JAN MOIR: Harry and Meghan are like two eager limpets sucking nutrients from the rusty hull of the Royal Yacht Britannia

Time to put away all the hopes and sweet dreams for the new year and wearily lift our eyes to Montecito, where the sun never sets without another gaseous drama taking place.

Even by their own standards of haughtiness and imagined insult, it’s been quite a week for Harry and Meghan.

It’s not just that the Duke of Sussex has embarrassed the armed forces and the entire British nation by being presented with a Living Legend of Aviation award, a completely silly accolade whose previous recipients include: – riffs by Hollywood flying log – Tweety Bird, Casper The Friendly Ghost and Flying Ace Snoopy. Rather, it appears that on the ground the Sussexes have been exposed as the Bonnie and Clyde of name-dropping, revealing themselves to be a pair of marauding bandits who raided the House of Windsor and made off with a prize . beyond rubies – the queen’s childhood nickname.

At the time, in the summer of 2021, the Sussexes claimed Elizabeth II had given her blessing to their baby daughter Lilibet’s baptism – and issued legal warnings to the BBC and others who suggested otherwise.

The couple’s decision to name their daughter Lilibet is said to have angered the queen

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have built a new life for themselves in California

Now we know that the queen was far from happy. In fact, she was furious and felt she had been goaded into accepting the Sussexes’ bold decision. “Angrier than I’ve ever seen her,” an aide said.

And the name nap was daring. Not to mention brutal, greedy and completely selfish. The only people who addressed the late monarch as Lilibet were her parents, her sister and her husband. One imagines that for a woman who spent much of her life on the public stage, a matriarch whose homes were business centers filled with official staff and courtiers, this loving intimacy mattered. Unlike the Koh-i-Noor diamond or the Balmoral ballroom, the Gold State Coach or any of her countless titles, the Lilibet name was not on loan, it was not a royal lease – it was hers and hers alone. Until it wasn’t anymore.

Harry served two tours of duty in Afghanistan

It was a tradition among the royal family to pay a silent tribute to the head of the family through the middle name of their daughters; three of the queen’s four granddaughters and four of her seven great-granddaughters have Elizabeth as their middle name. But this respectful tribute wasn’t good enough for the Sussexes, a pair of ‘con artists’ (according to a Spotify executive who worked with them) who were always hungry for lucrative connections to the House of Windsor; thus strengthening any silk ties that might subtly remind the American public of their supposedly exalted status.

Even as they dismissed the Royals as racists and worse, Harry and Meghan still clung to the institution’s superstructure, like two eager limpets sucking nutrients from the rusty hull of the royal yacht Britannia. But if they hated the royal family so much that they had to change continents to escape it, why didn’t they name their daughter Doria? That’s what I’d like to know.

The late queen’s consternation was recently revealed in Charles III. New king, new court. The Inside Story, a new book by the royal biographer, my colleague Robert Hardman.

Robert’s sources are impeccable and undoubtedly his version of events is the one that history will recognize as the truth. But as Lilibet-gate continues to make headlines around the world, it is notable that the litigious Sussexes have not said a word about this reputation-damaging development. Not a single squeak! The silence from Montecito is indeed deafening.

Perhaps Harry and Meghan will console themselves with the shiny new Living Legend of Aviation award, something to put on their mantelpiece, along with their Global Ambassadors of Do Gooding award and their Hey Guys Humanity Needs Us trophy.

The aviation award will be presented today by John Travolta at a star-studded ceremony in Los Angeles. Not only because he is a qualified pilot, but because he also feels a ‘special bond’ with the royal family because he danced with Princess Diana at the White House almost forty years ago. Dear God.

This is the cheesy, tinsel world that Prince Harry has chosen for himself, but will he actually come to this meaningless, cringe-inducing event? No one doubts that Harry was a brave helicopter pilot during his two tours of duty in Afghanistan, but so were many thousands of other pilots who flew in war zones around the world. And since then, it must be said that his most significant contribution to aerospace has been making countless flights on private jets while hypocritically lecturing everyone about climate change. Is there a price for that? Polite replies via airmail, please.