Vice President Dick Cheney continues his Caspian tour with a visit to Georgia. On Thursday, Cheney condemned Russia’s response to Georgia’s attack on South Ossetia and pledged to win Georgian membership into NATO.

Vice President Dick Cheney: “America is fully committed to Georgia’s Membership Action Plan for NATO and to its eventual membership in the Alliance. The United States is very pleased with the recent establishment of a NATO-Georgia commission. As the current members of NATO declared at the summit in Bucharest, Georgia will be in our Alliance. NATO is a defensive alliance. It is a threat to no one. Indeed, NATO is one of the great forces for freedom, security and peace that the modern world has known.”

Georgia’s proposed membership in NATO has raised tensions with Russia. The move would violate an initial US promise to Russia not to expand NATO eastward.