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Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

latimes.com

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Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#51

Post by dbg31415 »

DanBC wrote: post #34
dbg31415 wrote: post #26

So did recruiters cut bigger checks than they were supposed to? If so, someone had to sign off on that... either recruiters or the managers should be held accountable. Soldiers got contracts promising one amount but received checks for another amount? Yeah, they should have to pay that back then. But who wrote checks and / or promised numbers higher than the contracts?

> Soldiers got contracts promising one amount but received checks for another amount? Yeah, they should have to pay that back then. No, soldiers got promised one amount, got contracts for that amount, got paid that amount, and now it's being clawed back because the people who did the original promising and paperwork filing were breaking various laws.

Well if they have contracts for the higher amount... how is this a thing?

Unless the contracts weren't signed by someone from the government who could sign those contracts?

How would the soldiers know if the government recruiter was legit or not... yeah seems fucked. Government didn't supervise their recruiters correctly. Wouldn't that make all the contracts void? Messy.

If the military needs bodies, they should just go back to drafting them. Would help society see the true cost of policing the world instead of taking advantage of the poor.

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#52

Post by tedunangst »

erentz wrote: post #32
chrismcb wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article "Investigations have determined that lack of oversight allowed for widespread fraud and mismanagement by California Guard officials under pressure to meet enlistment targets."

But fraud on the part of the California Guard is an internal matter. If I form a contract with a company that says they will pay me some amount of money, but the company representative was committing fraud internally then too bad. The company needs to deal with that. It can't reneg on its agreement years later after having already fulfilled the terms of the agreement.

In this case though, it seems some of the terms of the agreement were "become a radio operator" and the recipient didn't do that. I imagine the recruiter very likely said "don't worry, nobody will check" but now they're checking.

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#53

Post by gnarbarian »

mnem wrote: post #29
dogma1138 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm surprised that this is somehow even passed the slightest political oversight. You need to be a special kind of bastard to ask some one who willingly signed up to get shot at while defending their country to pay back any amount of money they got paid for doing so. Wars aren't pretty, regardless of what you think about them, and especially about Iraq and Afghanistan never ever take it out on the soldiers, they are…

Well, they decide when they enlist to go kill people when told to.

This is laughably ignorant.

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#54

Post by JabavuAdams »

dogma1138 wrote: post #23
rileymat2 wrote: post #16

"Robert D’Andrea, a retired Army major and Iraq veteran, was told to return a $20,000 bonus he received in 2008 because auditors could not find a copy of the contract he says he signed." How is this possible? If private businesses could do this, it would be mayhem.

I'm surprised that this is somehow even passed the slightest political oversight. You need to be a special kind of bastard to ask some one who willingly signed up to get shot at while defending their country to pay back any amount of money they got paid for doing so. Wars aren't pretty, regardless of what you think about them, and especially about Iraq and Afghanistan never ever take it out on the soldiers, they are…

I wouldn't blame someone who got drafted, but it is reasonable to fault someone for joining a volunteer army of a militarily aggressive nation.

If you sign up to become a fire-fighter or paramedic, you will never be in a position where the machine you are a piece of requires / encourages you to kill people who don't need killing.

The fact is that there are parts of war / military life that are more exciting than being a fire-fighter, say. It's also culturally reinforced and lauded.

I've almost signed up at various times, but I view it as a form of "combat tourism."

We have almost a century of literature and culture devoted to uncovering the dark side of modern warfare. In addition, we have a large number of cases where our own governments have lied to us that are well documented, and entirely uncontroversial.

That said, I still see the appeal. It's just not a situation I want to allow myself to be put in.

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#55

Post by anotheryou »

derekp7 wrote: post #42
erentz wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But fraud on the part of the California Guard is an internal matter. If I form a contract with a company that says they will pay me some amount of money, but the company representative was committing fraud internally then too bad. The company needs to deal with that. It can't reneg on its agreement years later after having already fulfilled the terms of the agreement.

