Dick Cheney delivered a bellicose warning to Russia yesterday during a brief visit to war-torn Georgia, promising that America's small Caucasus ally would one day join the Nato alliance .

In combative mood, the US Vice-President stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Mikhail Saakashvili, the Georgian President, and bluntly reinforced Russia's worst fears — that Washington would not stop pushing for Georgian membership in Nato. He also attacked Moscow for trying to redraw the country's borders by force. “Georgia will be in our alliance,” he said, in defiance of the Kremlin, which has blamed the military alliance's expansion into Russia's traditional sphere of influence as one of the triggers for last month's five-day war in Georgia.

“Russia's actions have cast grave doubts on Russia's intentions and on its reliability as an international partner,” Mr Cheney said, a day after the US pledged $1billion (£564million) to help Georgia to repair the damage inflicted by its huge neighbour.

Mr Cheney's warm words for Georgia's Nato aspirations are likely to cause consternation in several European capitals, particularly Berlin and Paris. Chancellor Merkel of Germany and Nicolas Sarkozy, the French President, have argued strongly against letting the former Soviet republic into Nato too hastily. America's hawkish stance threatens to sour December's crucial Nato summit, where the membership attempts by Ukraine and Georgia will top the agenda.

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Mr Cheney also denounced last month's Russian invasion of Georgia as “an illegitimate, unilateral attempt to change your country's borders by force, that has been universally condemned by the free world”.

As the Vice-President spoke, the USS Mount Whitney, the flagship of the Navy's 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean, was steaming through the Dardanelles, heading for the Georgian port of Batumi with a cargo of humanitarian aid.

Moscow complained last week that two other US warships in the port were delivering weapons to re-arm Georgia, a charge Washington denied. But the presence of such vessels reinforced Mr Cheney's firm pledge to stand by the beleaguered country.

“You have been fearless in response to the occupation of your country and steadfast in your principles. We respect you,” Mr Cheney told the Georgian leader, who managed to rally hundreds of thousands of supporters at a nationwide demonstration this week to show his country's unity in the face of Russia's actions. Mr Saakashvili has accused Moscow of planning its operation long in advance, and of using his own offensive — which he says was triggered by constant provocation by Russian-backed South Ossetian militias — as a pretext to carve up his country.

US officials have backed Mr Saakashvili's claims. Matthew Bryza, the US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, said that the war “did not begin on August 7 with the attack on Tskhinvali by Georgia, which we do believe was a mistake; but it began much sooner, thanks to provocations by South Ossetian militias, under the command, by the way, of Russian officers — Georgia did not launch a war. Georgia was drawn into one.”

Moscow failed to secure the backing of its own security grouping, made up of former Soviet allies, in its controversial backing for South Ossetian and Abkhazian independence. A statement from the Collective Security Treaty Organisation, a much truncated remnant of the Warsaw Pact, condemned Georgian

“aggression” but stopped short of recognising the two secessionist regions as separate countries. So far only Nicaragua has followed Moscow's lead.

Mr Cheney's comments are likely to fan tensions in the volatile region, a week after Dimitri Medvedev, the Russian President, warned the West that he was ready for a renewed Cold War. The next stop Mr Cheney's tour was Ukraine, where political upheaval triggered by the Georgia crisis is threatening the pro-Western Government of Viktor Yushchenko.

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