Summary
The main argument in the article by Christopher Hitchens is that prince Harry should not have gone to fight in Afghanistan. He starts out his article by calling Harry’s removal from the front-line “hasty”, almost mocking the fact that “everybody seem[ed] to assume that it was the only right thing to do”. He then points out the illogical points about Harry joining in the combat inside Afghanistan.
It is silly to him that Harry was taken out because of the threat of increased danger for him and his comrades. He says that everyone fighting in the area where Harry was already is a “bullet magnet”. He thinks it was silly for people to imagine that Harry’s activation would “be of any operational use” to jihadist who doesn’t really care about British royalty. The writer starts to tattletale on the chief of British defense staff for being the one to freak out and secretly remove Harry from the war. He says that it could have been a little “encouraging for the Islamist gangsters” since the act could have been mistaken as a retreat. He refers to a time when Condoleezza Rice went to Afghanistan and “was not announced in advance” then questions “our obsession with security”.
He wants to know why the British government agreed to letting Harry go in and fight when there was no point to it. It doesn’t show the valiant character of Britain, and it just gives a bad example of leadership when he didn’t “stay in the same trenches as his fellows”. He then makes his point with Shakespearean quotes.
Analysis
Hitchens uses mostly logical appeals in his article. He starts to make them when he invited the reader to “examine the nonlogic that supposedly underlies this decision”. He questions the logic that was used, if any, in okaying this sort of move. By making fun of the British governments actions, he makes his own opinions seem validated and more right-minded than those of the chief of the British defense staff. A hasty generalization fallacy in this section is evident when Hitchens decides to make fun of the chiefs name; its unrelated evidence that shows he’s trying to get personal, and he almost tries to make the reader draw a conclusion about the guy before we even fully understand everything he’s done..
He makes fun of the words “bullet magnets” that were used to describe the potential dituation of the unit Harry was a part of. The fact that only a few of the soldiers in the active military could be in danger of attracting bullets is all just “piffle”. He thoroughly explains his statement, and though he doesn’t back it up with cold hard facts, he still proves his point. When it comes down to the nitty gritty, the enemy is just going to shoot at whoever they see, whether or not they are able to recognize Harry’s red hair and freckles.
He feels that it was to no ones advantage that Harry left for the front-lines. Hitchens does do a good job of showing both sides of things. He doesn’t fail to mention that Harry was “disappointed” when he had to leave. There is a faulty analogy in this article. Hitchens tries to correlate two things, and though he mentions that he’s aware that the connection is only by name, he proceeds to correlate them. The faulty analogy and the information he gathered on the subject made this article a very interesting read, and the reader is persuaded to see the situation as the writer does.
http://www.slate.com/id/2186186/pagenum/2/
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