fixing surface scratches

i have an opportunity to pick up a strat pretty cheap, but it has some funky scratching on the front. not through to the wood, but pretty noticeable. my question is how would i go about "fixing" this? I am picking this up to eventually mod to a gilmour clone (approximately), so I want to keep it black. can i just lightly sand out the scratches and then clear coat the front or is it a bigger job than that? do i have to do the whole body with poly (its a MIM mid-90's so I am assuming poly -- is that right)? the back has some buckle rash, but that's fine with me and I would leave it alone if that works.

I've never refinished (or finished, for that matter) a guitar, so I don't want to get in over my head on this even for the great price.

Thanks in advance for any thoughts on this!!! Here's a couple of pics (hopefully they upload correctly -- this is my first time posting pics):

Looks like you could wet sand with 1500-2000 grit and Polish it out. I'd go ahead and disassemble the guitar and Polish the whole thing. Study up, Google is your friend. :)

mojo!

Thanks for the quick reply Justin and the encouragement. I actually am now running through threads and googling stuff too. Just posted because I need to make a decision on buying or not in the morning. Leaning towards going for it. Maybe the mojo will win out and I'll never get to the polishing...