WAYNE, Pa. -- Sen. Rick Santorum yesterday answered questions about his view of the Bush administration's policies in Iraq with a fierce defense of President Bush's course and argued that Americans who are not committed to it don't understand that national security and Western democracy are at risk if the United States fails.

Echoing recent speeches by Vice President Dick Cheney, Mr. Santorum, R-Pa., warned that American soldiers are fighting to save "modern culture, Western democracy and the global economy," which he said are threatened by the spread of radical Islamic fundamentalism.

Last fall, as polls showed dropping support for Mr. Bush and Mr. Santorum, it appeared that the senator was trying to distance himself from the White House. At the time, Mr. Santorum was critical of White House handling of Social Security and of extending the president's tax cuts and suggested that Mr. Bush needed "to better define this war."

In another instance much earlier last year, Mr. Santorum publicly questioned administration handling of military operations in the Iraqi city of Fallujah. And Mr. Santorum's spokesman said he has expressed concerns about some aspects of the war effort in private conversations with the vice president and other top administration officials but had not publicly voiced them to avoid the appearance of "Monday morning quarterbacking."

On Nov. 11, when the president visited the Tobyhanna Army Depot near Wilkes Barre, Mr. Santorum did not rearrange his schedule to appear with him, instead making an appearance of his own in Philadelphia.

But yesterday, Mr. Santorum did not criticize any aspect of the Bush administration's policy in his speech to 500 cadets at Valley Forge Military Academy and College outside Philadelphia. He said the United States has been engaged in a long-term struggle against "Islamic fascism" and that Americans should view the conflict as being similar to the struggle against post-World War II fascism in Germany.

Mr. Santorum said a full U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq in the near future, as proposed by fellow Pennsylvanian Rep. John P. Murtha, D-Johnstown, could lead to an intensified terror campaign in the Persian Gulf theater, increase the regional influence of Syria and Iran and aid Iranian leaders' efforts to bring Iraqis "under the same sort of awful tyranny that exists today in Iran."

Mr. Santorum also spent much of his speech excoriating the media for, in his view, focusing exclusively on Iraq casualties -- a factor he blamed for the drop in public support for military operations there. "I don't know of any other war in American history where every casualty -- every casualty -- was the headline," he said.

Efforts by the media and war critics on the left to focus Americans' attention on "the tragic consequences" of the war end up "helping Islamic fascism win the battle," he said.

Mr. Santorum's leading Democratic challenger, state Treasurer Robert P. Casey Jr., suggested that those remarks about reporting U.S. casualties were inappropriate, and Mr. Casey's spokesman said the senator should apologize for their insensitivity.

"The body count is a pretty darn important number," Mr. Casey told reporters in Harrisburg yesterday. "That's part of the debate, and it's part of the important information that the administration should provide."

Mr. Santorum's embrace of Bush administration policy in Iraq could be a key issue in areas of the state where he most needs to win votes, said political analyst G. Terry Madonna, director of the Center for Politics and Public Affairs at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, referring to Philadelphia suburban voters and conservative Democrats in Western Pennsylvania.

Mr. Casey has criticized Mr. Santorum for not asking "the tough questions on Iraq,"such as seeking more objective assessments of Iraqi security forces' training and of reconstruction efforts. Mr. Santorum did support a Senate resolution last month that called upon the administration to give Congress more frequent, detailed reports about operations in Iraq.

Mr. Casey has not endorsed Mr. Murtha's call for a full withdrawal of U.S. troops in Iraq at the earliest practicable date. Mr. Casey's spokesman said he does not back that stand because he's not confident that Iraqi troops can control the situation yet.

Asked about Mr. Santorum's call -- repeated yesterday at Valley Forge -- for the president to create a bipartisan, non-political panel to analyze the situation in Iraq, Mr. Casey said that if it is "really bipartisan and really independent, ... then it's worthy of serious consideration. But if it's some after-the-fact, election-year conversion on the part of Senator Santorum to finally be raising issues, I think people will see right through it."