Hughes Gareth: Motions — United States Forces—70th Anniversary of Arrival in New Zealand During World War II 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Hughes Gareth: Motions — United States Forces—70th Anniversary of Arrival in New Zealand During World War II 
[Sitting date: 14 June 2012. Volume:680;Page:2978. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
GARETH HUGHES (Green) 
: 
 Kia ora Mr Speaker. I rise to speak on behalf of the Green Party and join with the Labour Party and National Party to acknowledge the 70th anniversary of US troops arriving as part of our alliance over World War II. We acknowledge the critical role US Marines played in the defence of the Pacific region against Fascist aggression in the 1940s. We remember their fallen just as we remember the fallen of New Zealanders and other allies. On 13 June 1942 a regiment of the US Army’s 37th Division landed at Auckland and on the next day the 1st Marine Division did so here in Wellington moving into hastily constructed camp facilities. All in all about 100000 US servicemen arrived in New Zealand with a peak of 48200 in July 1943. In addition many thousands of other American sailors merchant seamen made fleeting visits to the country.  
It is important to acknowledge why they were here. A month after the Americans arrived in July 1942 New Zealand’s military mobilisation—the largest in our country’s history—peaked with 159500 men and women under arms along with 100000 in our Home Guard. Unlike Australia our men based on Winston Churchill’s urging remained in the European theatre mostly in the sands of North Africa or the beaches of Fiji and were not here to protect us from the threatened Japanese invasion.  
 The threat was real and we rightly welcomed the American invasion as it was affectionately known and our guests. They may not have left the Transmission Gully motorway so often discussed but they left their marks on our culture our economy and on the hearts of those 1500 New Zealand women who married US servicemen. Interestingly as they departed between 1944 and 1946 numerous “bride ships” as they were known departed from New Zealand carrying nearly 1000 women and nearly 500 children back to the States.  
Seventy years on it is important to recognise those US servicemen and the people who can still remember it. Many of them will not be around for the 80th anniversary. Seventy years on it is important to acknowledge how New Zealand has changed. Seventy years on it is important to acknowledge that we are now a proud independent nation. Seventy years before foreign policy decisions essentially were made in London and after the War in Washington. Prime Minister Michael Joseph Savage who broadcast from his sickbed on 5 September 1939 said the immortal words: “Where [England] goes we go; where she stands we stand.”  
This year New Zealand also celebrated 25 years of nuclear-free status where we have truly become a proud independent nation. We no longer go where England goes and we no longer stand where Washington stands. We are a proud independent nation that can celebrate the fact that New Zealand refused to enter Iraq and be part of the illegal coalition of the willing in 2003 and were not privy to part of those human rights abuses committed over there. This was right that we are nuclear free and 70 years on we can celebrate the beginnings of our truly independent standard.  
Looking forward as we have built the relationship with the United States we must ensure New Zealand’s independence and urge as the Government puts it our very very good friends to abide strictly by the rule of international law in everything they do and tell them they are being closely watched.  
The Green Party acknowledges those servicemen and their families and we would like to pay our respects.