“BTW: Fired for something 17 years ago? There has GOT to be more to this.”
No, that will do it. There MAY be more to it, but lying to investigators would be enough.
Since this occured 17 years ago, he’s been vetted for the highest positions in the Navy requiring the highest level of security clearance (TS/SCI) and probably read into other stuff (i.e SAP) all of which required anal investigations of the highest of order.
Think Roughhead (CNO) found an opportunity to clean up an old score?