Questions about the future of democracy will be on the agenda at the Munich Security Conference

China's foreign minister and the Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, are scheduled to attend and could possibly meet to ease tensions. What else is on the agenda there? Well, at Cornucopia of Issues, Dan, I mean, this is the 59th annual Munich Security Conference. It's dubbed the Davos of Defense. This is a gathering of leaders from around the world. But with a huge emphasis, frankly, on Western democratic values, the theme of this conference this year is revision, revision of the international order. Deep concerns from Western leaders today that liberal democratic policies are on the way out as a result of autocratic regimes, they say. So no doubt on the agenda over this three-day conference will be questions about the future of democracy, questions certainly about President Putin's invasion of Ukraine and where that's headed in terms of a peace process.

And also bigger questions about the NATO alliance. Of course, a conversation that I've been having with Jan Sultonberg, the Secretary General of NATO multiple times over the last several months, has been whether or not Sweden and Finland will accede to the NATO alliance together. That's, of course, been a bone of contention for NATO member Turkey, as you know. Listen in to the latest comments from the Secretary General about that. For me, it is to just demonstrate that Sweden and Finland understand and are implementing policies which recognizes the concerns that Turkey has expressed and also why I think that the time has come to ratify. Let me add one more thing and that is that this is a Turkish decision. I will be speaking first on CNBC with Jan Sultonberg, the NATO Secretary General on Saturday.

And in just a few hours from now down, I'll be speaking with Finland's Foreign Minister as well to get the latest update on the situation with their attempts to join the NATO alliance. Now, one of the big questions, of course, going forward beyond whether or not we'll see Antoni Blinken meeting on the sidelines with Wang Li from China is the other meetings that will not be taking place here. Just to give you a sense of background on the Munich Security Conference, this is held in the Beiterhof Hotel. It's a very traditional and older hotel here in Munich. It's a conference, frankly, that I love attending every year because it brings together members of the defense community as well as the foreign policy community. And it has been traditionally a place where you see a lot of outliers, perhaps. Russia always has a huge representation here, as does Iran in the past.

The Foreign Minister of Iran has been here on a multiple times of occasions. And unfortunately, this year, we're not going to see either of those two countries represented at all. They've essentially been disinvited by the Munich Security Conference. As a direct result, as they say, they're bad actions over the last year. So I think it's really interesting to note that while this will be a conference focused on the future of the liberal democratic order, the folks threatening that liberal democratic order will actually not be in attendance to voice their concerns. So, Hadley, one year since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, a missed opportunity is it not to bring people together to try and find a pathway forward? As you say, you won't find any Russian or Iranian officials on the ground there. Actually, the vast majority of participants are from the US and Europe.

So what can realistically be achieved? How do you, how to, how to organize this, avoid this just becoming an echo chamber of sorts? Well, no doubt this is going to be an opportunity for these world leaders to sit in conference, just to give you an idea of everyone who's attending here. Vice President Kamala Harris is already on the ground. As we say, the foreign minister of Finland will be joining us later. There are a host of foreign ministers here as well from various other Western nations, as well as some representatives, excuse me, some representation from the global South. In a few hours from now, we'll be speaking with Israel, Heinez, with Turkey, Al-Faisal. We'll also be speaking later on this evening with ministers from Indonesia, as well as Europe. I want to just give you a sense, though, Dan, of the conversations that are going to be taking place here.

They aren't just about Russia's invasion of Ukraine. They are looking at the broader picture, what the threat of AI is today to the liberal democratic order. We saw earlier in the week those comments from Elon Musk essentially suggesting that AI could actually be a problem going forward and that democracies and other governments are going to have to deal with it. So I think that you're going to see a broad range of conversations here, in spite of the fact that you don't see that representation necessarily from Iran and Russia.

Capital Connection, CNBC