English: Secretary of Defense William Cohen talks with soldiers from a platoon of the 3rd Battalion, 160th Infantry (Mechanized), a unit of the 40th Infantry Division (Mechanized), of the California Army National Guard, following the closing ceremonies of the NATO Partnership for Peace training exercise Cooperative Neighbor. The California National Guard is part of the Department of Defense's State Partnership Program, which matches U.S. states with former East bloc countries. This provides the emerging democracies the opportunity to see how reserve forces are integrated into our national defense structure. Cooperative Neighbor is the first Partnership for Peace training exercise, held on the soil of the Former Soviet Union, to be fully integrated into the NATO planning process. The U.S. contingent, which included soldiers from the 1st Infantry Division, headquartered in Wuerzburg, Germany, and elements of the 86th Airlift Wing from Ramstein Air Base, Germany, as well as the California Army National Guard, joined military forces from 12 other NATO or Partnership for Peace member nations to participate in the two-week exercise. The landmark event was organized and hosted by the Ukrainian Defense Ministry in cooperation with the military forces of the Hellenic Republic of Greece --its NATO partner-nation for the exercise.