There is a a giant line called common sense and responsibility that separates:
A. Attacking another country; invading its soil; overthrowing its president & system of government based on NO evidence that the country was any kind of threat to either us or our alleys.
B. Defending your home; your government; your family from an immediate threat from an invading and hostile country.

The true conservative is NOT an imperialist. Perhaps you have not studied the writings and platforms of conservatives throughout our history including those by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, Thomas Pane, John C. Calhoun, John Tyler, Jefferson Davis or even those from more recent times, Ronald Reagan, Jessie Ventura, or Ron Paul.

While none of these conservatives would have invaded and overthrown another country based upon false evidence of terrorism, many of them were involved in wars and conflicts that had been unavoidable and for the safety of the safety of their countrymen.  
A few examples include:
The war of 1812. England invaded US soil.
The Mexican American War. Mexican troops crossed the US border along the Rio Grande under the authority of their government.
The War Between the States. United States troops refused to vacate a garrison which was within the territorial waters of the Confederate States of America.
The same month Lincoln issued a call to arms for 75,000 volunteers to cause an armed invasion of the Confederacy, and invasion not unlike the English invasion of the newly independent colonies in 1776.

The true conservative is not against war for the purpose of defense and one executed through the will and approval of the people. Yet, only a liberal (like LBJ) would nod to a war that brings nothing but misery to the US and death to Iraq and continues even without the consent of the American public.

Lincoln did start the Civil War without the consent of the people. In fact, during his administration more than 7,000 thousand citizens including agents of the press were arrested and jailed without trial simply for opposing his invasion of the Southern States.  One of these men was none other than the grandson of Francis Scott Key.
Though it is so that the majority of the Northern States did favor causing bloodshed against their Southern neighbors, I believe that it was because they were more interested in putting their industrial and war profiting interests before admitting the South's legal right to be free.

One thing that I have never been able to understand was how modern day Republicans seem to brag at being the party started by Lincoln even though that party held a far different platform than today's.  While the modern day Republican platform stands for lesser government and less taxes and more faith based community awareness, Lincoln went to war to uphold that central government had absolute authority over the states and the people. Lincoln going further beyond the bounds of the constitution created more sperate forms of taxation during four years than during any other point in history including World War II.  As goes faith, Lincoln was the only American president to of included doubts towards Christianity in his writings.

The South did not break the law of the land but had upheld it. Secession was included into the United States Constitution for two very important reasons. The right of secession was included so that it would be clear to future generations that the states owned the final say and authority over their destiny-that the states and their people could never be harmed by the Federal Government as long as they had a way out if need be. The second reason that the right of secession was included (ironically) was that in the event of a state or states separation, a civil war or revolution would be avoided. For in 1776 the colonies had no legal right to leave England and that was what justified England's decision to fight. By making secession a legal practice within the constitution, separation would be a protected form of action.  
It was the North under Lincoln who did not abide the law of the land. Lincoln and the North took the rights of decision, free will, and self government from not only the states and the people then but the future generations of all Americans.  

Secession was included into our constitution because our forefathers knew that no matter how perfect the government they formed was, it was no guarantee that it would always be as it should. They knew that they had no control over how future generations may lead the government.  They had no certainty that the government would always follow the constitution.

When the Southern states agreed that their role in the government was second class and inferior to that of the North, made more obvious by Lincoln's election, they saw no alternative to submission except secession.  
Yet, despite the constitution, Lincoln and his administration led an armed invasion of over one million volunteers to occupy the Southern states...Atlanta, Charleston, Columbia, Richmond, Jackson all burned and destroyed by men from Illinois, Maine, and Minnesota. Men from Mississippi, Texas, and Alabama died by the thousands in POW camps in Chicago, Elmira, and Boston.

The history that has been rewritten was the history of the United States War against the Confederate States.

The true conservative (to the earlier point) is not a party man.  He is one who pledges allegiance not to a king, queen, president, or flag, but to his rights.  Rights not given to him by a government, legislator, or country but by the people.  If Republicans or any other party does not uphold these old (aka conservative) ideas then he is not a conservative.  

Of course there are many other ideas and principals that a conservative considers but these I included are what define him most.  At the time, Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin were liberals.  Yet, their ideas gave birth to today's conservative.