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It all began with a single photograph, perhaps the most impactful ever taken of a royal family member.

Present was the Baron Killyleagh, standing closely beside a young woman, while a companion grinned suggestively in the background.

Absent that snapshot, captured at a party in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the claims of a teenager who said she was transported across the ocean and compelled to have perfunctory intimate contact with a prince of the royal family?

A curious, revealing move by someone who had publicly stated to have no known about her, said he could never have had sex with her, and yet provided a substantial sum of his mother's funds to resolve a protracted legal case.

A Long Period of Scandal

Against this backdrop, talk of the royals acting decisively to cut Andrew off are wide of the mark. This affair has endured for the better part of 15 years since that image, and a further image of Andrew ambling pleasantly with a convicted sex offender came to light.

• Self-importance: How long did his family members, perhaps even his parents, know that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Questionable Associations: They must have understood, if his employees and the law enforcement were doing their jobs, that he had some deeply disreputable companions given he publicly hosted them to royal residences.
• Monetary Excess: If the household did not know about his intimate behaviors, they certainly knew about his overspending with public money.

Travel were printed in public records: helicopter travel from the palace to a country club and back again in time for midday meal, chartered planes instead of regular transport, all for the benefit of "Airmiles Andy".

World of Deference

Furthermore the presumption which demanded deference when he appeared in a area or the supreme awareness about his designations used on his official documents in letters to his friends.

He avoided accountability while his mother, who inexplicably spoiled him, was still surviving. The sovereign did at least revoke him of royal responsibilities and honorary colonelcies in the aftermath of his disastrous and, we now know, deceptive television interview six years ago.

Recent Developments

Just in the last two weeks that events sped up, following the publication of biographical works giving more troubling particulars of his behavior and that of his associates.

Additional revelations have again revealed Andrew's assumption that he could avoid lying about his interaction with a notorious figure.

People (and the journalists) were far more perceptive of the royals. There was nobody of any significance to defend him, a result of all those years of hubris.

Monarchical Concerns

The wiser monarchical figures understood that. The primary concern is to pass on the crown, if not as before at least intact and untarnished.

They have spent the last 190 years trying to undo the reputation of past sovereigns, showing they are useful, accountable and reactive to their subjects.

His actions endangered all that in jeopardy in an time when submission and discretion is no longer sufficient.

The Fallout

Ultimately, the notoriously hesitant king was prodded further. There was no other option. The royal household had surrendered command of the narrative.

Presently the removal of honorifics and the continued and life-long personal shame that will pain Andrew most deeply.

• Downgrading: Reduced to just Mr Mountbatten-Windsor
• Prior Instance: The first member to forfeit his designations in recent history
• Armed Forces: Particularly painful given his duty in the Falklands war

He continues to be a royal advisor, on paper able to substitute for the monarch, and he is still in the lineage to the monarchy, but none of these will actually occur.

Future Prospects

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

Certainly, he is not retiring to suburbia, but to the royal family's vast grounds at a royal residence.

At that location, he will be furnished by the sovereign with one of the grace and favour houses and given some sort of private allowance.

This differs from his prior accommodation, where he paid a token payment for more than 20 years, and the county is a bit distant, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Outstanding Concerns

The situation continues. There are still documents in the custody of US Congress to be made public.

• Parliamentary Interest: Could parliament seek further action
• Fiscal Review: Or scrutinize the misuse of public money
• Judicial Potential: There may even be a law enforcement inquiry into his behavior

Perhaps for the moment the institutional damage to the institution is contained. The narrative from the royal household was evidently that the stripping of designations was what the monarch, and particularly other senior royals, sought.

Changed Stance

The cessation of illusion that Andrew was making the choice himself. And, remarkably, the concise statement showed plainly that the monarchy were supporting the complainant's account of incidents.

Even more, for the first time they ultimately showed consideration for the victims: "The measures are considered essential, notwithstanding the reality that he persists in refuting the claims against him."

In the end it is entitlement, selfishness and laziness that will undermine the monarchy. In his foolishness, self-indulgence and venality, Andrew gives the impression never to have understood that reality.