While digging through archives to prepare for this year’s 70th anniversary commemorations we uncovered a treasure trove of photos, letters, and other historical material from the 1940’s. I thought I’d share today a couple of photos related to a 70th anniversary that we will be commemorating next year.

First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt reviews Marines on Tutuila in American Samoa.

As a back-and-forth battle with the invaders continued in the South Pacific during August and September 1943, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt made a goodwill trip through the region to raise morale, rally the troops, and thank our allies for their steadfastness and fortitude. In order to address military and political opposition to the tour, she traveled in a private capacity as a representative of the Red Cross, inspecting the group’s facilities in battle zones.

Her trip quickly became legendary. Over the course of five weeks she made more than 20 stops, traveling in a small airplane without escort in order to avoid complicating military operations. In places she braved rugged terrain, thick jungles, malaria, and risk of attack to see as many rank-and-file servicemen and women as possible, speaking to more than 400,000 personnel before returning home. Her strength, courage, patience, warmth, and good humor won over skeptics along the way, including the irascible Admiral Halsey.

Mrs. Roosevelt on a parade ground in Pago Pago.

For obvious reasons the trip was a closely guarded secret, and Mrs. Roosevelt often landed without advance notice. In one of my favorite of her diary entries she recorded the reaction when she stepped off the plane on Guadalcanal: “At first there was complete surprise on the faces of the men, and then one boy in stentorian tones said, ‘Gosh, there’s Eleanor.’”

From August 27 through September 2, 1943, the First Lady toured facilities here in New Zealand, spending time in Auckland, Rotorua, and Wellington. She met with American and New Zealand troops, support personnel, and civilians. She visited marae, spent extensive time with wounded soldiers, and engaged with women’s groups and other NGOs.

The First Lady is greeted in Rotorua.

Next year, timed to coincide with the anniversary of the dates that she was actually here, we will celebrate her trip, her passion, and her accomplishments as First Lady. Among other things, we’ll draw on the daily “My Day” newspaper column that she wrote as a very public diary to chronicle her activities, including while she was in New Zealand. But more about all that later.

For now, I just wanted to share the two photos that we uncovered from her stop on Tutuila, as well as the sentiment she expressed after her return to Washington: “The Pacific trip left a mark from which I will never be free.”

In addition to the coins I mentioned yesterday, we also designed two commemorative stamps as part of our celebration of this year’s significant United States/New Zealand 70th anniversaries. We’ve been using the stamps on our outgoing mail at the Embassy and Consulate General for the past couple of weeks, but I thought I’d share them here (in larger than real-life form) in case we haven’t sent you a letter lately.

Earlier this month Secretary Clinton delivered a major address to the Economic Club of New York on the role of economics in US foreign policy. She talked candidly about a variety of critical issues such as currency manipulation, piracy, sustainability, and various modern-day trade and investment barriers, including those cherished by many old-school “free” traders.

A comprehensive, clear, and compelling review of current events and future strategy, the speech is the fourth in a series that the Secretary has given on various aspects of economic statecraft. As always, her remarks are well worth reading or viewing:

The prior three speeches in the series treated different aspects of the same general topic. The first speech discussed how diplomacy and overseas development assistance contribute to domestic economic health. The second emphasized economic values and the importance of respecting rules of fair global competition. The third focused on the critical role of women in creating and maintaining a robust and equitable global economy.

Delivered in the immediate aftermath of passage by Congress of comprehensive and mutually beneficial economic relations agreements with South Korea, Columbia, and Panama, the fourth speech is a strong statement of how the Administration will engage in matters of trade, investment, and economics going forward.

The November 2011 issue of Foreign Policy carries an insightful article by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on America’s policy and place in the Pacific and Asian regions. It is an excellent read. I won’t reprint it in its entirety, but you can access the piece by clicking here.

In her usual direct and nuanced way, the Secretary articulates the mutual benefits of an active and engaged America, and clearly lays out the tenets of US strategy. She grounds her points in historical context often overlooked in much of today’s sound-bite-driven, faddish popular discourse:

Secretary of State Clinton.

“Just as Asia is critical to America’s future, an engaged America is vital to Asia’s future. The region is eager for our leadership and our business — perhaps more so than at any time in modern history.

