Was Iraq all about Oil?

I've read in many different places that the Iraq war was not "all about oil". I consider Gwynn Dyer (and Scott Ritter) proof that not everyone, prior to the Iraq war, believed Saddam had weapons of mass destruction as frequently asserted by the Bush administration. In Ignorant Armies Dyer describes in great detail why the impending war is not about weapons of mass destruction and what is likely to follow. However all of his books on the Iraq War (Ignorant Armies, Future Tense and The Mess They Made) argue that oil is sold on the global open market so it unnecessary for the US to invade Iraq to get Iraq's oil - they can just buy it. I have alot of respect for Dyer's opinion so for a long time I was inclined to accept this view. He points out that Iraq continued to sell the majority of its oil to the US right up until the invasion in 2003. But I've always felt there was something missing. And I think I know what it is.

The difference between Iraq selling its oil on the open market and any other oil producing nation is Iraq (under Saddam) doesn't get the money. The Food for Oil program run by the UN receives the money. Saddam managed to siphon some money off, funnel some into bribes and kickbacks and the UN would spend some on medicine, etc. But the majority of that money went into the Food for Oil fund. According to this 2005 article in the Guardian -

The US Congress also voted to spend $18.4bn of US taxpayers' money on the redevelopment of Iraq. By June 28 last year, however, when Bremer left Baghdad two days early to avoid possible attack on the way to the airport, his CPA had spent up to $20bn of Iraqi money, compared with $300m of US funds. The "reconstruction" of Iraq is the largest American-led occupation programme since the Marshall Plan - but the US government funded the Marshall Plan. Defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Bremer have made sure that the reconstruction of Iraq is paid for by the "liberated" country, by the Iraqis themselves.

So the reconstruction of Iraq involved spending up to $20bn in Food for Oil money, which rightfully belongs to the Iraqi people. Had this money been used for "reconstruction", this expense might be justified but if you see the film No End in Sight or read "Imperial Life in the Emerald City", its clear that little or no reconstruction took place. Or better yet read Matt Taibbi's The Great Iraq Swindle. He refers to screwing the American public out of taxpayer money but keep in mind that its $20bn of Iraqi's oil revenue to $300 million of US taxpayer money. That money goes directly to US contractors (virtually no Iraqi's are directly involved in Iraqi reconstruction ... go figure) who provide little or no services in return. These contractors, such as KBR (and its parent Halliburton), Bechtel, Custer-Battles, DynaCorp and Blackwater, in turn make huge contributions to the campaigns of Republican politicians and the Republican party itself. The US buys oil from Iraq and a large percentage of that money goes directly back to US companies and Republican politicians. So the US, in effect, buys the oil and gets to keep the money - including the money for all of the Iraqi oil it has bought in the previous 10 years.

Its sort of like if I bought your house and when the transaction was finished I got the house and, minus a few transaction fees, I also got to keep my money. And you basically get nothing.