Principles of Building Partnership Capacity

The National Defense Strategy of the United States continues to place ever greater importance on the practice of building the capacity of partner nations. The role of the United States military in this endeavor will continue to grow for the foreseeable future. Thus, the central research question is: What are the core commonalities that make Building Partnership Capacity (BPC) efforts successful? The answer to this question provides six criteria to evaluate prospective BPC engagements and ten key considerations that BPC planners can utilize to increase the probability of successfully building a capacity in a partner nation. The secondary research question examines the characteristics of joint BPC engagements (engagements involving two or more Military Departments operating under a single joint force commander). The secondary research question provides six characteristics for the joint BPC planner to incorporate, in addition to the ten key considerations previously discussed, due to this unique type of military BPC engagement. With the ever expanding reliance on coalitions and the importance of regional security to combat global threats, BPC contributes to the overall deterrence capability of the United States. This thesis examines this significant Department of Defense mission and provides recommendations to assist decision makers with the evaluation of BPC engagements and planners with the development of both traditional and joint BPC engagements.