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The saga started with a single photograph, possibly the most impactful ever taken of a individual from the royal household.

There stood the Earl of Inverness, with his arm around a female youth, while a companion grinned suggestively in the rear.

Lacking that photograph, shot at a party in 2001, who would have believed the allegations of a young woman who said she was trafficked across the sea and forced to have brief intimate contact with a prince of the royal family?

An odd, revealing gesture by someone who had openly asserted to have no been aware of her, asserted he could no have had relations with her, and yet provided a substantial sum of his mother's resources to settle a drawn-out legal case.

A Long Period of Controversy

In this context, conversations of the royals acting swiftly to distance themselves from Andrew are misguided. This affair has endured for the better part of 15 years since that image, and another photo of Andrew strolling pleasantly with a disgraced financier came to light.

• Arrogance: How long did his brothers and sisters, maybe even his mother and father, realize that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Problematic Connections: They must have realized, if his staff and the authorities were doing their jobs, that he had some extremely unsavory associates given he publicly hosted them to estates.
• Financial Extravagance: If the monarchy did not know about his intimate behaviors, they certainly knew about his overspending with public money.

Travel were listed in official documents: chopper travel from the royal residence to a golf course and back again in time for midday meal, exclusive air travel instead of regular transport, all for the convenience of "Airmiles Andy".

Existence of Entitlement

Then there was the entitlement which demanded subservience when he walked into a area or the profound consciousness about his honorifics used on his letterheads in communication to his friends.

He avoided accountability while his parent, who strangely pampered him, was still surviving. The Queen did at least remove him of official roles and honorary colonelcies in the consequence of his disastrous and, we now know, mendacious television interview six years ago.

Current Situation

It was only in the last two weeks that events accelerated, following the issuance of biographical works giving more disturbing particulars of his actions and that of his associates.

Additional revelations have again revealed Andrew's thinking that he could get away with being untruthful about his contact with a disgraced individual.

The public (and the media) were far in advance of the royal family. There was not a single person of any importance to speak up for him, a result of all those years of arrogance.

Monarchical Concerns

The more intelligent royals understood that. The one imperative is to hand down the monarchy, if not as previously at least complete and untarnished.

Over time the last 190 years trying to undo the image of previous monarchs, showing they are useful, dutiful and reactive to their citizens.

He was placing all that in danger in an age when respect and discretion is no longer sufficient.

Consequences

Ultimately, the notoriously indecisive monarch was pushed further. There was little choice. The royal household had relinquished authority of the account.

Currently the stripping of honorifics and the ongoing and lifetime personal shame that will pain Andrew most deeply.

• Demotion: Demoted to just a commoner
• Prior Instance: The initial royal to lose his designations in contemporary era
• Armed Forces: Notably stinging given his duty in the conflict

He remains a constitutional officer, theoretically able to stand in for the king, and he is still in the lineage to the monarchy, but none of these will actually happen.

Coming Developments

Can persons he comes across still show respect to him? Will they still slip up and call him Prince? Will they even say Andrew,

Of course, he is not withdrawing to suburbia, but to the sovereign's extensive estate at a monarchical property.

In that place, he will be provided by the monarch with one of the royal residences and given some sort of private allowance.

This differs from his prior accommodation, where he paid a minimal payment for more than 20 years, and Norfolk is a bit distant, but even so it may not be far enough.

Pending Matters

Matters remain unresolved. There are still files in the custody of American legislators to be revealed.

• Political Pressure: Will legislators request additional information
• Monetary Probe: Or investigate the waste of taxpayer funds
• Criminal Investigation: There may even be a police investigation into his actions

Maybe for the present the institutional damage to the crown is restricted. The message from the palace was evidently that the stripping of designations was what the sovereign, and especially other senior royals, sought.

Changed Stance

No more deception that Andrew was acting willingly. And, remarkably, the short communication showed evidently that the royals were supporting the accuser's version of incidents.

Even more, for the initial instance they ultimately showed regard for the survivors: "The measures are deemed necessary, notwithstanding the fact that he persists in refuting the accusations against him."

Ultimately it is presumption, self-seeking and indolence that will undermine the institution. In his foolishness, self-indulgence and greed, Andrew appears never to have learned that truth.