Maybe I'm not understanding the whole situation but, accounting mistake or not, if you know they gave you more money then they should have isn't it wrong to take it? I made a mistake in my taxes a few years ago which caused us to get $500 extra in refunds. The easy thing to have done would have been to keep it and just hope they never found out. We didn't, I filed an amended return and sent them a check for $500 a few months later.
Like I said, maybe I don't understand this situation fully but, if you knowingly take something that isn't yours then you have to share a little of the blame, right? If your employer accidentally doubles one of your paychecks, are you going to rush out and spend the money or let them know someone screwed up?
Well - with all due respect - it honestly isn't as simple as you're saying here.
What usually happens is that some little schmo about 19 years old doesn't know what pay someone is supposed to get. He (or she) has filled out two dozen deployment orders already that day and they're all going to Iraq. Then one comes in that's going to Cuba, and the compensation is much different but the schmo doesn't even pay that much attention to detail (which is usually why that person is in finance in the first place).
And that have it line by line - Family Separation Allowance, Hazardous Duty Pay, etc. The very paperwork in your hands tells you "you're getting this." Now imagine that you're 19 years old yourself. (I'm always being given this 'excuse' when it's a college football player doing something he knows is against the law). You've never really been out on your own, and you spent 6-8-12 weeks in boot camp being told NOT TO QUESTION AUTHORITY.
It creates the perfect environment for that. And in some cases, the 'kids' here act responsibly. They've run up a little debt and want to get out so they don't think twice about it. Furthermore, in SOME cases when the person suggests that Finance has calculated wrongly, they're arbitrarily dismissed - and being both young and new to the service, what are they supposed to do?
And virtually every single case I ever saw of this involved a low-ranking enlisted person (E-4 or below), usually under 23.
The other little court martial thing involves 'misuse of a government credit card.' People get in all kinds of trouble over this (seemingly) mundane thing. You're traveling from Point A to Point B. You have a government issued credit card with a set limit (that you will get reimbursed when you get there). Your phone breaks en route and you buy a new I phone, knowing that since they're pretty generous with the reimbursement on travel that it's covered and you rationalize it because: a) you don't have another credit card; b) you're traveling across those big Western states out in the middle of BFE.
You get your money and pay it back IMMEDIATELY upon arrival, no big deal, right?
WRONG!!!
You have now committed fraud with 'misuse of a government credit card.' Never mind that one can reasonably argue the necessity of at least a phone for driving across New Mexico and Arizona (and most military posts are not exactly in downtown New York City).
I got around this by knowing I was moving and having plenty of money and plenty of credit card set aside so that I didn't have to use one. In fact, I never even had one. They actually told me I was going to get one at one time, and I told them I wasn't. Nothing happened.
So while what you're saying SOUNDS right to the civilian ear, there are plenty of reasons why it's not true.
Now in regards to re-enlistment bonsues......I got one when I re-upped in 1997. These are usually paid in increments (about 1/2 on the new start date and the rest divided into however many years you've re-enlisted for. So if you sign up for four years and get a $10,000 bonus FIRST they tax it at 28%. That puts you down to $7200. Then you might get about half of that ($3600) on the date your new enlistment starts. And the other $3600 would be divided over the next three years on the anniversary of your enlistment.
However - I DON'T PERSONALLY KNOW how this might affect WAR re-enlistment bonuses. It may be more complicated, probably is. Throw in things like promotions, travel pay, hazardous duty pay, family separation allowance, and all the other things and it is not all that difficult to see how a person even with the best of intentions (particularly if life hits them hard) might be misled.
And the thing is....since these soldiers likely all collect SOME level of VA disability, it is VERY EASY for the government to take it back.
You simply withold their monthly check until it's paid off.
I draw $1227 per month for a 60% disability. That would be paid off in a year. But this whole thing is still egregious, particularly when we're throwing money at everything else.