Dumbledore's 'Plan' for Harry

[Tom Wall]

No: HPFGUIDX 79216

Nicholas wrote:
And what is the 'flaw' in the plan? Dumbledore said that the flaw 
was delaying the revealation of why big V wanted to kill him. His 
reason for staying mum was to save Harry from the great burden it 
would place on him. DD's weakness was that he grew to love Harry and 
wanted to spare him further pain. But how does Harry knowing about 
the prophesy change the plan? 

Tom replies:
It doesn't, at least, not if I'm following Dumbledore here. The flaw 
in Dumbledore's plan was that he grew to love Harry too much, too 
much to force himself to tell Harry the truth about the prophecy and 
drop such a weight on such young shoulders (that cared about so 
much.) In other words, the plan involved TELLING Harry about the 
prophecy, which he didn't, because of the flaw in the plan: 
Dumbledore would grow to love Harry.

Voldemort exploited Dumbledore's weakness (love) by tricking Harry 
and leading him to the Department of Mysteries under false pretenses. 
Dumbledore tells us that Voldemort never should have been able to do 
this, and that if he, Dumbledore, had stuck to the plan and told 
Harry about the prophecy, then this never would have happened.

In other words, part of Dumbledore's plan involved revealing this 
information to Harry; but because one of the failings of old age is 
that it can sometimes forget what it is like to be young, Dumbledore 
did not tell Harry the truth. 

Thus, much of the weight of the tragic events at the end of OoP is 
Dumbledore's fault. As for the rest of the plan, well, I don't think 
he made that clear.

Is that what you meant?

-Tom