, but Charles doesn’t give a sh-t about his son or grandchildren. Their emergency narrative is that Harry is gaslighting his father, whose thunder was stolen by terrible Harry. The palace is obviously trying to fine-tune these talking points, which is where this Telegraph piece comes in:

Two weeks ago, a Telegraph reader wrote in to ask: “What will it take for this rift between the King and Prince Harry to end?” Back then, the answer seemed straightforward. When the security court case was over, whether the Duke of Sussex won or lost, there was a world in which they could conceivably talk again.

When the dust settled, whether the Duke was vindicated or at least felt he had tried his best, it was fractionally possible that father and son could reconnect – without leaks, without showdowns, without fears of jeopardising a Court of Appeal case in which the King must be scrupulously uninvolved. The King loves his son, sources have always emphasised; Harry, whatever some of his decisions suggest, loves his father in his complicated way.

After years of bombshells in the form of interviews, a memoir, Netflix documentary, podcasts, on-stage Q&As and more interviews, it was just possible that things would fall quiet enough for them to talk father-to-son again. The only thing required was rebuilding a fragile trust.

Prince Harry’s appeal was rejected. His interview, hours later with the BBC, felt like the last throw of the dice. He will now go to Sir Keir Starmer and Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, to ask for the board which decides his security status to be reviewed, he said, and still loves his country “despite what some people in that country have done”. He wishes “someone had told me” there was no way to win this case through the courts “beforehand”. Each answer was a revelation. Many served as evidence as to why the King and Prince Harry stopped talking in the first place.

Insiders have described lack of trust: the belief that any detail Prince Harry gleans about his family’s words, thoughts or indeed health may eventually make its way into the public domain. There was one line in the interview, therefore, that may have done more than any other in the last five years to ensure that they cannot go back to how things once were.

“I don’t know how much longer my father has,” said Prince Harry, reflecting on his father’s cancer. “He won’t speak to me because of this security stuff, but it would be nice to reconcile.”

It is impossible to overstate how little the King, or the palace, would have appreciated the airing of such sentiments. All are acutely aware of the King’s health, of his ongoing cancer treatment, and his efforts to keep the royal show on the road throughout. The palace operation will give no clues about his prognosis or what he suffers in private, maintaining that his progress is good and a recent hospitalisation for the side effects of treatment was merely a “blip”.

Prince Harry’s choice to raise the question of how long the King has left to live was described by one source, moderately, as being in “particularly poor taste”. There is, they said, “nothing that can be trusted to remain private,” adding that “as for there being no contact, well, he has just proven why, yet again”.

The emotive language describing Prince Archie and Prince Lilibet as “my father’s grandchildren” will have been noted, alongside the accusation that “duty of care has been thrown out the window”.

[From The Telegraph]

It’s hilarious to think that this is all the palace could come up with: if only Harry hadn’t spoken to the BBC, he might have been able to reconcile with his father! What absolute horsesh-t. Trust me when I say that the palace-issued talking points would have been much different had Harry not spoken to the BBC.

And when Harry said “I don’t know how much longer my father has,” I absolutely knew that Harry was making a pointed comment, and here’s the proof that it landed exactly as he intended. Harry cannot believe that his rotten old father is in such declining health and still refuses to even keep him updated on his health. And it’s so telling that’s the one thing the palace is harping on too, right? Not the stuff about the palace pressuring other countries to put the Sussexes in harm’s way. No, they’re super-mad that Harry suggested that Charles is at death’s door and lying to the country. I sense that Harry has been paying attention to all of William’s “when I’m king, I’m going to do this and that” stories. Harry sees that William is acting like Charles is at death’s door too.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid.