Is there a traditionalist conservative position on foreign policy and the missile shield?
Kilroy M. writes from Australia:
In regards to the split between the paleocon and neocon views on the missile shield in Central Europe, would you consider elaborating on the Trad-con view of foreign policy, and what principles are involved?
Something I have been trying to debate (without much luck) with the paleocons (because my comments are always ignored and deleted from the Chronicles blog), is how can they at one hand espouse a principled conservatism, and on the other, dismiss loyal allies who have asked for U.S. assistance and protection (i.e. Poland and the Czech Republic)?
If this is about the U.S. national interest, consider: do we think having a weakened Eurosceptic lobby, and therefore a more homogenously liberal EU, is in the U.S. best interest? The largest national block of the largest Eurosceptic coalition was elected from Poland in the recent EU elections, so when it comes to opposition to the EU’s multiculturalist, homosexual agenda, the greatest opposition doesn’t come from Wilders but Warsaw. Are we to be indifferent therefore to the geopolitics at play here?
Moreover, it’s one thing to be for a Republic and against an “empire,” but Poland and the Czechs invited the U.S. onto their soil, so can the neocon policy really be seen as an “imperial” act? Moreover, Thomas Fleming states that “anyone who thinks that Putin will not seek to take full advantage of any weakness is very naive, and any American who exults in our humiliation might think about emigrating,” but then he appears to favour the current administration’s policy of U.S. contraction. Does the great classicist not know what happens to power vacuums throughout history?
Perhaps you can shed some light on this. He and the moderator at the Chronicles blog don’t seem to be interested.
LA replies:
These issues are too big for me to grapple with at the moment, but perhaps readers will want to comment.
Posted by Lawrence Auster at October 02, 2009 10:51 AM | Send