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

Present was the Duke of York, standing closely beside a teenage girl, while another individual grinned suggestively in the backdrop.

Without that photograph, taken at a gathering in 2001, who would have believed the assertions of a adolescent who said she was trafficked across the Atlantic and obliged to have brief intimate contact with a individual of the royal bloodline?

A strange, telling action by someone who had openly asserted to have not heard of her, asserted he could not have had relations with her, and yet paid a substantial sum of monarchical funds to settle a protracted legal case.

A Long Period of Scandal

Against this backdrop, conversations of the royal family acting firmly to distance themselves from Andrew are wide of the mark. This controversy has persisted for the better part of 15 years since that photograph, and an additional snapshot of Andrew walking congenially with a convicted sex offender came to light.

• Self-importance: For what duration did his siblings, maybe even his mother and father, realize that Andrew was so presumptuous?
• Dubious Friendships: They must have understood, if his aides and the law enforcement were performing their duties, that he had some extremely unsavory friends given he openly hosted them to royal residences.
• Financial Extravagance: If the monarchy did not know about his sexual proclivities, they certainly knew about his wastefulness with state resources.

Travel were documented in official documents: chopper transfers from the estate to a country club and back again in time for midday meal, private flights instead of scheduled services, all for the convenience of "the frequent flyer".

A Life of Privilege

Furthermore the entitlement which required respect when he entered a space or the extreme awareness about his designations used on his correspondence in communication to his associates.

He could get away with it while his matriarch, who strangely pampered him, was still alive. The sovereign did at least strip him of royal responsibilities and ceremonial ranks in the consequence of his disastrous and, it is now clear, mendacious television interview six years ago.

Latest Events

Just in the last two weeks that events accelerated, following the issuance of accounts giving more disturbing information of his conduct and that of his associates.

Additional revelations have again exposed Andrew's thinking that he could get away with being untruthful about his relationship with a convicted criminal.

People (and the media) were far more perceptive of the royals. There was not a single person of any consequence to defend him, a outcome of all those years of presumption.

Institutional Fears

The more astute monarchical figures understood that. The primary concern is to hand down the institution, if not as before at least complete and unblemished.

For generations the last 190 years trying to overcome the reputation of earlier rulers, proving they are useful, accountable and responsive to their citizens.

He was placing all that in peril in an era when deference and secrecy is no longer enough.

Aftermath

Ultimately, the well-known uncertain monarch was pushed additional. There was no alternative. The palace had surrendered command of the story.

Now it is the removal of titles and the continued and lifetime personal shame that will afflict Andrew most severely.

• Downgrading: Demoted to just Mr Mountbatten-Windsor
• Prior Instance: The initial royal to forfeit his honorifics in contemporary era
• Naval Career: Particularly stinging given his role in the Falklands war

He continues to be a royal advisor, theoretically able to act for the king, and he is still in the lineage to the throne, but neither of these will ever occur.

Future Prospects

Do individuals he meets still show respect to him? Will they still slip up and call him Prince? Might they say Sir,

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

At that location, he will be furnished by the monarch with one of the estate properties and given some form of financial support.

This differs from his prior accommodation, where he paid a nominal rent for more than 20 years, and Norfolk is a bit distant, but even so it may not be adequate distance.

Outstanding Concerns

Matters remain unresolved. There are still files in the possession of American legislators to be made public.

• Governmental Scrutiny: Could legislators demand more
• Monetary Probe: Or scrutinize the improper use of state resources
• Judicial Potential: There may even be a criminal probe into his conduct

Perhaps for the moment the harm to the monarchy to the institution is limited. The narrative from the royal household was evidently that the removal of titles was what the sovereign, and especially other senior monarchical figures, wanted.

Altered Approach

No more deception that Andrew was making the choice himself. And, remarkably, the brief announcement showed clearly that the institution were aligning with the complainant's account of occurrences.

Additionally, for the premiere occasion they finally showed concern for the survivors: "The censures are deemed necessary, despite the fact that he continues to deny the accusations against him."

Finally it is arrogance, self-seeking and indolence that will undermine the monarchy. In his folly, self-gratification and venality, Andrew seems never to have learned that reality.