STRATFOR has a lengthy analysis of the Administration’s reasons for invading Iraq. Excerpt:

From Washington’s point of view, the problem of al Qaeda has become the problem of U.S. relations with the Islamic world in general and with al Qaeda in particular. The Bush people also see this as unsolvable. The creation of a Palestinian state simply will be the preface for the next generation of the war. Repudiation of Israel might satisfy some — while destabilizing Jordan and Egypt — but it still would not solve the core problem, which is the desire to expel the United States from the region.

That leaves abandoning the region altogether, which is seen as impossible. First, there is oil. Although the development of Russian oil reserves is underway, the fact is that Persian Gulf oil is a foundation of the Western economic system, and abandoning direct and indirect (through client regimes) access to that oil would be unacceptable.

Second, al Qaeda’s dream is the creation of an integrated Islamic world in confrontation with the non-Islamic world. This is a distant threat, but were the United States to leave the region, it would not be unthinkable. That itself makes withdrawal unthinkable.

The al Qaeda problem cannot be confined simply to al Qaeda or even to allied groups. It is a problem of a massive movement in the Islamic world that must be contained and controlled. Placating this movement is impossible. The manner in which the movement has evolved makes finding a stable modus vivendi impossible.

What may be possible is reshaping the movement, which would mean changing the psychological structure of the Islamic world. Five events have shaped that psychology:

1. The 1973 oil embargo

2. The survival of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein

3. The defeat of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan

4. The perceived defeat of the United States in Somalia

5. Sept. 11, 2001

Each of these events served to reverse an Islamic sense of impotence. From 1973 until Sept. 11, the Islamic world has been undergoing a dual process. On the one side, there has been a growing sense of the ability of the Islamic and Arab worlds to resist Western power. On the other side, there has been an ongoing sense of victimization, a sense predating the United States by centuries.

The center of gravity of Washington’s problem is psychological. There is no certain military or covert means to destroy al Qaeda or any of its murky allied organizations. They can be harassed, they can be disrupted, but there is no clear and certain way to destroy them. There may, however, be a way to undermine their psychological foundations, by reversing what radical Islamists portray as the inherent inevitability of their cause. Sacrifice toward victory is the ground of their movement. Therefore, if the sense of manifest destiny can be destroyed, then the foundations of the movement can be disrupted.

While invading Iraq has important military and strategic implications, the psychological angle is important, too.