WASHINGTON — William Crowe, an Annapolis-trained submarine officer who rose to chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and served as ambassador to Great Britain, died Thursday of cardiac arrest at a Bethesda, Md., hospital.
He was 82.
With an academic bent, Crowe sometimes wondered if his advanced degrees might stymie his Navy career, but he moved from diesel submarines after graduating from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1946 to chief of the Pacific Command.
President Reagan named him the 11th chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1985.
The year before, Crowe had impressed Reagan, who stopped in Hawaii en route to China for a briefing from Crowe on the military situation in the Far East.
Crowe retired from the military in 1989.
But in 1994, President Clinton appointed him ambassador to the Court of St. James’s, where he served until 1997.
Born in La Grange, Ky., William J. Crowe Jr. grew up in Oklahoma City.
In addition to his degree from the Naval Academy, he had a master’s in personnel administration from Stanford University and a master’s and doctorate in politics from Princeton University.
