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Russia's Best Neighbors are Democracies, Cheney Says

07 May 2006

No Eastern Europe nation or NATO member is threat, vice president adds

Washington -- Russia has a "tremendous opportunity" to become a strategic ally and partner of the United States and other democracies -- none of which constitute any kind of threat to Russia, Vice President Cheney says.

The vice president made his remarks during a May 7 interview in Dubrovnik, Croatia, with NBC News following a meeting with the prime ministers of the three Adriatic Charter nations -- Croatia, Albania and Macedonia. (See related article.)

The vice president expressed the hope that Russia would see its future as one of friendship and partnership with the United States and Europe, along with a renewed commitment to democratic practices and human rights inside its borders.  At the same time, he acknowledged that Russia currently is "backsliding on democracy to some extent," having used control over energy resources such as natural gas "to try to gain leverage over those governments that used to be part of the old Soviet Union."  (See related article.)

"The best neighbor that a government can have is another democracy," Cheney said. "None of those governments in Eastern Europe constitute any kind of a threat to Russia.  The fact that many of them are now members of NATO does not constitute a threat to Russia. It's hard, though, sometimes to get the Russians to believe that."

Cheney said that the United States and Russia have common interests around the world, including the need for a unified international position on Iran's nuclear program.  He also expressed support for Russia hosting the upcoming Group of Eight (G8) Summit in St. Petersburg.  "I think a good, free, open exchange of ideas among the leaders of the eight, including Russia, will be basically a positive and healthy thing," he said.  (See related article.)

The G8 comprises Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, the United States and Russia.

Asked about the resignation of Porter Goss as head of the CIA, Cheney said that the demands on the intelligence community have shifted from the technical demands of counting missiles and silos during the Cold War to the much more difficult task of penetrating small groups of terrorists.  "It places a much heavier emphasis on human intelligence than was required before," he said.  "So there are big changes under way in the intelligence community." 

On Iraq, Cheney said he believed 2005 would prove to be the turning point in history at which the Iraqi people elected an interim government, wrote a constitution, held national elections and undertook large-scale training and deployment of security forces.

For more information on U.S. policy, see Russia.

The transcript of Vice President Cheney's interview with NBC News is available on the White House Web site.

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)