Navy Fliers Say Probe Getting Too Personal : Tailhook: Pentagon investigators are asking questions about their sex lives that have nothing to do with scandal, sources say.

Naval aviators interrogated by Pentagon investigators complained Wednesday that they are being subjected to embarrassing questions about their personal sex lives that have nothing to do with the Tailhook convention scandal.

Several sources familiar with the Department of Defense probe said the investigators are demanding that officers answer questions about masturbation and their sexual likes and dislikes.

The investigators, who include former FBI agents, are in the second month of an investigation of sexual harassment and assaults by drunken Navy and Marine aviators against more than 25 women, 13 of them Navy officers, at the September, 1991, Tailhook Assn. convention in Las Vegas.

Pentagon investigators are currently questioning officers from three Miramar Naval Air Station squadrons who were at sea during the first round of interrogations in July. In addition, about 13 officers who were interrogated in July are being questioned a second time.

On Wednesday, sources said some questions posed by the Pentagon investigators had nothing to do with the Tailhook sex scandal and appeared to be designed solely to embarrass the person being questioned. The interrogations were done at the Miramar, home to the well-known Top Gun fighter pilot school.

Marine Corps fliers who were questioned earlier this month at El Toro Marine Corps Air Station in Orange County by the Department of Defense investigators made the same complaints.

According to sources familiar with the Pentagon investigation, aviators are being asked when was the last time they masturbated, how many times a week they masturbate, and if they have engaged in any embarrassing sexual conduct.

The sources, who requested anonymity, said there is no correct answer to the sex questions.

“If you answer no they call you a liar and threaten to charge you with perjury. If you answer yes, they tell you that’s conduct unbecoming an officer, and that it’s deviant sexual behavior,” he said.

Other sources said some aviators were also asked questions about their sexual relationships with their wives.

Marine Corps Maj. Steve Little, a Pentagon spokesman, declined to comment about the investigators’ questions. He said it is Department of Defense policy “not to comment on an ongoing investigation.”

Local Navy officials who requested anonymity said the investigators refuse to say what, if anything, the personal questions have to do with the Tailhook investigation.

These officials said that aviators are also being pressured to take polygraph examinations and threatened with retaliation if they refuse, even though official Department of Defense policy states that polygraph tests are voluntary.

Navy sources familiar with some of the interrogations said that aviators who are being questioned a second time were told “there are three kinds of people” who attended the 1991 Tailhook convention.

According to these sources, the Pentagon investigators described the Tailhook participants as those who were on the third floor of the hotel where the sexual assaults occurred; those who have taken polygraph examinations and cleared themselves of wrongdoing, and those whose guilt or innocence remains unresolved.

A common tactic used by the investigators--particularly on aviators being questioned a second time--is to come across as friendly and conciliatory. Individual interrogations are usually done by two investigators.

“They’ll try to disarm you by telling you they’re representing the government. They’ll tell you that they really want to help you and ask if you wouldn’t feel better if you cleared things up by taking a polygraph,” said one Navy source.

A Navy wife whose husband was interrogated by Pentagon investigators said the Tailhook probe is causing rifts in marriages and families.

“The stress and uncertainty of what’s going to happen to the husband has caused a lot of problems for a lot of marriages and families,” said the woman, who requested anonymity. “The husbands have no recourse but to answer questions. I asked my husband if he signed away his civil rights when he joined the Navy. . . . How can they (Pentagon) expect to get the truth when they have everyone terrified?”

She said that some wives who are volunteers on committees and activities at various Navy bases in San Diego are debating whether they should resign in protest over the Tailhook investigation.

The wives are especially angry with admirals who have failed to move to protect the rights of airmen who serve under them, the woman added. The woman’s husband is a senior officer who underwent a lengthy interrogation last month.

In October, the Navy’s inspector general said that as many as 70 Navy and Marine officers were suspected of sexual misconduct at the 1991 Tailhook convention and of attempting to obstruct the inspector general’s investigation. An earlier investigation by the Naval Investigative Service concluded that some officers were guilty of criminal wrongdoing, but there were no charges filed.

The Pentagon launched a third investigation after congressional critics charged the Navy had botched its investigation.

Acting Navy Secretary Sean O’Keefe is scheduled to visit Miramar today to meet with senior officers. He is expected to field questions about the Tailhook investigation and try to lift the base’s sagging morale.

Adm. Frank Kelso, chief of naval operations visited the base Monday and met with junior officers. Kelso also fielded several questions about the Tailhook investigation and heard complaints from dozens of aviators who said the probe is debilitating the aviation community.