Enduring Partners 2026 boosts U.S.-Thai joint readiness through specialized exchanges

Military leaders from the United States and Thailand have launched the fourth annual Enduring Partners exchange, a two-week training event running June 1–12, 2026, that expands coordination between the Washington Air National Guard and the Royal Thai Air Force across additional sites in both countries.

“Enduring Partners 2026 has evolved into a premier training event for both the Air National Guard and the Royal Thai Air Force,” said Brigadier General Kenneth Borchers, Commander, Washington Air National Guard. “We continue to bring together Airmen and Soldiers from across the 54 states and territories of Guard Nation with our Thai Air Force counterparts for truly invaluable training and enhanced interoperability on both sides. This is an incredible opportunity that gets better every year.”

Participants are pursuing specialized tracks in combined dissimilar air combat, cyber defense, space operations, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HA/DR), ground controlled interception, and tactical coordination.

For this year’s iteration, U.S. personnel are operating from Bangkok and Chiang Mai, while Royal Thai Air Force counterparts are training concurrently at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Camp Murray and Spokane in Washington, and Warren Grove Air Base in New Jersey. The dual-hemisphere setup is designed to address regional stability and disaster-response protocols in real time, leveraging the National Guard Bureau’s State Partnership Program to connect the effort across distances.

The exchange builds on a defense relationship rooted in the 1833 Treaty of Amity and Commerce, making the Thai-U.S. alliance one of the longest in U.S. history. By emphasizing high-level technical foundations, the program seeks to ensure both forces sustain readiness to respond to modern crises and support a free and open Indo-Pacific.