Royalist: King Charles is still very worried about Prince Harry’s memoir

Prince Harry will be “allowed” to wear a military dress uniform, but only at a private and brief vigil on Saturday evening. The staging will involve all of Queen Elizabeth II’s grandchildren, placing themselves around her coffin in a certain way. Keep in mind, Harry still won’t be “allowed” to wear a uniform at QEII’s funeral, where he will once again walk beside his brother and his cousin Peter Philips in the second procession, from Westminster Hall to Westminster Abbey. The uniform decision for Saturday’s vigil is now being described as a personal edict from King Charles III, and a conciliatory gesture towards Harry. Again, Harry didn’t request this from his father. This is the institution looking stupid, petty and disrespectful to veterans on the world stage. As for the shorter procession on Monday, the staging is exactly like Wednesday’s procession, with Harry, Peter and William walking behind QEII’s children. So, what does this all mean? Nothing much. From The Daily Beast:

Harry’s “win” with the uniform: It will be interesting to see how Harry plays this victory over the establishment. But one suspects that it is somewhat Pyrrhic and will do little to assuage his irritation and anger at what he sees as the institutionalized cruelty of the Palace that, as recently as Wednesday, essentially sought to belittle him and advertise his outcast status by not allowing him to wear a military uniform or offer a royal salute to the queen while processing behind her coffin in London.

But the royals are “nervous”: For their part, the royals remain nervous about the contents of Harry’s memoir, whether decorum means its publication has been delayed or not. The family feud is on, no matter how many carefully choreographed royal appearances raise hopes of a reconciliation between Harry and Prince William.

What has changed: “Nothing has really changed,” a family friend of the royals tells The Daily Beast in response to an inquiry about the true state of relations between Prince Harry on one side and his brother and the rest of his family of origin on the other. “The expectation is that once the mourning period is up, Harry and Meghan will go back to California, he will publish his book, and the family here will be left to pick up the pieces.”

The family knows that they can disparage & smear Meghan: Another source told The Daily Beast that there was still “intense” concern among the royal family about Harry’s book containing highly damaging revelations about his father. The source added that while the Palace believes it can brush off attacks from Meghan, who is largely discredited in the U.K. as the media have pounced on a string of inaccuracies in her various interviews—many of her supporters put this media animus down to racism—an attack by his son on King Charles would have a completely different level of credibility. It would be the ultimate insider takedown.

The Sussexes & Waleses’ appearance in Windsor last weekend: The alacrity with which William laid claim to the title of peacemaker in the wake of the appearance is likely to have annoyed Harry. Sources in William’s camp were telling reporters that the joint appearance was William’s initiative even as the engagement was happening.

[From The Daily Beast]

“Harry and Meghan will go back to California, he will publish his book, and the family here will be left to pick up the pieces.” We’re seeing in real time, on the international stage, how the family has always treated Harry and Meghan with racism, pettiness and cruelty. If the family is so worried about what’s in Harry’s book, perhaps they should have treated Harry and Meghan better from the start, or at the very f–king least, made a big show of treating them well during this visit. Meghan even said that in the Oprah interview last year, basically asking the rhetorical question of: did they think we were just going to stay silent forever? As I keep saying, whatever is in Harry’s memoir is not going to be as bad as what makes it into his second book.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.