Actually the guilty parties did this back in the Bush era.
That said the Auditor ahs no choice, his/her job is to root out waste and corruption.
To fix this you need congressional action.
Yeah, figured it was so. The problem is that when it is this widespread Auditors should have caught this the following year or at least as part of the separation/retirement process. No excuse for this type of massive mistake. It always turns out bad when government people don’t do the jobs they are paid or “sworn” to do.
If a representative (of the government, operating legally or not) signed that document with a soldier, AND the government paid that money (with the implication that it was a valid indebtedness), AND so much time has passed, in a normal court of business law, the soldier would get to keep the money as I understand it. OF course, the government can basically jigger the laws any way that it pleases these days - or, just ignore them entirely.