What Does Iraq's Elite Military Units Do In Their Spare Time

Iraqi police load victims killed in a bank robbery into a truck in central Baghdad, Iraq, Tuesday, July 28, 2009. Gunmen killed several security guards Tuesday during an early morning robbery at a bank in central Baghdad, an attack that appears to be the work of insurgents attempting to finance operations against Iraqi and U.S. forces, police officials said. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)

Iraqi Army Officers Pulled $4.8-million Bank Heist, Police Say -- L.A. Times

Members of an elite military unit have been arrested and the money has been recovered, authorities say. The episode fuels fears that internal corruption may be the nation's biggest security threat.

Reporting from Baghdad -- When thieves shot dead eight guards and made off with $4.8 million in one of Iraq's biggest ever bank heists last week, fingers quickly pointed at the Sunni-led insurgency.

Extremists must be turning to crime to finance their activities, so the hypothesis went, and $4.8 million would pay for a lot of bombs.

But after a series of arrests and a sweep of a government compound in recent days, Iraqi police now say the culprits were in fact Iraqi army officers attached to the elite unit guarding Shiite Vice President Adel Abdul-Mahdi.

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Update: Iraq bank robbers were Vice-President’s security guards, police say -- Times Online

My Comment: If this is Iraq's best ..... they are in trouble.