I am glad they went as far as to explain the king's reasoning. The concept of "face," also known as honor or dignity, is not a concept that many westerners are consciously aware of.
For those that still don't get it -- the approval of a leader has to do with how wise, correct, or useful they are. Imagine your government's leader said, "We will gather nuclear weapons to fight against the enemy!" And then he throws one away because it was a dud. But it turned out he was wrong and now some garbageman somewhere has his hands on a nuclear weapon.
That's basically what's going on here. And like many leaders, the king wants to "sweep it under the rug," because anything else requires him admitting he made a mistake.