Prince Harry Tells Stephen Colbert That British Press Accounts Of Afghanistan Kill Count Are “A Dangerous Lie”

11.01.2023 - 18:21 / deadline.com

In his latest stop on the Spare book tour, Prince Harry told Stephen Colbert on The Late Show last night addressed the controversial inclusion in his new memoir of the number of his kills while serving in the British Army during the war against Afghanistan.

“I made a choice to share it because, having spent nearly two decades working with veterans all around the world, I think the most important thing is to be honest and to be able to give space to others to be able to share their experiences without any shame,” the Duke of Sussex said, “and my whole goal and my attempt with sharing that detail is to reduce the number of suicides.”

Harry called British press descriptions of his book’s account of his Afghanistan experience as “boasting” are “a dangerous lie.”

“My words are not dangerous,” he said about the war passage as it appears in context within the book, “but the spin of my words is very dangerous.” When Colbert asked if by “dangerous” he meant that such press accounts make Harry and those around him an “increased target,” Harry responded, “Yes, and that is a choice they [the press] make.”

Colbert called Spare‘s account of Harry’s war experience “a very thoughtful description of what that knowledge is like to have,” and that “there’s nothing boastful about it.”

Other topics covered during the interview were Harry’s speculations on what his mother, Princess Diana, would think of his recent and ongoing estrangement from his brother Prince William. Said Harry, “We wouldn’t have got to this moment. It’s impossible to say where we would be now, where those relationships would be now, but there is no way that the distance between my brother and I would be the same” if their mother was alive.

Near the end of the