I also remember the 'old days' and believed that the 'good men' were generally doing their best to learn lessons and prevent a recurrence - it never crossed my mind that anyone would act otherwise.
I used to feel the same way but for me, that all changed with what I saw as a gross miscarriage of justice over the Mull of Kintyre Chinook accident. As soon as I read the abridged BOI report it was very obvious what had occurred; i.e. "the system" was protecting "the system" at the expense of the deceased. The slurs put on the crew were outrageous in view of the debacle of the Mk2 Chinook's lack of airworthiness when it was forced into service. Thank goodness it was eventually all put right.
Since then I've seen "the system" fail to mention the full training history of the captain of another high profile RAF accident. Having done so might well have attracted criticism of the RAF's ability to properly manage and monitor personnel throughout their flying career. The pilot in question was put in a position where he needed skills that he had previously shown to have had fundamental difficulties with during his basic training. Not only that, but he was allowed to push the envelope of the aircraft too far and another tragic accident occurred.
Just two examples I can recall (I remember them because I was involved in earlier training of pilots in both those accidents). I think it's a very good thing that accident investigation is done independently. After all, we would be horrified if airlines were allowed to do their own accident investigations. For obvious reasons.