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WASHINGTON: Despite his deep-rooted unpopularity in Britain, US President George W. Bush says he's not concerned about massive protests when he opens his state visit in London today.
"No, not concerned at all. Glad to be going to a free country where people are allowed to protest," Bush said on Sunday.
After arriving at Heathrow Airport, the president and his wife Laura will be whisked to Buckingham Palace and largely kept in what Bush himself describes as a security-enclosed bubble - cut off from activity in the rest of the city.
"I'm really looking forward to it. It's going to be a fantastic experience," Bush told reporters at the White House.
Bush fielded a number of questions about the expected visit, during which he will meet with his key ally in the Iraqi invasion, British Prime Minister Tony Blair. "I'm looking forward to sitting down with him in person," he said.
Amid warnings of a possible al-Qaida attack, the White House is said to have insisted on extremely careful precautions and such events as the traditional horse-drawn carriage ride with Queen Elizabeth will not be part of the trip.
Nor will Bush address Parliament. To do so might have invited a public relations disaster as Bush likely would have faced a similar spectacle to the one he endured in Australia when his speech to parliament was twice interrupted by heckling.
Instead, Bush's itinerary includes a banquet with the Queen, a speech on the transatlantic alliance at Whitehall Palace, meetings with British soldiers and their families and an event on HIV/AIDS.
Lamenting the constraints of moving around with a large entourage, Bush last week told British journalists: "I travel in somewhat of a bubble."
He was explaining why the last day of his trip, when he will tour the countryside in Blair's home district, will be a refreshing change of pace.
But analysts said the bubble in which Bush travels will serve him well politically.
It will spare him from such embarrassments as being photographed in the same frame as placards protesting his policies and demonstrators tearing down his effigy in imitation of the toppling of the Saddam Hussein statue in Baghdad.
Political analyst Larry Sabato said many American voters may tend to shrug off Bush's unpopularity in London.
But to the extent the protests of his Iraq policies underscore rising doubts domestically about the mission, it is helpful for Bush to keep his distance from the demonstrations.
"That's the only way to do it," Sabato said.
The trip will be the first state visit to Britain by an American president since Ronald Reagan in 1982.
In previewing it, White House aides described it as an opportunity to highlight the special relationship the United States has with Britain, its closest ally.
But neither the historic bonds between the two countries nor the ties forged between Bush and Blair have done much to help allay the antipathy many Britons feel toward the US president.
That antipathy has grown with the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq - a main justification for the war - and mounting guerrilla attacks there.
A poll published by Britain's Sunday Times showed that 37 per cent of those questioned thought Bush was "stupid," while 60 per cent called him a threat to world peace.
(Xinhua News Agency November 18, 2003)
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