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Politics

Cheney is blunt in trip abroad

A thank-you tour is also a defense of Bush administration policies.

SYDNEY, Australia - Vice President Dick Cheney, in a series of blunt and sometimes biting statements during a visit to Japan and Australia, defended the Iraq war, attacked administration critics at home and warned that the U.S. would confront potential adversaries abroad.

His visit was meant to thank Australia and Japan for their support in Iraq. But in a series of public appearances and media interviews, Cheney's tone was typically feisty.

Answering growing criticism in the United States and Australia, he defended the Iraq war as a "remarkable achievement" in one speech, and dismissed suggestions his influence in Washington is waning.

Cheney's support for the Iraq war drew protesters into Sydney's streets for two days. But the crowds were small and the clashes brief, and Cheney enjoyed a generally warm welcome, including lunch at Australian Prime Minister John Howard's harborside mansion and a cruise past the Sydney Opera House.

In Japan, Cheney asserted that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's opposition to President Bush's troop buildup in Iraq would "validate the al-Qaida strategy."

A furious Pelosi complained to the White House that Cheney was impugning the patriotism of critics of the war. Cheney refused to back down: "I said it and I meant it," he told ABC News. "I didn't question her patriotism, I questioned her judgment."

Cheney was more diplomatic, but no less direct, on Friday when he discussed North Korea's pursuit of nuclear weapons and China's rapid modernization of its 2.3-million-strong military forces.

Noting that China - an emerging economic power - had hit a defunct weather satellite with a missile last month, Cheney said that some of the country's actions were at odds with its pledge to develop peacefully.

In the same speech, though, he praised China for its help in persuading North Korea to seal its main nuclear reactor in exchange for oil. But Cheney added North Korea had "much to prove," namely that it would honor the deal.

Michael McKinley, an expert in Australia-U.S. relations at the Australian National University, said Cheney's association with an Iraq policy that many see as a failure has made him unpopular, but it is too soon to write off his influence.

[Last modified February 25, 2007, 05:18:47]