This week, royal reporter/commentator Richard Palmer wrote some interesting analysis of everything that’s gone down between Prince Harry, King Charles and the courtiers. Palmer mentions, off-hand, that this week’s furious briefing war resembled the shenanigans between then-Prince Charles and Princess Diana’s camps in the 1990s. You know what? That’s what it is. Charles is torching Harry the exact same way he used to bully and emotionally abuse Diana. Starkly similar set-ups. Camilla will pop up any minute to brief her media allies that Harry is emotionally disturbed (just like Diana) and that Charles has done everything to help him but Charles has to move on. That’s the play. Charles and Camilla are running it back, bar for bar. Palmer also claims to have sources in the Sussexes’ camp, and they have some stuff to say.
What should have been the perfect opportunity for bridge-building and a chance for the monarch – the great convenor feted for bringing people together to resolve problems – to see his grandchildren for the first time in four years, has dissolved into mutual recriminations and a briefing war reminiscent of the actions of the rival camps when Charles and Diana split in the 1990s.
Harry had hoped that his return to Britain for a series of events to support the Invictus Games would be a watershed. He hoped it would allow him to bring Meghan and their children, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, to see their family and begin repairing the rift that tore the Windsors apart when the Duke and Duchess of Sussex quit in 2020. But his plans have been thwarted at every turn, according to those close to him, culminating in claims that the offer to let Harry stay at Buckingham Palace for one night this week had been withdrawn.
Moments after it was reported that Harry had accepted the King’s offer to stay, royal sources insisted that was no longer possible because he had chopped and changed his mind and missed a deadline necessary to put staff in place.
It was, according to some close to Harry, a deliberate attempt to humiliate him.
“I think it absolutely was done to try and humiliate Harry. Step back from all of this, it is obvious to anyone that some at the Palace have done everything in their power to make this trip as difficult and as hostile a landscape as possible for Harry,” one friend said.
“Unfortunately, that attitude has been the case for some time. Frankly, everyone in Harry’s team is rather resigned to this sort of behaviour whenever he comes to town. It’s notable that such a circus doesn’t happen when he’s back in the States or when he visits any other country.”
A compromise may be possible but to really fix their problems, according to some insiders, the King will need to have confidence that his younger son has moved on and will no longer embarrass him and the monarchy. At the same time, Harry will need to have confidence that his father is really there for him, Meghan and the children.
It has been a dreadful few days for Harry, who along with six others lost a £50m court case claiming unlawful news gathering against the publishers of the Daily Mail on Tuesday. But it has been clear, talking to people close to him over the past few weeks, that he still has so much unfinished business with “the institution” and the men in grey suits at the Palace for it to be easy for him to move on.
He was furious that Ravec, the Home Office-run executive committee for the protection of royalty and public figures, refused to provide armed police protection for him and his family on their planned visit, and equally angry that a promised review of his security while in the UK generally had not been completed. He feels the King, whose staff sit alongside police and civil servants on Ravec, could have resolved this. But what is said to have compounded his anger was when it was then leaked that Buckingham Palace was the royal residence where he and his family would stay, which he believes makes them all immediately vulnerable when their car emerged in public in his view.
“It is obvious to anyone that some at the Palace have done everything in their power to make this trip as difficult and as hostile a landscape as possible for Harry…” This is true. It’s also not new, and Team Sussex acknowledges that. So why is Harry still bringing nothing but good faith and optimism to the table, knowing that his father will screw him over at every turn? Of course I’ll blast Charles all day long for being a deadbeat, dogs–t father and for setting these traps. But at some point, doesn’t Harry deserve some of the blame too? It’s been six-plus years of Charles and Prince William going out of their way to undermine, disrupt and destroy the Sussexes, and Harry’s attitude is still “the sun will come out tomorrow!”
Photos courtesy of Cover Images.
