Vice President Joe Biden, with a child survivor of the March earthquake and tsunami, at a temporary housing complex for tsunami victims in Natori, one of the hardest quake stricken cities, in northeastern Japan, Aug. 23
AFP: Vice President Joe Biden praised Japan’s courage and resolve as he visited its tsunami-shattered coast, where American forces helped with a large-scale relief effort.
Biden, near the end of an Asia tour, is the top-ranking American official to travel to the region where the March 11 earthquake and tsunami claimed more than 20,000 lives and sparked the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
…. “I came to express not only my commitment to say, ‘We will do whatever we can to help,’ but to tell you how much the president, how much I, how much the American people admire your character.”
… The United States, which has maintained bases across Japan since World War II, mobilised more than 20,000 troops and some 160 aircraft in disaster relief and recovery operations after Japan’s worst peace-time catastrophe.
One of the core achievements of the US “Operation Tomodachi” (Friend) was to clear Sendai’s international airport, where the tsunami had swept aircraft, cars, mud and debris across runways and into terminals.
At earlier talks in Tokyo, Japan’s outgoing centre-left Prime Minister Naoto Kan thanked Biden for his country’s “enormous assistance” and said he would like to “reiterate our gratitude” on behalf of Japan’s people.
“You do not need to express gratitude to us,” Biden replied. “You’d do the same for us. Our only regret is that we could not do even more.”
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Vice President Joe Biden strolls through the earthquake and tsunami stricken area, now full of weeds, in Natori
White House.gov