Never thought I would find an instance when something a Taliban spokesman said about hostilities in Afghanistan made sense … but with the considerable help of Britain’s Prince Harry, they have done it.

Prince Harry, third in line to the British throne, in remarks published in Britain on Monday, said he had killed Taliban militants during his tours in Afghanistan, and seemed to compare the killing of those militants to playing a video game.

The brave prince was described as a “co-pilot gunner” on an Apache helicopter, and his remarks about life in the army got quite a bit of attention, plus some surprisingly insightful reaction from the Taliban, a day later.

Zabiullah Mujahid, the Taliban spokesman, said the prince had “a mental problem” if he could find parallels between video games and killing actual people.

This is from The National’s story for tomorrow’s newspaper: “As co-pilot, Prince Harry was in charge of the weapons systems in a two-man cockpit, firing Hellfire air-to-surface missiles, rockets and a 30-millimeter gun. ‘It’s a joy for me because I’m one of those people who loves playing PlayStation and Xbox, so with my thumbs I like to think I’m probably quite useful,’ he said.”

Came the Taliban retort.

“There are 49 countries with their powerful military failing in the fight against the mujahideen, and now this prince comes and compares this war with his games, PlayStation or whatever he calls it,” Mujahid said. “This is a serious war, a historic war, resistance for us, for our people …”

And unlike many of the ravings of the ultra-fundamentalists, this actually has some resonance. There is, in fact, something disturbing about equating the deaths of fighters to scoring hits in an arcade game.

Granted, Harry is not a very bright lad, and perhaps Exhibit A in why the Brits should abolish the monarchy.

(I am embarrassed for my British co-workers here in the UAE that they still have a queen and, eventually, a king. Isn’t that more than a little, oh, 18th century? Feel free to chuck out the royals, like most of the world has done.)

In the remarks released yesterday, the prince put it this way:

“Take a life to save a life. That’s what we revolve around, I suppose. If there’s people trying to do bad stuff to our guys, then we’ll take them out of the game.”

There’s that word again. “Game.” It doesn’t sit well. Not at all.

The Taliban guy added that their fighters “don’t take his comments very seriously, as we have all seen and heard that many foreign soldiers, occupiers who come to Afghanistan, develop some kind of mental problems on their way out.”

Maybe. Maybe so. Many of Harry’s problems seem to have existed before he ever set foot in Afghanistan and put his thumbs to work.