Last week Barack Obama announced a new strategy for Afghanistan that he believes addresses the fundamental realities of the problem — including the rather belated American realization that Pakistan is integral to achieving even a remote resemblance to stability. The attacks in Lahore on Monday illustrate once again the need for a comprehensive regional solution in South Asia. But does the president’s vague public strategy hit the mark?

The most glaring problem with the proposed plan is that it continues to ignore the realities of development and military action. The White House argues that development assistance to Pakistan will help strengthen the state. The same has been said about Afghanistan. Research indicates that economic assistance and development do reduce internal state conflict and decay. However, development timelines stretch for decades, not days, weeks and months.

Military operations, however, are gauged on a much shorter timeline. Part of the problem in Afghanistan has been that development has been militarized. Development objectives are seen as a necessity to advance the political military objectives. This is problematic. Take Pakistan for example. On the one hand Obama wants to develop his way to stability; on the other, he continues to use predator drone strikes against insurgent forces. These strikes may kill insurgents, but they also inflame Pakistani public opinion against the US, thus ultimately undermining the development agenda.

All of this falls victim to a third timeline, of course: that of the US electoral cycle. Obama wants results in time for congressional midterm elections which are just two years away. If he is smart, he will continue to lower expectations because in two years the West will be lucky if we can manage the status quo in South Asia, never mind improve it.

One hopes the granularity of detail in the plan for Afghanistan and Pakistan, often referred to as AfPak for short, is much higher than what the public heard last week. But even if it is, the administration has not really grasped the fundamental problem with a military-cum-development strategy for the region. The big lesson to take away from AfPak is that to prevent such an occurrence elsewhere, we need to locate and address problems today.

As such, the Obama team must really look beyond simply trying to “fix” Afghanistan. The administration would be smart to institute a commission, possibly headed by the vice president, Joe Biden, to review how the US engages the world. The stovepipes of the Pentagon, the State Department and the much neglected US Agency for International Development are quite frankly no longer sufficient. Washington needs to redress its commitments and development agenda to the world, because the US cannot afford to wage war in a number of theaters to shore up weak and failing states such as Afghanistan.

As for the current debacle, the fact that the US is actually providing leadership is a good start. The Bush administration failed to lead in NATO and failed to lead in Afghanistan. So a renewed focus on what NATO should be doing globally and specifically in Afghanistan is welcome. That said, perhaps one of the best developments would be the recognition that NATO cannot do it alone and a regional plan within which NATO plays a role is most desirable.

Of course, these means other organizations, principally the UN, need to step up to the plate, which has not been the case. Some real leadership from the weak UN secretariat is in order. NATO can certainly play a role in helping to professionalize the Pakistani military, in training Afghan and Pakistani forces and in developing trust between the Pakistani and Indian militaries, but it cannot enforce the panoply of development goals in the region that Obama would like to enact.

Finally, the US should take a cue from its northern neighbors and enunciate a strategy that is sustainable and achievable.