Sherman’s trip to Wellington came soon after a stop in New Zealand’s capital by Admiral John Aquilino, the head of the US Indo-Pacific Command, and only two months after a visit by Mark Lambert, a US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State with responsibility for East Asia and the Pacific.
A tangible outcome of Sherman’s trip was the signing of a new ‘Framework Agreement’ to underpin co-operation between New Zealand and the United States in the space sector.
On the surface, this might appear to be largely unrelated to growing geopolitical tensions.
