Yeah. They gave the radio operator bonus to the cook (as an example). It's easy to see from the amount it was the radio bonus, and it's easy to see from the service record somebody was a cook, and that was bonus was overpaid. And now they want their money back (which is pretty shitty, given the circumstances). But the amounts of the correct bonus and the given bonus are not unknowable. These aren't bespoke contracts, every one unique.
The military is very good at doing whatever they want to.
There's a better than good chance they just started docking 100% of his pay without telling them anywhere but their pay stub, then put them in a situation where it takes man-days at a minimum to get answers. It's something that happened to a way too many people that I knew. first one was old navy so ended in a hilarious fist fight(after being without pay for two months from an admin error), second one was new navy so it was a very painful process of working with personnel while they were on 4 hour workdays in shipyard, then there are way too many people that fell into classic bonus blackmail were the navy just beats you down in all directions(socially, finciancilly, and time) after getting disqualified from your job(mast, medical, mental, and family issues all included) (basically if you get bonus of some sort it hangs over your head for a good 4-6 years, and if you do pay it back you're paying it back in docked pay, withheld taxes, and maybe even your bank account. And in the amount that was paid to you before taxes).
I'm guessing here, but I imagine there's a clause like "recipient agrees to attend X training, and return bonus otherwise." Whether the recipient remembers seeing that clause is another matter.
