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Brazil’s vision of its military’s role fits well with the country’s growing internationalseriousness and economic and institutional capacity...It is seeking to be a morecohesive national power, and that requires exercising full control over its vastterritory and borders. 599Echoing this opinion, Hurrell states that since 2004, Brazil “has shown a renewedinterest in accelerating and protecting its indigenous technological development andreviving its nuclear energy program”. 600In further indications of Brazil’s growing material power, in January 2008, Brazilbecame a net foreign creditor for the first time. 601 During the Lula presidency, thecountry opened 33 new embassies, 19 new consulates and 5 new permanentmissions to international organizations, including the International Atomic EnergyAgency and the United Nations Human Rights Council, 602 signalling firm monetarycommitments to a more activist role in foreign affairs.Brazil faced a different regional context from that which greeted the inception ofLula’s first term. The election of Evo Morales in neighbouring Bolivia at roughlythe same time as Lula’s re-election resulted in some disquiet in Western capitalsover Latin America’s perceived ‘Left turn’. 603 Brazil’s value as an interlocutorbetween the US and the Leftist governments of Chavez, Morales, and Correa ofEcuador, increased in this environment, giving it more latitude in foreign policy tochallenge the United States on certain strategic issues. At the same time, Brazilianpolicymakers felt the need to make a greater effort to counterbalance the influenceof Venezuela and Chavez’s radical anti-American stance. This need was perhaps599 Alexei Barrionuevo, “President of Brazil Unveils Plan to Upgrade Military in Effort tobe Global Power”, in New York Times, 18 December, 2008. Accessed online at:http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/19/world/americas/19brazil.html, 4 October, 2010.600 Hurrell, 2010: 63.601 Riordan Roett, “How Reform Has Powered Brazil’s Rise”, Current History, 109, Issue724 (February 2010): 51.602 Hurrell, “Brazil and the New Global Order”, 60.603 See Christian Science Monitor, 2006. “Latin America’s Two Left Feet”, November 8,2006. Accessed online at: http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1108/p08s02-comv.html on 4October 2010; Oliver Stone, 2010. South of the Border. Documentary Film: PentagramaFilms. For scholarly analyses, see Hector E Schamis, et al., “A ‘Left Turn’ in LatinAmerica?”, Journal of Democracy Special Issue (October 2006), 17, No.4; Jorge G.Castañeda, “Latin America’s Left Turn”, Foreign Affairs, (May/June 2006); Special Issueof Third World Quarterly, 2009, Vol. 30, No.2.235