Minister tips full-blown war games within a year

Hillary Clinton. Photo / Simon Baker

Full-blown military exercises between the United States and New Zealand could begin within a year, in contrast to the "speed dating" exercises of recent times, says Defence Minister Wayne Mapp.

New Zealand and the United States are now beginning to plan higher-level exercises as a result of the Wellington Declaration, he told the Herald yesterday.

Dr Mapp said the declaration, signed in Wellington last week by United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was about Foreign Ministers including security and military issues in their talks rather than him talking more with his American counterpart, Defence Secretary Robert Gates.

But he said there had been a developing pattern of high-level defence visits and officer exchanges for several years now, begun under the Labour Government.

"This declaration makes that whole process somewhat more transparent," Dr Mapp said.

In terms of what he called "unit-based exercises", he said the declaration put New Zealand and the United States "at the beginning of a process".

Unit-based exercises involved a company of infantry or a ship or several aircraft.

They were exercises that would take place over a series of days and would be different from the recent Good Passage Exchange, conducted with Japan and the United States.

Dr Mapp said that involved "a couple of vessels going parallel for a couple of hours and then moving on".

"You could sort of describe it as speed-dating almost."

Dr Mapp said he expected unit-based exercises would start within a year to 18 months.

Until those were regularised, he did not foresee a higher-level visit by Dr Gates to New Zealand.

Prime Minister John Key said at his post-Cabinet press conference that Dr Gates would be welcome to visit New Zealand if he wanted to come here.

VIP visits this year

* January: Secretary of US Navy Ray Mabus visits NZ.

* March: US General Gary L. North, Commander Pacific Air Forces, visits NZ.

* April: US General James E. Cartwright, Vice-Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, visits NZ.

* May: NZ Minister of Defence Wayne Mapp meets US Defence Secretary Robert Gates in Singapore

* June: US Lieutenant General Benjamin R. Mixon, Pacific commanding general, United States Army, visits NZ.

* June: Secretary of Defence John McKinnon visits US.

* July: Vice-Chief of Defence Force Admiral Jack Steer visits Washington.

* Oct: Admiral Steer meets the commander of the US Pacific Command, Admiral Robert Willard, in Seoul.

* Oct: NZ Chief of Army Richard Rhys Jones visits US.

- Source: Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Wellington.