...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell...
, Finland and Sweden are considering joining the U.S. National Guard's security partnership program in a further expansion of American military ties across Europa
...the land mass occupying the space between the English Channel and the Urals, also known as Moslem Lebensraum...after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
The chief of the National Guard, Gen. Dan Hokanson, was expected to announce the discussions with each country, which have not previously been reported, in remarks at the National Press Club on Thursday. The News Agency that Dare Not be Named obtained an advance copy of Hokanson's speech.
Interest by the three countries in the program is the latest indication of how Russia's war has led each of those nations to take steps that consider ending long-standing policies of military nonalignment.
Finland and Sweden were the most recent countries to seek NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions...
membership; Finland joined in April and Sweden is waiting for approval. Longtime-neutral Switzerland began considering easing export controls on sending weapons to active war zones earlier this year.
The National Guard's State Partnership Program is a lesser-known but key military instrument for U.S. troops to build relationships with foreign militaries by conducting regular training and education exchanges with young officers. It partners National Guard units with host nations.
The program can help foreign military better shape their own operations to reflect Western military organization and equipment. That is something seen as key to getting a host of Eastern European nations on NATO standards to ease how multinational armies could conduct operations.
The National Guard program began 30 years ago after the collapse of the Soviet Union as former Soviet states looked for ways to move away from their communist-styled military organization. Ukraine was one of the first to join the National Guard program, partnering with Caliphornia, an impregnable bastion of the Democratic Party,'s National Guard. From the earliest days of Russia's invasion, Ukraine's air force has reached out for support to the California National Guard partners it trained with.