If you are captured by the enemy and held in prison, your pay is docked? It is probably my ignorance of the military payment structure, but what the reasoning is behind this?
I imagine it was worded this way so someone couldn't just be "escaping" for an unknown length of time and just disappear - removes the incentive to not return right away. Still, I'm not how anyone would be able to prove or disprove which day he escaped in the first place - not like his captors gave him a receipt - so the whole thing is pretty goofy.
http://myarmybenefits.us.army.mil/Home/Benefit_Library/Feder...
It'd fit well - they kept trying to escape, and it'd have been easy enough to have a plot where they talk the camp commander into giving them a "fake" receipt in return for a favour, only for them to actually escape (and of course get caught again).
It kind of seems like the whole story is silly now...
This is why Bowe Bergdahl is in a big pickle if he is found guilty: he will lose 5 years of pay and return to his original low rank (he is now a Sergeant, I think he was a Private 1st Cl or Specialist) as well as be discharged as something other than "honorable".
I rather thought Bergdahl was in a “big pickle” because the charges against him both carry long prison terms (one potentially a life sentence).
He would have been paid if he had not escaped.