Why Did Admiral Take His Own Life? -- Those Who Admired Jeremy M. Boorda Wonder How Questions About His Medals Could Make This Genial Man Commit Suicide

WASHINGTON - They were tiny things, really: two bronze "V's" no bigger than wedding rings. But they were worn beside the heart, and they said that a sailor had shown under fire that exquisite trait known as valor.

For decades, as he clawed his way from the ranks of the Navy masses to the post of chief of naval operations, Adm. Jeremy M. Boorda wore the "V's," along with a quilt of other medals and decorations that adorned his uniform.

Yesterday, facing questions about his right to those small "V's," he fired a bullet into his chest, not far from where his ribbons were worn, and took his own life.

Law-enforcement sources said Adm. Boorda left two notes, one to his wife and family and another to all Navy sailors. In the message to sailors, Adm. Boorda acknowledged he made a mistake in wearing the "V" pins. He had wrongly thought he was entitled to them, he said, but worried that some would never see his action as an honest mistake.

Stunned government officials and fellow military officers pondered how so small a thing might push a man of his stature to so awful an act, and many wondered if that could be all that was tormenting the nation's top naval officer, whom all knew as "Mike."

Adm. Boorda, 57, shot himself to death yesterday just before an interview with a Newsweek reporter who planned to ask him questions about the legitimacy of the two Vietnam-era service "V's" he had worn until about a year ago.

Newsweek editor Maynard Parker said the magazine "was working on a story that called into question the military decorations that . . . Boorda had been wearing for years." He said the magazine had not reached conclusions in its reporting.

Navy officials said questions had been raised about his right to the "V's" - which signify valor during armed combat against an enemy - shortly after Adm. Boorda became chief of naval operations in April 1994. The admiral had stopped wearing the "V's" then.

Adm. Boorda had claimed his first "V" on the basis of his service as a junior officer aboard a destroyer shelling the Vietnam coast in 1965.

He claimed his second "V" based on duty as the executive officer of a missile ship between 1971 and 1973 on similar missions. As executive officer, he would have been responsible for much of the ship's paperwork and should have been familiar with requirements for medals.

The citations that accompanied both medals cited Boorda's involvement in "combat operations" but did not specifically say Boorda had come under hostile fire and should receive his medals with the "V" pins.

"The Viet Cong shot back. Shelling the shoreline was not the world's safest thing to do," Norman Friedman, a naval historian, said in an interview. "It was nasty duty, and they generally earned their honors."

Honor hinged on combat

Nonetheless, Friedman said, Army and Marine personnel engaged in ground combat in Vietnam - Newsweek's Col. David Hackworth was one of them - have tended to consider naval personnel as less entitled to combat decorations.

A list of Adm. Boorda's medals and honors released by the Navy yesterday after his death did not mention the "V's."

Adm. Boorda was the first person to rise from enlisted sailor to become chief of naval operations, and as such, a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

A native of South Bend, Ind., he grew up in Chicago. He dropped out of high school, fibbed about his age and joined the Navy at the age of 17.

Over the next 35 years, he used a forceful but low-key manner to surmount social and institutional barriers to occupy the chief's office.

Navy's reputation

In recent months he was wrestling with the problem of reclaiming the Navy's reputation after a series of scandals that began with the Tailhook sexual misconduct affair.

He had been named the chief of naval operations in 1994 to replace Adm. Frank B. Kelso II after the investigation into Tailhook.

He had emphasized Navy sensitivity to gender issues and last November ordered a Navywide stand-down, or day of reflection, after several more highly publicized sexual-misconduct cases.

In addition to those worries, top Pentagon officials pointed out that the Navy chief had recently drawn two public attacks on his leadership. An anonymous letter in this week's Navy Times alleged that Adm. Boorda had lost the respect of other senior officers and should resign. And former Navy secretary James Webb delivered a scathing speech at the Naval Academy last month accusing unnamed service leaders of currying political favor at the expense of Navy personnel.

In April, speaking at the annual meeting of the U.S. Naval Institute, a private organization, Adm. Boorda said: "Do we have problems? Yes, we do. Do we have the best Navy in the world? You can count on it."

He seemed to be weathering the storms, including trouble at the Naval Academy and a string of Navy jet crashes, and was pushing forward pet projects like the futuristic weapons platform called the arsenal ship.

Several senior naval officers who worked closely with him said Boorda had given no indication that the job was getting him down.

Friends, however, also described Boorda as a highly sensitive person who took criticism of himself and the Navy personally and who lacked a tough hide.

"Any attack on the Navy, Mike Boorda would absorb as a body blow," said a Navy official who was a friend of Boorda's for decades. "He felt things very keenly."

How the issue came up

Questions about Adm. Boorda's decorations were first raised by a nonprofit organization that provides news organizations with investigative leads, the National Security News Service. Roger Charles, a correspondent with the service, had filed Freedom of Information Act requests seeking information about Adm. Boorda's awards.

"It's hard to comprehend why somebody with his experience" would wear the devices, said Charles, a former Marine officer.

Navy officials said Adm. Boorda stopped wearing the "V's" about a year ago after he was told about the FOIA request.

Newsweek officials said that yesterday morning, Newsweek's Washington bureau chief outlined to Rear Adm. Kendell Pease the details of the reporting about the decorations by Hackworth, the weekly's contributing editor for military affairs.

Abrupt departure

Pease, the Navy's chief spokesman, said that at 12:30 p.m., when he told Adm. Boorda about the 2:30 p.m. interview, the admiral asked him how they should handle the questions, then without waiting for a reply, answered his own question: "We'll just tell him the truth."

Pease said the admiral abruptly announced he was going home for lunch.

Adm. Boorda stormed to his car, brushed past his driver and drove himself home, a law-enforcement source said. The concerned driver apparently followed him home in a second car a short time later and arrived to find him mortally wounded, the source said.

He had shot himself on a bench overlooking the Washington Navy Yard's parade ground. He was pronounced dead at D.C. General Hospital.

Adm. Boorda's top deputy, Adm. Jay L. Johnson, took over as acting Navy chief after the shooting.

After Adm. Boorda's death, President Clinton said: "He was known for his professionalism and skill, but what distinguished him above all else was his unwavering concern for the welfare of the men and women who serve the United States and our Navy. We will all remember him for that and much else."

"Admiral Boorda's death is a deep personal loss for me and a great tragedy for the nation," said Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Bremerton, who counted Boorda as a close friend.

"He was a steady hand at the helm of the Navy during a turbulent time," Dicks said, "and his rise through the ranks from a 17-year-old enlistee to Chief of Naval Operations was an inspiration to each and every sailor in the fleet."

Adm. Boorda, who earned a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Rhode Island, was awarded the Defense Distinguished Service Medal, the Distinguished Service Medal, the Legion of Merit, and the Meritorious Service Medal.

He was married at 19 to Bettie Moran, and their first son, David, was born in 1958 severely disabled.

They had three other children, Edward and Robert, both Navy officers, and Anna. A daughter-in-law also is a Navy officer.

Information from Associated Press and Washington Post is included in this report.