At a recent meeting of the Organization of the American States, Secretary of State Kerry stated, “The era of the Monroe Doctrine is over.” What’s the replacement?

Gen. Kelly: The first thing is that the Latin Americans have put the Monroe Doctrine so far behind them they think it’s unusual when we bring it up. The replacement is partnership. In the two years I have been in this job, the buzzwords or buzzphrase that I use that gets a very positive reception is not only “partners,” but “equal partners.” Our partnership with these countries is not just in the military realm, I have very close relationships with many of the Ministers of Defense, but with the Presidents as well. We don’t lecture them, we don’t tell them what to do; by example they see what equal partnership is all about. So I would say that it’s partnership that has replaced the previous doctrine.

Are our declining resources directed towards South America reducing our influence there and making the partnership less important to them than it is to us?

Gen. Kelly: I wouldn’t say it’s declining; we haven’t paid much security attention to the region for 15 years. So we’re at a normal steady state; almost no resources, with the exception of Colombia – and that’s a minimal investment really – but almost no real resources for 15 years. They want to partner with us, they like the partnership, they want to be our friends for the most part. There are some countries that are not interested in a U.S. partnership and that is their loss. But others are confused because we don’t really seem to care about them very much, while the Chinese are heavily investing in the region, albeit primarily economically. Our trade is very robust with this part of the world, and so is the Chinese. The Chinese tend to “invest and take:” the Latin Americans resent that to some extent. The Chinese will come in and invest in a copper mine and mine it dry. There’s trade and there’s mutual benefit, but they wish the Chinese were a little bit