It was announced this month that Prince William will be posted to the Falkland Islands in his role as a Search And Rescue pilot with the RAF. Brugo Marco, the Argentine official responsible for the territory, described it as a “provocative act” that showed a “military presence in a zone of peace where there is no armed conflict.” The Ministry of Defence, on the other hand, declared that his posting was routine for a helicopter pilot. Both parties are right – the Duke of Cambirdge’s time in the contested province may be intended as “routine”, but the life of Royals is very rarely so.
While posted in the Falklands (technically a British territory, but with disputed sovereignty claims from Argentina, who call the islands Las Malvinas), the Prince will fly the Sea King helicopter in a supportive capacity to the four Typhoon fast jets that currently protect British interests in the surrounding airspace. It is an operational role and not, as reported by some media, part of his training.
After graduating from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in 2006, William spent time at the Britannia Naval Training College, and then transferred his commission to the Royal Air Force in 2009, completing the hat-trick of services. But it is the recent announcement that the Prince will serve in the Falklands that has marked the most controversial point in his military career. His visit will fall just before the 30th anniversary of the conflict in which his uncle, the Duke of York, served as a helicopter pilot.
He is, of course, not the only Windsor boy to have his military career mapped out in the press. The Telegraph recently reported that Prince Harry will be returning to Afghanistan next year after completing his training as an Apache helicopter pilot. The younger Prince was hastily withdrawn from Helmand Province in 2008 after a German newspaper and an Australian magazine breached the press black-out put in place by the British and Canadian authorities. But his squadron has been lined up for a return to the warzone in the late summer of next year where Harry will fly the AH-64 helicopter – a combative aircraft equipped with rockets, hellfire missiles and target acqusition radar. In a television interview he told the press that he “severely hoped” he would be given the chance to return to operations. “You know money’s been spent towards your training,” he went on, “God knows how much money’s been spent on us. So from their point of view, if I’m not going then I’m taking up someone else’s space.”
And this, in short, is the problem. Harry’s tour of Afghanistan will be an exercise in spending, what with the special arrangements and extra protection required for himself and his colleagues. William’s time in the Falklands will see the same cost – costs that the MOD shouldn’t be able to afford. Earlier this year the coalition government announced the Strategic Defence and Security Review, which outlined the motions for a 7.7 per cent budget reduction for the MOD. The army pulled out of Germany, the Nimrod MRA4 was scrapped and HMS Ark Royal was decommissioned. But more importantly, jobs were lost. Around 50 per cent of trainee pilots – young men and women who had signed away the next four decades of their lives to the Air Force, who had trained for as many as six or seven years, flown hundreds of hours, some of whom had earnt their wings and completed the world’s most intensive fast jet training course, and were amongst the best pilots of their generation – were made redundant. Because the Princes aren’t salaried in their positions they weren’t considered for reduncancy – they didn’t spend eight months wondering whether they would have a job at the end of the year, or whether they would ever get the chance to do the job they spent every day training for. Had they been subjected to the same assessment process as their colleagues, the brothers may well have survived the cuts. But then again, they may not have done. Meanwhile, the cost incurred by British defences in supporting the Princes in their roles could have been spent elsewhere – could have saved a job or two.
For, the indisputable truth must be, the money spent on special arrangements for William to train at RAF Cranwell, or for Harry to be in residence at Sandhurst, has overshadowed any contribution they have made to the country’s defences. And so, we must ask, why are the second- and third-in-line heirs to the throne in the forces? Money the MOD can ill afford is spent to maintain their positions as a surplus of skilled young pilots are made redundant in budget-cutting measures; if this is an exercise in PR then, as the Falklands controversy has shown, it’s a spectacularly bad one. The Palace has told the press this.
There was a time when it was a thing of pride to see a country’s young Princes in military uniform, serving their country and proving their mettle on the battlefields. But in a climate where their involvement angers nations, potentially endangers comrades and detracts funds from already ailing services busy filing reduncancy notices, perhaps it’s time for Royals to show their credibility in purely ceremonial or charitable roles. I’m sure they do want to be pilots – most young men do, I’m told – but now is not the time.