This information is at the ready — for the people who actually need to know it (i.e., the actual chain of command, not self-appointed billionaires of made up departments).

They don’t plan to fill them. They plan to eliminate the position of anyone who takes this option.

Oh geez. I’m so used to reading sexual trauma records from the DoD that I just assume immediately. Sorry about that, my bad entirely.

In-service death tends to be an almost automatic grant of service-connected death benefits, likely only burial in this case. DoD failed this person. That doesn’t mean that the VA will.