I don't think NG will be the primary focus in the Middle East, given how short it seems to be in the Middle East (e.g., Iran in recent years was a net importer).

The assumption is that the implied use of military force will be used to direct oil cargoes to the US and Western Europe.

If you want to stray into the realm of geopolitical speculation, I would say that they went to Iraq for a variety of reasons. Some rational and valid, some quite purposefully insane.

One of the rational reasons for going into Iraq was to artificially and gradually inflate oil prices. They had to do this to give the US economy a chance to prepare for peak oil. The logic behind this is: Iraq is a country that could be made into the world's largest oil exporter in fairly short order. Think about that from a military / tactical perspective. Iraqi oil is a sure thing. Just wipe out the entire civilian population, and there can be no insurgency. This is assuming that the economic fallout from peak oil got bad enough. I am certain that Americans would support any number of Iraqi civilian casualties to ensure that Iraq continues to expand its oil production, IF faced with a large enough crisis here at home.

By invading Iraq, they created a buffer of easily scalable oil supply that they could tap in an emergency. They drove up prices in the short term, but my guess is they did not care about that. They were thinking about the long term picture. They wanted to ensure that America, or rather the world in general, would not get caught in a situation where we were faced with a catastrophic decline in oil production, ie a production problem that could not be overcome no matter how many resources were thrown at the problem. From a tactical perspective, that is one of the ultimate goals of the US military industrial complex. By having an Iraq on the back burner, they are ensured to have oil available for production IF an extreme emergency arises where that extra oil is needed. A great depression and a downward spiral of decreased oil production combined with global pipeline terror and decreased capital flows could be an apt description of such an emergency. Indeed, such a situation could easily spiral into a total breakdown of society across the globe. From a purely tactical perspective, 5 million barrels a day of cheap Iraqi oil brought online during such a crisis could and would turn it around. What is a few million dead Iraqis compared to that? That is no doubt the philosophical question that guides them through all of this.

This analysis assumes that Bush, Cheney, and their controllers are driven by a vision of a greater good that is "somewhat benign". Back in 2001, I think their advisors had told them things like "dont worry what the people say, you are saving civilization by doing this." I think that is why they don't care so much about how they've wrecked the economy. In their minds, they've saved it. Just like in their minds they've prevented more terror attacks. It's total delusion, but given the information they've been fed, it is understandable. The entire system is corrupt. From the figureheads like Bush and Obama, to the advisors, all the way down to the think tanks and foundations that create their philosophy of war. They dont question the overarching philosophy of imperialism and global governance, so they will end up destroying the engines of wealth that support them.