WASHINGTON: Since Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was catapulted to the stage two weeks ago when named as Sen. John McCain’s choice for vice president, Americans have been scrambling to learn more about her.

Until now, we’ve heard little from Palin herself — aside from the scripted speeches that she has delivered with ease.

Her first interview came on Sept. 11, the seventh anniversary of the terrorist attacks in the US in which nearly 3,000 people died.

The McCain team chose Charles Gibson, of ABC News, to conduct the interview Thursday night. Anticipation was heightened with the stories of her teenage daughter’s pregnancy, “Troopergate” and interpretation of “lipstick-on-a-pig” comments.

Naturally, it was difficult to live up to those kinds of expectations. But Gibson tried to probe areas that have so far been off limits.

In a sometimes tense and generally probing interview, Gibson began with foreign policy. What did this former mayor of a town of 9,000, and now governor of one of America’s most remote and least populated states, know about the real world?

Palin, we learned, had traveled abroad to Mexico and Canada, and more recently made brief stops in Germany and Kuwait to meet Alaska’s National Guard members, but she had never met a foreign head of state, and only got her passport last year.

But she knew about Russia — because you can “actually see it” from Alaska.

This may have sounded rather naive to some, but Palin held her ground, pointing out that she was an agent of change, not the same old Washington politician clinging on to a “big fat resume.”

Taking a hard line on national security, she staked out a particularly hawkish line on Russia, and refused to rule out war with Russia should Georgia eventually join NATO and then be invaded by Moscow’s troops.

“We have to keep our eyes on Russia, under the leadership there,” she said, but stressed she hoped the US could avoid a new Cold War. At times visibly nervous, at others she appeared so on-script that she used the same phrases repeatedly.

Asked about her previous comments in church that the Iraq war was a task from God, Palin clarified her earlier comments that suggested the Iraq war was ordained by God Himself, talking instead about a plan for good and a reference to God-given rights.

Gibson asked her if America was fighting a holy war, and she explained she had been paraphrasing Abraham Lincoln and “would never presume to know God’s will, or to speak God’s words”. Asked whether she was sending her 19-year-old son Track, who is deploying to Iraq, on a task from God, the Alaskan governor said: “I don’t know if the task is from God, Charlie.”

Asked whether her experience was sufficient, Palin cited her knowledge of energy issues in oil- and gas-rich Alaska.

“Let me speak specifically about a credential that I do bring to this table,” she said. “And that’s with the energy independence that I’ve been working on for these years as the governor of this state.”