I would say that's exactly it.
We gave a good friend who worked at Lockheed for years. He has some unbelievable-but-true stories, like yours, in dealing with the government.
But "flushing the budget" is done all the time when grant monies (whatver the source) aren't completely spent before the deadline. If they're not spent, they must be returned. I worked for a few years for a nonprofit and come June, we'd order lots of giveaways and other things or the money would have to go back. It made me angry to see it because in the end those were my tax $$ (most of their funding came from the State). I finally left for MANY reasons.
gave = have
durn fingies