This is what happened in Lebanon following the murderous attacks on French troops and U.S. Marines by suicide bombers acting on orders from Tehran, so believe several Western intelligence agencies.

The blast that leveled the U.S. Marine compound near Beirut International Airport, and which killed 241 U.S. service personnel was reported at the time to be the largest ever non-nuclear detonation in history. Just a few miles away the explosion of the French compound known as Drakkar took the lives of 55 French soldiers.

These two attacks prompted presidents Ronald Reagan and Francois Mitterrand to reevaluate the mission and begin redeploying. French and Italian troops (and the few dozen of the Queen's Dragoons dispatched from London) began an immediate repatriation of their forces, while the United States opted to redeploy - first from the airport positions onto the ships of the Sixth Fleet cruising off the Lebanese coast, and shortly thereafter, the Marines were redeployed back to the United States.

After five years of a painful war in Iraq, reading the tea leaves of Levantine politics, there appear to be indications that the United States is ready to "redeploy" from Iraq.

In fact, Iraq has now become a central focus point in the U.S. presidential elections. And with the November voting day rapidly approaching, the Iraqis are suddenly finding out that their country is becoming an important campaign stop on the road to the White House.

This week the Democratic Party's presumptive candidate for the White House, Illinois Senator Barack Obama, accompanied by his own brigade of reporters, television cameramen and press photographers headed to the Iraqi war zone – more likely for the heavily fortified compound known as the Green Zone – where he spent several hours talking to high ranking U.S. military officers, including General David Petraeus, the top U.S. commanding officer in Iraq, and Iraqi officials, including Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Obama undoubtedly learned from U.S. officers that his intended plans to withdraw all U.S. forces from Iraq within 16 months, if he were to become president, was not a good idea.

Consequently, Obama will most likely have to rethink his policy and order a more leisurely redeployment of U.S. forces.

On the other hand the Republican Party's candidate for the U.S. presidency had earlier voiced his opinion regarding the presence of U.S. fighting forces in Iraq: Senator John McCain believes American troops must remain as long as it takes, "even up to 100 years."

When the Republican roadshow hits Baghdad, McCain will in all certainty meet with the same people who briefed his democratic rival.

They are likely to tell him that while Obama's plans for early withdrawal are unrealistic, they will also tell him that his own plans to keep U.S. troops indefinitely in Iraq is just as unrealistic.

At the end of the day the Republican and the Democratic points of view – once diametrically opposed – now appear to be merging to the point where it is hard to tell them apart.

What brought this about?

One can offer three explanations: first is election rhetoric; second is unexpected shifting realities on the war front; and third, the unpredicted rate by which the Iraqi government matured politically.

In short, neither of the two policies are realistic, and recent changes in Iraq will force both camps to rethink their strategies.

That being said, a more recent development may in fact leave the candidates little choice as they will be guided by the sudden shifts of violence in nearby Afghanistan. Last month the death toll of U.S. military personnel in Afghanistan – 15 killed – surpassed the number of GIs killed in Iraq, which stood at six.

The increase of violence in Afghanistan comes at a time when Iraq appears to be heading toward relative calm. Obama may yet have his early redeployment of U.S. troops from Iraq, only to send them to Afghanistan.

At the same time McCain may also turn out to be partially right. U.S. forces could remain deployed for up to 100 years, except the senator from Arizona got the country wrong. If U.S. forces are to remain anywhere for any long period of time in the Middle East it is more likely to be in Afghanistan than in Iraq.