OK, but why would the CNG offer bonuses it knew weren’t approved or funded? None of this is adding up, frankly.
I’m not arguing that the soldiers didn’t deserve every last penny, just that there’s something fishy along the line here. I know when my son joined the Army (not the Guard) he had a contract. He committed to a certain MOS, and to serve for four years; the Army promised him $X, in writing, if he fulfilled the contract. How did the CNG make promises, not put it in writing, as part of the reenlistment effort? Didn’t the soldiers have any kind of contract? It was all just wide open?
The top brass at the CNG offered the ‘extra’ bonuses to meet reenlistment levels that they were suppose to meet. Otherwise enough soldiers weren’t reenlisting.
Either the CNG brass thought is was OK, or that they could get away with it and the US government wouldn’t notice.
Note that it did take them 10-12 years to track it down.
Apparently most/all? of them had contracts for the extra amount, but the US says that the fact the CNG wasn’t supposed to offer these extra amounts means the contracts weren’t valid.
And one soldier is being required to pay back his entire $20K bonus because he no longer has his copy of the contract, and they can’t find one for him either.
So they want ‘all’ the bonus back.