Well, the smartphones wars just up amped up a notch: Google has agreed to fork over $12.5 billion for Motorola Mobility, the phone-making arm of electronics giant Motorola. This is Google’s biggest acquisition to date.

Now, a lot of folks are saying this is a move to secure patents in the increasingly litigious smartphone space, and they are right, but I see another target: Apple.

By acquiring Motorola Mobility – and at a premium (63% more than its closing price Friday) – Google now controls the software (Android) and the hardware for a smartphone. This gives Google a really good shot at making as pure an Android phone as they can, like Apple does with iOS.

Yes, Google tried this before with its original Android phone, the Nexus, which wasn’t the greatest (I’ve read), but the Nexus was more of a proof-of-concept phone than a real iPhone killer. Now that Android is more mature operating system, Google can build phones – and hopefully convince the carriers to not put a bunch of crapware on (I blame Dell and the PC desktop for this innovation) on the phones.

This helps and hurts the Samsungs and other Android phone makers. Yes, they will get the same patent protection that Google gets for the Android software, but now Google can compete with them in the hardware arena. And Motorola knows how to make phones.

Will Google fork Android here and there to tie it to a specific – Motorola – phone to have tighter integration with the hardware (and Google properties)? Why not?

Is this bad news for Apple? Not really. Sure, Android is now a little less vulnerable to patent lawsuits, but that doesn’t mean game over on this (stupid) front, by any means.

Apple still has a huge lead in smartphones, and is still the phone all others are compared to (and the iPhone 5 is due to arrive shortly, raising the bar again). It knows how to design and integrate hardware/software. Google just has a bunch of smart people – but with the Motorola Mobility purchase, they just got a bunch more smart people, but this bunch is smartphone smart.

Big winner?

The consumer. Patent protection will help keep the cost of phones down; Google entering the hardware market will encourage all sides to innovate. Phones will keep getting slicker and more affordable (I’m ignoring the telecom piece).

Things are getting more and more interesting in the smartphone space…

Update: Over at TechCrunch, it looks like Erick Schonfeld agrees with my take on the purchase. Patents nice, but having the whole package is the end game.