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This episode commenced with a isolated photograph, possibly the most consequential ever captured of a royal family member.

In the frame appeared the Earl of Inverness, with his arm around a teenage girl, while a companion grinned knowingly in the backdrop.

Absent that snapshot, shot at a gathering in 2001, who would have believed the allegations of a adolescent who said she was trafficked across the ocean and forced to have cursory intimate contact with a individual of the monarchy?

A strange, indicative gesture by someone who had publicly claimed to have not been aware of her, asserted he could not have had relations with her, and yet handed over a substantial sum of monarchical resources to settle a long-delayed legal case.

Years of Disgrace

Considering this, conversations of the royals acting decisively to distance themselves from Andrew are wide of the mark. This controversy has persisted for the majority of 15 years since that photograph, and another snapshot of Andrew ambling congenially with a notorious individual came to light.

• Arrogance: To what extent did his brothers and sisters, possibly even his mother and father, understand that Andrew was so presumptuous?
• Dubious Friendships: They must have known, if his aides and the authorities were fulfilling their roles, that he had some extremely unsavory associates given he publicly hosted them to palaces.
• Monetary Excess: If the household did not know about his personal conduct, they certainly knew about his wastefulness with state resources.

Journeys were listed in official documents: chopper transfers from the estate to a country club and back again in time for midday meal, private flights instead of commercial flights, all for the convenience of "the travel enthusiast".

Existence of Entitlement

Additionally the presumption which demanded respect when he walked into a space or the profound obsession about his royal titles used on his official documents in letters to his friends.

He avoided accountability while his parent, who inexplicably pampered him, was still living. The monarch did at least strip him of public duties and honorary colonelcies in the aftermath of his disastrous and, it is now clear, deceptive public statement six years ago.

Latest Events

Merely in the last two weeks that events sped up, following the issuance of biographical works giving more disturbing information of his actions and that of his connections.

More information have again highlighted Andrew's thinking that he could avoid deceiving about his interaction with a notorious figure.

Society (and the journalists) were far in advance of the monarchy. There was nobody of any consequence to support him, a consequence of all those years of arrogance.

Royal Worries

The wiser royals understood that. The primary concern is to transfer the institution, if not as previously at least whole and unblemished.

They have spent the last 190 years trying to overcome the reputation of earlier rulers, demonstrating they are useful, responsible and reactive to their citizens.

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

Consequences

Eventually, the notoriously hesitant king was pressured further. There was no alternative. The royal household had lost control of the account.

Now it is the stripping of designations and the ongoing and lifetime social disgrace that will hurt Andrew the most.

• Downgrading: Reduced to just a private citizen
• Past Example: The first royal to lose his designations in modern times
• Naval Career: Especially hurtful given his role in the engagement

He remains a counsellor of state, theoretically able to act for the monarch, and he is still in the lineage to the throne, but not any of these will truly happen.

Coming Developments

Do individuals he encounters still defer to him? Might they still make mistakes and call him Sir? Would they say Andrew,

Of course, he is not retiring to a common area, but to the sovereign's vast property at a monarchical property.

At that location, he will be furnished by the monarch with one of the grace and favour houses and given some type of financial support.

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

Unresolved Issues

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

• Parliamentary Interest: Will legislators seek further action
• Fiscal Review: Or scrutinize the waste of state resources
• Criminal Investigation: There may even be a criminal probe into his actions

Maybe for the present the reputational impact to the crown is contained. The narrative from the institution was clearly that the revocation of honorifics was what the sovereign, and notably other senior royals, sought.

A Shift in Position

The cessation of illusion that Andrew was acting willingly. And, remarkably, the brief announcement showed clearly that the monarchy were siding with the victim's narrative of incidents.

Furthermore, for the initial instance they finally showed regard for the victims: "The measures are judged required, notwithstanding the fact that he continues to deny the allegations against him."

In the end it is entitlement, self-interest and inactivity that will destroy the crown. In his stupidity, personal excess and corruption, Andrew appears never to have learned that truth.