“We are the only power with a network of strong alliances in the region, no territorial ambitions, and a long record of providing for the common good. Along with our allies, we have underwritten regional security for decades — patrolling Asia’s sea lanes and preserving stability — and that in turn has helped create the conditions for growth.

“We have helped integrate billions of people across the region into the global economy by spurring economic productivity, social empowerment, and greater people-to-people links. We are a major trade and investment partner, a source of innovation that benefits works and businesses on both sides of the Pacific, a host to 350,000 Asian students every year, a champion of open markets, and an advocate for universal human rights.”

The Secretary then proceeds to discuss in detail the Administration’s “multifacted and persistent effort to embrace fully our irreplaceable role in the Pacific, spanning the entire US government.” She notes that “[i]t has often been a quiet effort. A lot of our work has not been on the front pages, both because of its nature — long-term investment is less exciting than immediate crises — and because of competing headlines in other parts of the world.”

In the Secretary’s rubric, the strategy is one of forward-deployed diplomacy, which means engaging actively on the ground throughout the region and adapting in real time to the rapid and often dramatic shifts occurring in today’s interconnected world.

She reviews in detail the six key lines of action in American strategy: strengthening bilateral security alliances, deepening working relationships with emerging powers, engaging with regional multilateral institutions, expanding trade and investment opportunities, forging a broad-based military presence, and advancing democracy and human rights.

Auckland's Cloud, the site of several Pacific Island Forum events.

The views that the Secretary expresses are not theoretical or philosophical. They are practical, tangible, and operational. Just one excellent example was the nature and scope of US participation in this year’s Pacific Island Forum in Auckland.

The US sent its largest and highest-level delegation ever to attend the PIF’s Post-Forum Dialogue. Led by Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides, the contingent included senior officials from the Department of State, USAID, White House, Department of Commerce, Peace Corps, Department of Defense, and Coast Guard.

Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides at the Pacific Island Forum.

Playing key roles along with Deputy Secretary Nides were Assistant Secretary Kurt Campbell, making his third visit to New Zealand in the past 12 months, and the Governor of American Samoa, the Honorable Togiola Tulafono, as well my fellow American Ambassadors from Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Palau, and Australia.

Our visitors came to work. The delegation split into several teams based on subject matter focus, and almost two dozen of my colleagues from the Embassy and Consulate General provided support and squired the teams through more than 110 separate meetings with their counterparts from the Government of New Zealand and/or other PIF attendees.

Deputy Secretary Nides and Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully meet the press after a productive bilateral meeting.

Our visitors also came to pony up, commit, and execute. Progress was made on a variety of matters including disaster preparedness, climate change, sustainable development, and fisheries. Several MOUs and agreements were signed.

For example, we signed partnership agreements with the Secretariat of the Pacific Community and the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme to advance climate change adaptation in the Pacific Small Island States. Those agreements are part of a larger, two-year US$ 21 million package to address climate change impact in the region.

We also signed ship-rider agreements with Nauru and Tuvalu, bringing the total number of those agreements in the Pacific to eight. Under those successful agreements, the US Coast Guard extends the reach and power of island nation law enforcement officers by hosting them on our vessels and aircraft to patrol national Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs). Such joint activity is essential to the economic health as well as the security of partner nations, given the large amount of illegal commercial fishing in the EEZs.

Deputy Secretary Nides signs an agreement with Dr Jimmie Rodgers, Director of the General Secretariat of the Pacific Community.

Such collaboration is a natural part of our uninterrupted, generations-long engagement in the region. The United States is itself a Pacific nation with deep, enduring, and historic ties to our Pacific friends and neighbors. And that isn’t going to change. On that note, I’ll give the Secretary the final word:

“I’m well aware that there are those who question our staying power around the world. We’ve heard this talk before. At the end of the Vietnam War, there was a thriving industry of global commentators promoting the idea that America was in retreat, and it is a theme that repeats itself every few decades. But whenever the United States has experienced setbacks, we’ve overcome them through reinvention and innovation.

“Our capacity to come back stronger is unmatched in modern history. It flows from our model of free democracy and free enterprise, a model that remains the most powerful source of prosperity and progress known to humankind … So there should be no doubt that America has the capacity to secure and sustain our global leadership in this century as we did in the last.”