Realism

The liberal view of the world is founded on three principals. First is that democracies are less likely to wage war against one another, second that free trade makes countries economically dependent on one another and they won't declare war because the don't want to disrupt their economies and third they prefer international institutions like the UN to set some ground rules about war. The combination of these three items has at their roots the idea of prosperity. Conservatives are founded on the principal of realism and they fall into two camps. There are structural realist and human nature realist. The structural realist is offensive and the human nature realist is defensive but both are motivated by security sometimes seen as survival. The structural realist believes that any country will try to expand its power if it believes the cost is low and the reward is high. Human nature is a starting point for classical political realism. Defensive realists view human beings as inherently egoistic and self-interested to the extent that self-interest overcomes moral principles. When prosperity and security (survival) come into conflict, survival wins. Russia felt that the expansion into Ukraine threatened their survival and Israel felt that Hamas threatened their survival. When the US went into Vietnam it was defensive realism and meant to curtail the domino effect of communism. A practical way to understand the liberal view was expressed by Rodney King in the LA riots when he asked the question, why can't we all just get along.