If you buy a piece of electronic equipment from a dealer at a flea market, and it is later found out that the merchandise was stolen, you have to return the merchandise to the original owner. Even if there was a valid contract between you and the dealer that sold it to you. I think this is seen as something similar -- the people giving out the bonus money basically "stole" it, so it wasn't theirs to give. Kind of lik…

But if the dealer was known he would have to reimburse me, no?

Also what if I where no longer in possession of the good?

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#56

Post by Implicated »

snerbles wrote: post #39
dominotw wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this merely a reflection of general American population that views the army as a major drain on national resources that can be better spent elsewhere. Or is there something more sinister going on inside the National Guard.

Support from the American populace consists of flag-waving and slapping "Support our Troops" yellow ribbon magnets on their cars. Unless they're personally related to someone in the military, servicemembers and veterans are invisible at best, or seen as deranged reactionary boogiemen at worst. EDIT: I should really note that this depends on where you live. Support is certainly more sincere in the South, over here on…

As someone who has traveled the country pretty extensively, I can't agree.

As someone who grew up in a large western coastal city, I would agree that perception is accurate to that locale.

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#57

Post by vacri »

dogma1138 wrote: post #23
rileymat2 wrote: post #16

"Robert D’Andrea, a retired Army major and Iraq veteran, was told to return a $20,000 bonus he received in 2008 because auditors could not find a copy of the contract he says he signed." How is this possible? If private businesses could do this, it would be mayhem.

I'm surprised that this is somehow even passed the slightest political oversight. You need to be a special kind of bastard to ask some one who willingly signed up to get shot at while defending their country to pay back any amount of money they got paid for doing so. Wars aren't pretty, regardless of what you think about them, and especially about Iraq and Afghanistan never ever take it out on the soldiers, they are…

While I'm certainly of the opinion that this is a ridiculous situation and those bonuses should be left alone (salary of 42 auditors alone would probably take the lion's share of the recoverable funds, independent of the moral issue), let's keep things in perspective - deployment to Iraq was not 'defending their country'. The US was never threatened by Iraq.

Similarly, not everyone in Vietnam got drafted, and even if they were drafted, that's no excuse for the abuses there. If you're signed up to fight against your will, that's no excuse for taking part in activities such as the My Lai massacre. Where is the moral high ground in punishing innocent foreigners because your government on the other side of the world forced you to fight?

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#58

Post by cjslep »

I imagine this only damages the USA. The next time they need heavy recruitment numbers, people will look at the signing bonuses offered and either say "My life is worth more than this amount" or "this amount is too good to be true, they'll ask for it back in the future" and not sign on.

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#59

Post by mikecb »

throwawayIndian wrote: post #8

Elsewhere, a for-profit prison extended their contract[1] with Feds barely a month after the Department of Justice said it would end[2] contracts with private prison operators. [1] https://twitter.com/i/moments/789498562904293376 [2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/08/1... These are pretty quick u-turns by an establishment that's confident about business as usual following elections. Gravy-tra…

This was for a DHS immigration facility, not for a prison. (Not that it makes it any better, but it doesn't break with Justice's decision.)

Re: Thousands of California soldiers forced to repay enlistment bonuses

#60

Post by vacri »

dlp211 wrote: post #43
mnem wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they decide when they enlist to go kill people when told to.

Hardly, the vast majority of jobs in the US Army are non-combat. You shouldn't paint with such a broad brush, many who serve do so out of a sense of duty to the nation, to escape a bad situation including poverty or get out of a dying town, and/or to gain access to higher education through the use of tuition assistance and GI Bill programs.

How do you get to enlistment age in modern western society, where every second movie and video game is about military guys blowing things up and massacring wave after wave of lemming-enemy, without thinking that the army is there to kill people? If you're in a non-combat role, you're still there explicitly to support those in a combat role.
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