It's not them and US

This week's visit by American Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will mark a turning point for the two countries' relationship after a 25-year chill caused by our No Nukes policy.

Retired senior diplomat Brian Lynch, one of New Zealand's most distinguished foreign affairs experts, revealed to the Herald on Sunday the importance of the announcement. He gave an interview in Washington DC after meeting US government representatives about ways of formalising the friendship between the two countries.

In a speech that the US State Department has informally dubbed the "Wellington Declaration", Clinton is expected to announce plans for top-level talks between New Zealand and US ministers each year, ranging across issues such as climate change, trade and national and regional security.

She is likely to lift the presidential ban - dating back to the Reagan administration - on joint military exercises and operations.

The improved relationship could be lucrative for New Zealanders, as a free-trade deal like the Australia-US one could inject billions of dollars into the economy. And even the improved military relations could be profitable.

Six years ago Auckland shipfitters Babcock NZ lost a $1.4 million United States Army contract to refit an 1120-tonne landing craft, the LCU Great Bridge based on the Pacific base of Guam, because of the nuclear ships stand-off. The landing craft made it halfway to New Zealand before being ordered by the Army to turn back.

On its website, the Herald on Sunday was first to report the pending breakthrough in US-NZ relations, after encountering Brian Lynch - now director of Victoria University's New Zealand Institute of International Affairs - arriving at the American capital's Dulles International Airport.

He later confirmed that he had met other thinktank experts and US Government representatives on Thursday, NZ time, shortly after the State Department confirmed details of Clinton's visit.

She was scheduled to visit in January but that trip was postponed after the Haiti earthquake.

This week, she will visit Wellington to announce the new, warmed-up relationship and honour New Zealand's contribution on battlefields such as Afghanistan.

She will also visit Christchurch to inspect the US Antarctic base there and to look at the rebuilding work after that city's earthquake.

"Clearly her speech next week will be of considerable significance for the bilateral relationship across a number of areas. There are more possibilities now than any time since the 1980s," Lynch said.

Anzus, the alliance between the US, Australia and New Zealand, is not expected to be renewed. Instead, New Zealand and the United States are likely to lift the ban on joint military exercises and operations, a ban that has already been sidestepped a number of times.