Sergeant Michael Smith, 24, also was demoted to the rank of private, fined US$750 pay a month for three months, and will receive a bad conduct discharge from the army.
"He will be taken into custody at the courthouse and transported to the local confinement facility at Howard County (Maryland) until his orders are cut and then he will assigned to a military confinement facility," said US army spokesperson Shaunteh Kelly.
Smith, who was photographed holding his growling Belgian shepherd within inches of cowering detainees, was found guilty on Tuesday of assaulting and maltreating prisoners Abu Ghraib prison in late 2003 and early 2004.
He was the latest in a string of enlisted soliders to be tried for abuse at Abu Ghraib documented in photographs taken by soldiers that showed guards beating and sexually humiliating Iraqi detainees.
Prosecutors said he set the dog on prisoners for his own amusement.
He was found guilty of two counts of maltreatment involving three detainees, one count of conspiring to make detainees soil themselves, one of dereliction of duty, one of assault and one of committing an indecent act.
Smith was alleged to have engaged in a contest with fellow dog handler Sergeant Santos Cardona to use their military working dogs to make terrified prisoners soil themselves. Cardona is due to stand trial on abuse charges in May.