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All good points, but whatever anyone believes there's the undeniable fact that:
1) The U.S. had a war plan for invading Iraq.
(My .02: The U.S. is quite competent in such matters)
2) They, once again, did not have a "post-war" plan. It literally didn't and still doesn't exist.
(The analogy: It's like building a skyscraper without blue prints or a project plan - almost surely, it won't turn out as you had hoped)
The U.S. had lots of time to plan post-war Iraq as the war plan revisions led by Tommy Franks were in the works for over a year (i'm sorry, I don't have the exact timeline handy - feel free to correct me).
In the Bush admin's defence, a plan to stabilize and rebuild a country like Iraq is nearly impossible. While you have military experts in Franks and his men, who exactly to you call upon to create a post-war plan?
So ... Do you go in an invade without a sound strategy for post-war or not invade at all?
Hindsight says, clearly, there was no rush to get Sadaam out - he clearly was not an imminent threat, even according to the intel they had during the height of the WMD euphoria. Someone in power needed to completely impress upon Bush et al. the vital importance of a post-war plan.
Powell did, to a point ("you break it, you buy it"), but it clearly was only a single voice when Bush, Cheney and co. were urgent to go. ("Urgent to go" because they had already started building up forces in the Middle East, were pressing the UN and had vital intel from CIA ops that required they move quickly or not at all).
They decided to go instead of wait.
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