New Orleans made her first appearance in the Western Pacific in August 1969 as flagship for Amphibious Ready Group Bravo.

In August 1970, she became flagship for Commander First Fleet and provided support for president Richard Nixon's visit to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, and made a port call to Acapulco.

On 9 February 1971, she picked up astronauts Alan Shepard, Stuart Roosa, and Edgar Mitchell some 900 miles (1,450 km) south of American Samoa.

CTF 78, headed by Rear Admiral Brian McCauley, was tasked with de-mining operations for the coast and harbors of North Vietnam.

[3] She was also present for the recovery of astronauts Thomas Stafford, Deke Slayton, and Vance Brand during the joint American–Soviet Apollo–Soyuz mission of 24 July 1975.

[4] That was the last splashdown of an American crewed spacecraft in the 20th century as NASA would go on to use the Space Shuttle, which landed like an airplane on land-based runways.

From May to December 1984, New Orleans sailed the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific, participating in eight major amphibious operations.

She also served as the medical and communications support ship for president Ronald Reagan's trip to Bali, Indonesia.

Upon her return to home port, New Orleans participated in two major exercises leading to her thirteenth deployment to the Western Pacific.

She served as a member of CTG-36/CTF-156, the largest amphibious task force to deploy from the West Coast of the United States in 25 years.

Significant accomplishments included the off-load of 1,700 Marine combat troops on G-Day and aviation mine countermeasures in the North Persian Gulf, ten nautical miles (19 km) off the coast of Kuwait.

[citation needed] New Orleans received the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal and a Meritorious Unit Commendation for Somalia related operations from 18 October 1993 to 1 February 1994.

The ship got underway again on 31 January 1997, for another WESTPAC cruise which included boarding the Marines from the 31st MEU(SOC) based out of Okinawa, Japan and participating in Operation Tandem Thrust '97 in Townsville, Australia in which it weathered Cyclone Justin before returning to port on 2 May.