The one actually reasonable explanation that I read for this whole mess (because yes, nuclear programs had clearly not been restarted before the war and the idea of democracy is naiveté taken to a new level -- remember they are Arabs and have no democratic tradition -- democracy is what the losers in the Middle East cry until they get power, and then screw that) is that the US was getting too much grief throughout the Arab world for bases in Saudi Arabia ("infidels in the Holy Land", etc.) and that we had to get our troops out of there. Still, the Middle East is to important not to have a significant troop presence, so where do we put them? Using Cuba and Guantanamo in the early 1900s as a model, why not invade a country, take out a government you don't like anyway, put in one friendly to you, sign a 99 year base lease (again, a la Guantanamo) and there you go.

That actually makes sense.