Prince Harry has been the subject of criticism from the military community and beyond after stating in his memoir Spare that he killed 25 members of the Taliban, according to reporting from leaked copies.
Aside from other shocking accusations—such as the claim that his brother, Prince William, knocked him to the floor during an argument—the 38-year-old also spoke of his decade-long service in the British army, which included being in charge of firing missiles from an Apache attack helicopter.
The Duke of Sussex wrote that he killed 25 suspected Taliban insurgents during his two tours of Afghanistan. According to reports from the leaked manuscript he said he was neither “satisfied” or “embarrassed” by the fact. “In truth, you can’t hurt people if you see them as people,” Harry said. “They were chess pieces taken off the board, bad guys eliminated before they kill good guys. They trained me to ‘other’ them and they trained me well.”
It is perhaps the only major revelation to emerge from Spare that has clear real-world implications beyond the international sport of royal watching. Former U.K. military officers have criticized Harry’s publication of the details. But experts say that Prince Harry’s comments also get at something deeper about how service members process the violence that they experience in war.
Prince Harry’s comments stoked condemnation from British military figures like Richard Kemp, a former British Army colonel, who warned in the U.K.’s Telegraph newspaper that his actions could “provoke” the Taliban and their followers to “carry out attacks against the UK.”
The response from the Taliban was swift. “The ones you killed were not chess pieces, they were humans; they had families who were waiting for their return,” tweeted Anas Haqqani, a senior member of the Taliban government and a member of the Haqqani Network, which the U.S. and U.K. label as a terrorist organization.
Former head of the Royal Navy, Admiral Lord West, told the U.K. Sunday Mirror newspaper that Harry was putting the security of the Invictus Games—a sporting competition that spotlights wounded and injured veterans that was founded by Harry—into jeopardy, calling his publication of his wartime actions “very stupid.”
And Tobias Ellwood, the chairman of the Defence Select Committee in the U.K. Parliament and a former British army captain, told press that “there is the unwritten assumption that nobody publicly discusses kill counts for the principal reason that it can have security repercussions.”
Bigger questions
But Jessica Wolfendale, a professor of philosophy with Case Western Reserve University’s Inamori International Center for Ethics and Excellence, says that such accusations are likely overblown. “I don’t really think they’re harmful in terms of endangering British forces. They could be harmful in the sense of creating hostility towards British forces, if it’s believed that his attitude is representative of the British forces.”
Instead, she and other experts tell TIME, Prince Harry’s statement brings to light an important question about the type of training service members receive in order to be able to carry out their role in the military. Increasing the physical and psychological distance from their actions in war can help service members get past the natural human resistance to killing, Wolfendale says.
She adds that despite graphic memoirs from special operations soldiers about their time in war—including some like American Sniper that have become Hollywood blockbusters—the concern surrounding Harry’s rhetoric has more to do with his nonchalant manner of speaking.
“It’s not so much the fact of talking about having killed but the attitude that he seems to express in the way he talks about it,” Wolfendale tells TIME.
Harry’s comments are also reminiscent of a separate controversy during a 2013 interview where he compared his control of the weapons system as a “joy,” likening it to “playing PlayStation and Xbox,” according to the Guardian.
“I do hear that as literally objectifying something that is deeply human with great moral costs attached to it,” said David DeCosse, the Director of Religious and Catholic Ethics and Campus Ethics Programs at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics. “That language is regrettable to me, in fact, it sort of dehumanizes these people.”
Prince Harry's comments stoked condemnation from British military figures like Richard Kemp, a former British Army colonel, who warned in the U.K.'s Telegraph newspaper that his actions could “provoke” the Taliban and their followers to “carry out attacks against the UK.” The response from the Taliban was swift.
In his memoir, the Duke of Sussex describes killing 25 Taliban fighters in Afghanistan as "chess pieces taken off the board". Ex-colonel Tim Collins said that was "not how you behave in the army".
