Did the U.S. dramatically reduce attacks on American troops by paying off the enemy?

I recently saw a foreign policy journalist on C-Span who wrote a book about this topic. He claims that violence dropped significantly after the government effectively paid off both Sunnis and Shiite enemy combatants. It was a strategy used sometime late in 2007, I believe. We paid warlords (al-Sadr) and enemy groups money to stop the attacks. It proved to be quite effective. The amount of attacks almost dropped to zero because Iraqis were finally getting paid some cash after being jobless for so long. 60 U.S. dollars per month to them was a lot of money to them and they could provide for their families. It took the desperation factor out of the picture. Do you think that could work in Afghanistan?