Pessimism

KiwiPundit says:

There's no way to recover from Abu-Ghraib except to severly punish those who took part and those who knew, and fire or demote those who should have known or are otherwise culpable through inaction. Then we just have to wait for the wounds to heal.

Yes. The problem is that, judging by past behaviour, the US is unlikely to hand out anything more than a wet bus ticket. Lt Calley, the leader of the massacre at My Lai, served only three years of his life sentence. The only soldier so far convicted of killing prisoners unlawfully in Iraq received a demotion and a discharge - for manslaughter! The US Army has dragged its feet over investigating and prosecuting other suspicious deaths of prisoners in custody - and has not lifted a finger to investigate grossly unlawful deaths of civilians. And most importantly, despite the Taguba report recommending immediate disciplinary action against military intelligence staff at Abu Ghraib, the army's reaction has been anything but "immediate".

I don't think there's much hope there, I'm afraid. Serious prosecutions would involve admitting that the United States did something bad - and that is something that the US will never do. At least, not under the current administration.