Projo 7 to 7 News Blog

By John E. Mulligan
Journal Washington bureau

WASHINGTON -- Cementing his status as a congressional advisor to the new administration on foreign affairs, U.S. Sen. Jack Reed will accompany Vice President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. this week on a fact-finding tour of southwest Asia.

Biden's office said this afternoon that he will travel with a bipartisan Senate delegation including Reed, a senior member of the Armed Services Committee, incoming Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John F. Kerry, D-Mass.; Sen. Susan Collins, R-Me.; and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.

The officials did not release any details of the trip -- including which countries they will visit -- citing security reasons. But several Asian news organizations have reported that Biden and the delegation from Capitol Hill will visit Pakistan.

This morning, Biden, Reed and Kerry attended the Newport, R.I., funeral of Claiborne Pell, the longtime Democratic U.S. senator from Rhode Island, who died last week at age 90.

Rhode Island Democrat Reed has been to Pakistan several times - often on tours that encompassed Iraq and Afghanistan as well. Reed has made 12 wartime tours of Iraq, most recently an internationally-publicized visit last July as an informal guide to then-Sen. Barack Obama.

He has also traveled with Biden. In July, 2006, the Delaware Democrat joined Reed on a tour of Iraq. Much has changed since that visit, when the two men said they had found that the insurgency in Iraq had given way to what Reed called ``a low-grade civil war.'' Since President Bush launched the strategic shift known as the ``surge'' of U.S. combat troops, levels of violence have dramatically declined.

Taken together, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - with its threats to neighboring Pakistan - may constitute the gravest foreign policy challenge facing President-elect Obama.

Biden spokeswoman Elizabeth Alexander said, "The delegation will make it clear to foreign leaders that they are not there to speak on behalf of the U.S. government or the President-elect. We extend our thanks to the Bush Administration for their cooperation in making this trip possible."

 Tags  Biden Jack Reed politics

Comments

joyce12 said:

Reed is forever touring war ravaged areas.Yet,isn't it ironic that this Vietnam era graduate of West Point never did a tour of duty in Vietnam or any other war zone.Why hasn't anyone questioned him about this lack of real experience,a lack,which to me,is deliberately obscured in his carefully constructed resume.

Link | January 5, 2009 7:19 PM
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bill said:

The primary reason for visiting vietnam by biden,
kerry,collins and graham was to promote "fair?
trade" ...how many more jobs are going to be lost
in this country because of this foolishness? It
seems to me that some of our elected officials have sold out to big business and the chamber of
commerce crowd. I hope the ones responsible for
this fiasco will be voted out, but that probably
won't happen.

Link | January 19, 2009 6:20 AM
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