State Partnership Program

The State Partnership Program has been successfully building relations for over 30 years and now includes 88 partnerships with 100 nations around the globe.

The SPP evolved from a 1991 U.S. European Command decision to set up the Joint Contact Team Program in the Baltic Region with Reserve component Soldiers and Airmen. A subsequent National Guard Bureau proposal paired U.S. states with three nations emerging from the former Soviet Bloc and the SPP was born, becoming a key U.S. security cooperation tool, facilitating cooperation across all aspects of international civil-military affairs and encouraging people-to-people ties at the state level.

This cost-effective program is administered by the National Guard Bureau, guided by State Department foreign policy goals, and executed by the state adjutants general in support of combatant commander and U.S. Chief of Mission security cooperation objectives and Department of Defense policy goals.

Through SPP, the National Guard conducts military-to-military engagements in support of defense security goals but also leverages whole-of-society relationships and capabilities to facilitate broader interagency and corollary engagements spanning military, government, economic and social spheres.

Czech Republic
The Czech Republic is unique to the State Partnership Program as it has had security cooperation agreements with both the Nebraska National Guard and the Texas National Guard since it joined the program in 1993, giving the nation’s armed forces access to capabilities unique to each state.
Rwanda
Nebraska National Guard and Rwanda Defence Force leaders formalized a new partnership Dec. 12, 2019.