Prince Harry acknkowledges killing as part of his military duties

[Jenna]

Britain's Prince Harry has acknowledged that he killed Taliban insurgents on his latest tour of duty in Afghanistan as a crew member of an Apache attack helicopter.Harry has been serving for four months as a co-pilot gunner (CPG) in southern Helmand province -- considered a Taliban heartland -- and flew on scores of missions with the trigger to rockets, missiles and a 30mm cannon at his fingertips.No one is saying how many insurgents Harry might have killed but toward the end of his deployment, the 28-year-old, known to his comrades as Captain Wales, shared some of his feelings about combat with reporters while on duty in the massive military base known as Camp Bastion. He said it was sometimes justified to "take a life to save a life. That's what we revolve around, I suppose."

"Our job out here is to make sure the guys are safe on the ground and if that means shooting someone who is shooting at them, then we will do it," said the prince, third in line to the British throne."It's not the reason I decided to do this job. The reason to do this job was to get back out here, and carry on with a job."Away from his helicopter, the prince mixed freely on base, eating in the canteen with everyone else and relaxing by playing video games with others in the 130-strong 662 Squadron, 3 Regiment Army Air Corps (AAC). With those comrades, he was just "one of the guys."

Prince Harry on Afghan mission: 'Take a life to save a life' - CNN.com

[Trojan 42]

I should hope he did. No point in being a gunner in an Apache otherwise.

[Odd]

Oh, reminded the media ruined his first tour. Thanks

[pgg]

Good. Hope he kills more of them.

[Trojan 42]

He has just finished his tour and is coming home.

[lewisipso]

I should hope he did. No point in being a gunner in an Apache otherwise.

Um. This? As stated, this was rather obvious. News a little slow?

[Xiphos]

I should hope he did. No point in being a gunner in an Apache otherwise.

An awful waste of a great seat! I sure suspect he made good use of it. Why the media even wrote such an obvious story is amazing.

[sgtbear111]

An awful waste of a great seat! I sure suspect he made good use of it. Why the media even wrote such an obvious story is amazing.

Nothing amazing about the sleazy media trying to generate "news" out of this. They ignore the combat deaths and burials of our troops ("our" meaning Brits, Canadians, allied, and US forces) and who they were and what they died for. Yet the same sleaze-bag whores of the press will fall all over themselves to cover some Hollywood or TV face whose greatest sacrifice was getting up in the morning. I'm surprised this wasn't twisted by CNN into accusations of "war crimes". I suppose that one has to feed the press monster because they will just fabricate and lie, lacking a real interview based in fact. Captain Harry Wales has been a victim of the sleazy press before. He is savvy enough to distrust the US press, and my concern would be OPSEC after the US media gets their raw material..... maybe they decide to share it with the bad guys?

"He (HRH Harry) also expressed frustration about the media. Referring to the TV producer whom he was addressing, he said: "I never wanted you guys to be out here, but there was an agreement made to invite you out on the deal that the media didn't speculate before my deployment. That's the only reason you guys are out here."

Harry deserves our respect for serving his country, up front, where it matters.

[Xiphos]

Harry deserves our respect for serving his country, up front, where it matters.

I respect he's actually in harm's way doing a dirty job. I'm sure he could have done something comfortable and still gotten a lot of attention for "serving" ...

[Trojan 42]

His first tour was on the ground, frontline stuff. However he was pulled out early after the press announced that he was in theatre ( properly spelt ). He has always said he wanted to return to combat role.

He's a good lad and likes army life as he is just one of the lads. My son was at The Royal Miltary Academy Sandhurst with Harry in the same class and says he's a top bloke.

[Jenna]

Update:

One former officer said the Prince had "undoubtedly increased his value as a terrorist target."

However, an influential former Army officer defended the Prince's comments, saying his apparent flippancy is a way of dealing with "some horrible realities".

The 28-year-old Apache helicopter co-pilot said he had taken insurgents "out of the game" during a 20-week deployment to Camp Bastion.

In a series of interviews during his tour of duty, Prince Harry described his role as "a joy" because "I’m one of those people who loves playing PlayStation and Xbox, so with my thumbs I like to think that I’m probably quite useful”.

They were fears his remarks could stoke tensions in the region after two Taliban commanders branded the Prince a naive "coward" for comparing the conflict to a computer game.
When asked whether he had killed enemy fighters in Afghanistan, the Prince, known as Captain Wales on tour, said: “Yeah, so lots of people have. The squadron’s been out here. Everyone’s fired a certain amount."

Dai Davies, former head of the Met’s Royalty Protection Squad, said it was unwise for Prince Harry to discuss his deployment.

"Purely from a protection point of view, I think it was highly unadvisable for Prince Harry to draw attention to himself," he told the Mail.

‘It may be the reality that he killed insurgents, but saying this publicly just increases the likelihood of some lunatic trying to take revenge on him.

"If you look at other senior royals, they never discussed their deployments. Prince Andrew never did. His father never did and nor did his uncles. None of them discussed whether they did or didn’t kill while in the military."

He added: ‘Had I still been in charge of Royalty Protection, I would certainly now be reviewing and enhancing Prince Harry’s security.’

Another ex-senior officer, Glen Smyth, former chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, said: "I think it would have been better for Prince Harry to have simply said he had been deployed in an operational capacity, and to have left it at that.

Prince Harry 'more of a terrorist target' after admitting to killing Taliban - Telegraph