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The saga started with a single photograph, perhaps the most significant ever snapped of a member of the monarchy.

In the frame appeared the Duke of York, arm-in-arm a female youth, while a companion beamed conspiratorially in the background.

Lacking that photograph, captured at a social event in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the allegations of a adolescent who said she was trafficked across the Atlantic and obliged to have cursory sexual encounters with a individual of the royal bloodline?

A strange, indicative gesture by someone who had openly asserted to have never heard of her, said he could no have had intimate contact with her, and yet provided a substantial sum of monarchical resources to resolve a protracted legal case.

A Long Period of Scandal

In this context, discussions of the royals acting decisively to cut Andrew off are wide of the mark. This scandal has persisted for the largest portion of 15 years since that picture, and a further image of Andrew strolling congenially with a convicted sex offender came to light.

• Self-importance: To what extent did his family members, possibly even his mother and father, know that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Problematic Connections: They must have known, if his aides and the police were doing their jobs, that he had some highly questionable companions given he publicly invited them to estates.
• Fiscal Irresponsibility: If the monarchy did not know about his intimate behaviors, they certainly knew about his wastefulness with taxpayer funds.

Trips were listed in public records: chopper travel from the palace to a country club and back again in time for midday meal, private flights instead of commercial flights, all for the comfort of "Airmiles Andy".

Existence of Entitlement

Then there was the presumption which required subservience when he appeared in a area or the supreme awareness about his royal titles used on his letterheads in messages to his personal acquaintances.

He managed to escape consequences while his parent, who strangely indulged him, was still surviving. The monarch did at least revoke him of official roles and ceremonial ranks in the wake of his catastrophic and, it is now clear, untruthful television interview six years ago.

Current Situation

Merely in the last 14 days that events sped up, following the issuance of accounts giving more disturbing information of his actions and that of his associates.

More information have again exposed Andrew's thinking that he could get away with being untruthful about his relationship with a notorious figure.

People (and the journalists) were far ahead of the monarchy. There was nobody of any consequence to defend him, a consequence of all those years of hubris.

Institutional Fears

The wiser royals realized that. The one imperative is to transfer the institution, if not as heretofore at least complete and untarnished.

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

Andrew was putting all that in jeopardy in an time when deference and discretion is no longer adequate.

The Fallout

Ultimately, the notoriously indecisive sovereign was pushed more. There was no other option. The palace had relinquished authority of the account.

Presently the stripping of titles and the persistent and life-long social disgrace that will pain Andrew the most.

• Reduction: Lowered to just a commoner
• Historical Precedent: The initial member to forfeit his honorifics in contemporary era
• Armed Forces: Notably painful given his duty in the conflict

He remains a constitutional officer, in principle able to substitute for the sovereign, and he is still in the succession to the throne, but none of these will actually come to pass.

Coming Developments

Can persons he meets still show respect to him? Will they still slip up and call him Prince? Will they even say Sir,

Of course, he is not withdrawing to a common area, but to the monarchy's large estate at a royal residence.

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

This is not his prior accommodation, where he paid a token lease for more than 20 years, and the area is a bit far, but even so it may not be adequate distance.

Pending Matters

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

• Governmental Scrutiny: Will lawmakers seek further action
• Financial Investigation: Or scrutinize the improper use of state resources
• Judicial Potential: There may even be a police investigation into his actions

Perhaps for the time being the harm to the monarchy to the institution is contained. The statement from the royal household was evidently that the removal of titles was what the monarch, and notably other senior royals, wanted.

Changed Stance

No more illusion that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, significantly, the brief statement showed plainly that the institution were siding with the victim's narrative of events.

Additionally, for the first time they eventually showed regard for the affected individuals: "The measures are judged required, regardless of the reality that he continues to deny the allegations against him."

Ultimately it is arrogance, selfishness and indolence that will destroy the monarchy. In his folly, self-gratification and greed, Andrew gives the impression never to have understood that reality.