Before meeting Meghan Markle and becoming a full-time working royal, he spent 10 years in the British military, including two tours of duty in Afghanistan. It was on this day 18 years ago in 2006 that Harry officially completed officer training at the prestigious Sandhurst Military Academy.
Prince Harry was moved under guard to a secure location during a Taliban attack on Camp Bastion in Afghanistan, the defence secretary has said. Philip Hammond said "additional security arrangements" recognised that the prince "could be a target ... specifically as a result of who he is".
They include his time training the most famous British Apache pilot, Prince Harry. After going to Afghanistan as an infantryman in 2008, the Duke trained as a pilot and returned as an Apache gunner in 2012, when he was 27.
The Duke of Sussex wrote that he killed 25 suspected Taliban insurgents during his two tours of Afghanistan. According to reports from the leaked manuscript he said he was neither “satisfied” or “embarrassed” by the fact. “In truth, you can't hurt people if you see them as people,” Harry said.
Background and writing. In July 2021, it was announced that Harry was set to publish a memoir via Penguin Random House, with proceeds from its sales going to charity and Harry reportedly earning an advance of at least $20 million. It is ghostwritten by journalist J. R. Moehringer.
Harry and William were never going to receive an inheritance in Philip's will. Although the contents of Prince Philip's will have been sealed, as with other Royal wills, apart from a few small personal gifts his estate will have gone to the Queen, thus avoiding inheritance tax.
No they do not. There is only the 2 of them who were the children of Prince Charles and the late Diana, Princess of Wales. They do have a step sister who is the daughter of Camilla, The duch*ess of Cornwall. Princes Philip, Charles and William all look a lot alike.
During Prince Harry's 10 years in the Army, he undertook two operational tours of duty in Afghanistan and qualified as an Apache Aircraft Commander. He reportedly discloses in his autobiography, Spare, that he killed 25 people in his role as an Apache helicopter pilot during his second tour of duty in Afghanistan.
The Duke of Sussex had brought a legal challenge against the downgrading of his security when he stopped being a working royal. He lost that legal claim in the High Court in February - and he has now had a further bid to appeal rejected. But Prince Harry still intends to pursue this legal battle.
Nathan Hunt was a warrant officer in the Royal Engineers and served with Prince Harry in Afghanistan in 2008, as part of a Household Cavalry unit. He earned a Mention In Dispatches for locating roadside bombs, potentially saving many soldiers' lives, including Prince Harry.
Harry and Meghan met in 2016 and married in 2018. They stepped down as senior royals in January 2020. Angry about media intrusion, they were frustrated that Buckingham Palace stopped them developing their "SussexRoyal" brand. Harry remains a prince and is fifth in line to the throne.
Meghan, duch*ess of Sussex (/ˈmɛɡən/; born Rachel Meghan Markle; August 4, 1981) is an American member of the British royal family and a former actress.
As the second child of King Charles III and the late Princess Diana, Prince Harry is fifth in line for the throne after his brother, nephews and niece.
Due to being royal, Harry doesn't have a last name like us mere mortals do. In fact, the official name listed on his son Archie's birth certificate is His Royal Highness Henry Charles Albert David Duke of Sussex.
That I might spill the beans on them, just as ghostwriter J.R. Moehringer, hired by Prince Harry to pen his bestselling memoir, Spare, has done, and as the ghostwriter behind Donald Trump's Art of the Deal, Tony Schwartz, did before him. “You're not going to do that to me, are you?” they ask.
It covers many controversies - Prince Harry writes that he killed 25 Taliban fighters while in the Army in Afghanistan, took psychedelic drugs, has a deeply strained relationship with his brother and begged his father not to marry Camilla.
Even though “Spare” was technically ghostwritten, it is no less authentic, in this way. “All texts, from the fictional to the non-fictional, and from the personal to the impersonal (and everything on that spectrum), are constructed and artificially organized,” he says.
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