Abstract: In this paper, a new joint radar transmitter and receiver polarization optimization method is proposed based on the optimal detection criterion. First, a fully-polarimetric radar echo model is introduced, and the fully-polarimetric target detection algorithm is designed based on Neyman Pearson criterion, the detection performance is derived and analyzed. Then, a joint radar transmitter and receiver polarization optimization method is proposed to improve the capability of the target detection. Finally, the simulation results demonstrate that the target detection performance can be improved by using this algorithm remarkably.