[SpiderMonkey]

There is a fundamental paradox in liberalism: In order to create and maintain liberalism in the real world, one must commit illiberal acts. A liberal state must defend itself through warfare and political scheming just as any other state must, but in doing so will lose its liberal character (e.g the Cold War, War on Terrorism).

Whats the solution? How far should liberalism be comprimised in order to allow its own existence? Who gets to make the descision over how much liberalism is the correct amount?

[Garibaldi]

There's actually no illiberal action necessary and synonemous in running a nation. Look at Switzerland, they don't need to fight many wars. They tore through Hitler, but I haven't heard much else. Modern Liberals would have a much harder time, but Classical Liberalism can stand on it's own much better than conservatives, fascists, socialists, or else could.

[Todd D.]

With the exception of Afghanistan, most classical liberals are against the War on Terror, since the stance is mostly isolationist. As far as the Cold War is concerned, if you are talking about Vietnam, Korea, and all the other little oopsies that both sides committed, then most liberals would be against that too. I agree with Garibaldi, there's no illiberal action necessary to run a liberal nation, it's just "First do no harm"