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This episode commenced with a isolated photograph, arguably the most significant ever captured of a individual from the royal household.

Present was the Baron Killyleagh, arm-in-arm a teenage girl, while an associate smiled knowingly in the background.

Without that snapshot, captured at a social event in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the claims of a young woman who stated she was transported across the ocean and compelled to have cursory relations with a prince of the royal bloodline?

A strange, indicative action by someone who had openly asserted to have not heard of her, said he could never have had intimate contact with her, and yet paid millions of monarchical money to resolve a protracted lawsuit.

Over a Decade of Scandal

Considering this, conversations of the royals acting swiftly to distance themselves from Andrew are inaccurate. This controversy has persisted for the majority of 15 years since that picture, and another image of Andrew walking pleasantly with a convicted sex offender surfaced.

• Self-importance: For what duration did his family members, possibly even his parents, know that Andrew was so self-entitled?
• Questionable Associations: They must have realized, if his staff and the police were fulfilling their roles, that he had some deeply disreputable friends given he publicly hosted them to royal residences.
• Monetary Excess: If the household did not know about his sexual proclivities, they certainly knew about his wastefulness with public money.

Trips were documented in public records: private aircraft transfers from the royal residence to a country club and back again in time for dining, private flights instead of regular transport, all for the convenience of "Airmiles Andy".

Existence of Entitlement

Additionally the arrogance which expected respect when he appeared in a room or the supreme awareness about his honorifics used on his correspondence in letters to his friends.

He could get away with it while his matriarch, who strangely indulged him, was still living. The sovereign did at least revoke him of public duties and honorary colonelcies in the consequence of his disastrous and, as revealed, mendacious television interview six years ago.

Current Situation

Merely in the last 14 days that events sped up, following the issuance of accounts giving more grim particulars of his actions and that of his connections.

Further disclosures have again highlighted Andrew's thinking that he could get away with being untruthful about his contact with a disgraced individual.

The public (and the press) were far ahead of the royal family. There was not a single person of any consequence to speak up for him, a consequence of all those years of presumption.

Royal Worries

The wiser royals recognized that. The one imperative is to pass on the monarchy, if not as before at least complete and untarnished.

Over time the last 190 years trying to reverse the image of earlier rulers, proving they are valuable, accountable and reactive to their citizens.

He was placing all that in peril in an time when submission and privacy is no longer adequate.

Aftermath

Eventually, the well-known indecisive king was pressured further. There was little choice. The royal household had relinquished authority of the story.

Currently the stripping of honorifics and the ongoing and lifetime social disgrace that will afflict Andrew most deeply.

• Downgrading: Reduced to just Mr Mountbatten-Windsor
• Prior Instance: The initial monarch to lose his designations in contemporary era
• Military Service: Especially stinging given his role in the conflict

He is still a counsellor of state, theoretically able to act for the monarch, and he is still in the lineage to the monarchy, but none of these will ever happen.

What Lies Ahead

Can persons he encounters still defer to him? Might they still make mistakes and call him Sir? Would they say Sir,

Of course, he is not retiring to a common area, but to the monarchy's extensive property at Sandringham.

In that place, he will be supplied by the monarch with one of the grace and favour houses and given some form of financial support.

It is not his previous residence, where he paid a token payment for more than 20 years, and the county is a bit far, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Unresolved Issues

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

• Political Pressure: Might parliament demand more
• Financial Investigation: Or investigate the waste of taxpayer funds
• Legal Possibility: There may even be a criminal probe into his actions

Possibly for the present the institutional damage to the crown is restricted. The narrative from the institution was plainly that the revocation of honorifics was what the king, and notably other senior monarchical figures, desired.

A Shift in Position

The cessation of deception that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, significantly, the concise communication showed plainly that the royals were siding with the complainant's account of incidents.

Even more, for the premiere occasion they finally showed consideration for the affected individuals: "These actions are judged required, despite the fact that he continues to deny the accusations against him."

Ultimately it is entitlement, self-seeking and indolence that will kill the monarchy. In his folly, personal excess and venality, Andrew seems never to have learned that truth.