The Conservative Political Action Conference, which meets later this month, on Tuesday announced its first panel on an important topic: “When should America go to war?” But none of the participants in the panel come from the non-interventionist school of thought on the Right.
The panel features Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark, James Jay Carafano, and former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton, and will be moderated by K.T. McFarland. Don’t get me wrong, all of the panelists are well worth hearing from (several of them have been published by the Washington Examiner), but they also all come from the hawkish wing of the conservative movement, which doesn’t represent the full spectrum of opinion on the Right on the issue of when it’s appropriate for the U.S. to go to war.
I consider myself to be hawkish, and strongly disagree with the foreign policy views most associated with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. But I also know that there is a subset of the conservative movement that argues that supporting limited government extends to foreign policy, and I enjoy engaging proponents of this view.
It would make for a much more vibrant discussion if somebody with non-interventionist views were on the panel rather than having a discussion representing various shades of hawkishness. I don’t have much doubt that Bolton and the others could handle themselves ably in such a debate. If anything, having somebody who represented non-interventionist views would be a benefit to the hawks, because it would allow them to respond to non-interventionist arguments that particularly resonate among many of the younger attendees of CPAC.
It’s worth noting that CPAC, the largest annual gathering of conservatives, hasn’t announced its full schedule yet, so perhaps there will be other opportunities for such a debate. But either way, I think this panel would benefit from adding a different perspective.
