If you thought 2025 might be a breakthrough year in the War of the Windsors, the latest antagonistic salvos from Montecito make that a very bad bet to take.
In fact, straight from Prince Harry himself, The Prince Who Dared To Break Free isn’t currently on speaking terms with his father.
“I would love reconciliation with my family. I’ve always, you know, there’s no point in continuing to fight anymore,” Harry told the BBC in an interview on Friday. “As I said, life is precious. I don’t know how much longer my father has. You know, he won’t speak to me because of this security stuff.”
This “security stuff” is a nod to the catalyst for Harry being interviewed by Britain’s public broadcaster in the first place: Hours earlier, he’d learned that he’d lost his appeal to have the same level of security the other royals get if he and his wife and children are ever in the U.K.
While he’s still entitled to publicly funded police security if he’s ever in the kingdom where he was once third in line to rule, Harry lost the next-level protection he once enjoyed when he and Meghan decided to step down from their jobs as working royals and move to the U.S. in 2020 to pursue a life of philanthropy, no-holds-barred-memoir-writing (for him) and podcasts, Netflix lifestyle show and flower confetti entrepreneurship for her.
Conspiracy theories
Harry has long maintained that this loss of security is both unfair and dangerous, a point he iterated and escalated to conspiracy level in this BBC interview.
“I have had it described to me once by people who knew about the facts that this is an old fashioned, good old fashioned establishment stitch-up, and that’s what it feels like,” he told the BBC of the court’s decision to deny him this protection.
“There is a lot of control and ability in my father’s hands. Ultimately, this whole thing could be resolved through him,” he added, saying his father didn’t necessarily need to intervene but “step aside” by allowing RAVEC, the committee that makes these decisions about security for royals and public figures, to conduct a risk assessment.
Is Prince Charles standing in the way of Harry’s security requests?
This hasn’t happened, and Harry seems to insinuate that it is because his father is deliberately blocking it in an attempt to force him back into working royal life out of fear. It’s something he expanded on in a written statement he made on Friday as well.
“This legal action has been a last resort, but one that has uncovered shocking truths, starting with the fact that the Royal Household are key decision makers on RAVEC, and my sole representation for matters regarding my safety,” the statement says in part. “I’ve also learned the names of those involved, many of whom retired immediately after playing their part.”
It’s the same committee, Harry adds, that initially denied his then-girlfriend Meghan Markle security protection in 2017.
He goes on to call this committee’s ongoing decision not to do a risk assessment for his and his family’s safety — which he says, given the threats they receive, including from terrorist groups, would essentially be a no-brainer — a “reckless action that has knowingly put me and my family in harm’s way.”
This also matters, Harry says, because without the level of security he believes he needs he can never bring his family to the U.K.
Harry not likely to bring his family to the U.K.
“I can’t see a world in which I would be bringing my wife and children back to the U.K. at this point. And the things that they are going to miss is, well, everything,” he says. “You know, I love my country. I always have done. Despite what some people in that country have done. So, you know, I miss the U.K. I miss parts of the U.K. Of course I do. And I think that it’s really quite sad that I won’t be able to show my children my homeland.”
It is also, he says, the greatest hurdle against him ever reconciling with his family.
“This current situation that has been now ongoing for five years with regard to human life and safety is the sticking point. It is the only thing that’s left. Of course, some members of my family will never forgive me for writing a book. Of course they will never forgive me for lots of things,” he says. “I would love reconciliation with my family. I’ve always, you know, there’s no point in continuing to fight anymore.”
‘I don’t know how much longer my father has’
Here, he lobs in a bit of a headline-making grenade, by saying, “Life is precious. I don’t know how much longer my father has,” which telegraphs as less a platitude than a sort of dark hint when the world knows that the King has been receiving treatment for cancer for a year now.
Until they fess up to their part in denying him the security he believes he is entitled to, however, Harry doesn’t see a path forward until they put the “truth” in the kind of truth and reconciliation process he says he learned about while working with Canadian Indigenous communities for this winter’s Invictus Games in Whistler.
“I’ve now found out the truth. I’ve shared some of it with you today. A lot of it exists out there whether people choose to ignore it or not,” Harry concluded. “It would be nice to have that reconciliation part now. If they don’t want that, that’s entirely up to them.”
And while we almost certainly will never hear directly from any of those family members — out in force today for a ceremony marking V.E. Day — Buckingham Palace itself has issued a statement on the ruling.
“All of these issues have been examined repeatedly and meticulously by the courts, with the same conclusion reached on each occasion,” their spokesperson told The Sun tabloid.
