Holy cow. The guy who was the Army’s logistics chief says Rumsfeld threatened to fire planners who wanted to discuss post-war strategy in Iraq:

“The secretary of defense continued to push on us … that everything we write in our plan has to be the idea that we are going to go in, we’re going to take out the regime, and then we’re going to leave,” Scheid said. “We won’t stay.”
Scheid said the planners continued to try “to write what was called Phase 4,” or the piece of the plan that included post-invasion operations like occupation.
Even if the troops didn’t stay, “at least we have to plan for it,” Scheid said.
“I remember the secretary of defense saying that he would fire the next person that said that,” Scheid said. “We would not do planning for Phase 4 operations, which would require all those additional troops that people talk about today.

So the idea was to anoint Chalabi the new ruler of Iraq, have him declare peace in our time, recognize Israel, and thank the US profusely. What the Shia and Kurds thought about this was evidently not the United States’ problem.
Senator Fulbright wrote a book about Washington politics entitled “The Arrogance of Power.” If he were still alive he’d have to write a sequel.
Via Kevin Drum, who has more thoughts on this.