The key reason that anti-U.S. and internecine sectarian violence in Iraq has fallen probably is not the surge of U.S. troop numbers–that tactic failed when it was employed in 2005. Instead, the lull in violence is due to U.S. military leaders having taken two actions that the administration is unlikely to publicize widely, according to Independent Institute Senior Fellow Ivan Eland, director of the Center on Peace & Liberty. The one-two punch consists of deploying diplomatic carrots rather than lethal sticks–namely, negotiating with Shi'ite cleric Moktaka al-Sadr and making payments to Sunni guerilla groups.

"Make no mistake: paying off your enemies is always a better and cheaper strategy than expending the blood and treasure to fight them," writes Eland in a new op-ed. "Yet paying off enemies to reduce the violence is not a long-term solution to stability in Iraq. In that part of the world, if you quit making the pay offs or conditions change in such a volatile and fractured society, violence could quickly escalate again."

Eland–long a proponent of using a U.S. troop withdrawal to motivate the fractious elements in Iraq to negotiate a power-sharing arrangement with decentralized governance–fears that Barack Obama and John McCain are missing the big picture. "The al Qaeda that threatens the United States is in Pakistan, not Afghanistan or Iraq," Eland continues. "Thus, the U.S. should withdraw all of its forces from Iraq and Afghanistan and concentrate on dealing with al Qaeda in Pakistan."