Chiung Yao, a romance writer who published some of the best-selling novels in the Chinese-speaking world and helped shape the idea of romantic love there for generations, died on Wednesday at her home in New Taipei City, Taiwan. She was 86.

言情小说作家琼瑶上周三在台湾新北市的家中去世，享年86岁。她曾出版过多部华语世界最畅销的小说，并帮助塑造了几代人的浪漫爱情观。

Her son, Chen Weizhong, and her daughter-in-law, Jessie Ho, announced on her Facebook page that her death was a suicide. She had been advocating for the right to a dignified death.

她的儿子陈中维和儿媳何琇琼在琼瑶的Facebook页面上宣布她的死亡系自杀。琼瑶一直在倡导有尊严的死亡权。

“Death is a journey everyone must take,” she wrote in a Facebook post on the day she died. “I don’t want to leave it to fate or wither away slowly. I want to take control of this final chapter.”

“死亡是每个人必经之路，”她在去世当天的Facebook帖文中写道。“我不想听天由命，不想慢慢枯萎凋零，我想为这最后的大事‘作主’。”

Chiung Yao’s first book, “Outside the Window,” the semi-autobiographical story of a doomed love affair between a high school student and her Chinese literature teacher, was published in 1963 and achieved great success. She went on to publish more than 60 novels and short-story collections. Many of her works were adapted into films and television series.

琼瑶的首部作品《窗外》于1963年出版，是一部半自传小说，讲述了一名高中生与她的国文老师之间注定失败的爱情故事，作品获得了巨大成功。她后来出版了60多部小说和短篇小说集。她的许多作品被改编成电影和电视剧。

In Chiung Yao’s novels, love transcends everything else. It’s worth giving up one’s family, career, social status, even — literally — one’s limbs. “You only lost one of your legs,” a character in her 1973 novel “Fantasies Behind the Pearly Curtain” famously says. “What she lost was her love.”

在琼瑶的小说中，爱情超越一切，为了爱情，放弃家庭、事业、社会地位，甚至——毫不夸张地说——放弃肢体，都是值得的。“你只不过是失了一条腿，”她的1973年小说《一帘幽梦》中的人物说了这样一句名言。“她为你割舍掉爱情。”

Her plots are often dramatic and intricate, filled with twists and turns of love in all its shades: bittersweet, unrequited, obsessive, resentful and tragic. Among the titles of her novels are “The Heart Has a Million Knots” (1972) and “Several Degrees of Sunset Red” (1964).

她的故事情节往往跌宕起伏而又复杂，充满各种曲折的爱情：悲喜交集、单恋，痴情，怨恨和悲剧。她的小说包括《心有千千结》（1972年）和《几度夕阳红》（1964年）。

She was also known for mixing her love stories with elements of ancient Chinese literature. “We would love to think that we all learned our poetry from school, from our elders. But in truth, a lot of us learned them from Chiung Yao,” Eileen Chow, a Sinologist at Duke University who grew up in Taiwan, said in an interview. “I feel like I’m a poetry professor in some ways because of her.”

她还以将爱情故事与中国古代文学元素相结合而闻名。“我们乐于认为我们的诗词是从学校和长辈那里学来得。事实上，我们很多人都是从琼瑶那里学来的，”在台湾长大的杜克大学汉学家周成荫在接受采访时说。“我觉得，某种程度上说，我是因为她才成为诗词教授。”

Her style was so distinct that people’s overly sentimental remarks could draw comments like “You’re so Chiung Yao!” On both sides of the Taiwan Strait, many women bear “Chiung Yao names,” given names that are similar to those of her female characters and usually have Chinese characters such as “dream,” “rain” and “cloud.”

她的风格非常独特，以至于过分多愁善感的言论可能会被评论“你太琼瑶了！”在台湾海峡两岸，许多女性都有“琼瑶式的名字”，它们与她笔下女性角色的名字相似，通常包含“梦”“雨”“云”等字。

She often wrote of young people rebelling against their families and social norms. That’s one reason her novels were popular in Taiwan before the nationalist government lifted martial law in 1987, and in mainland China in 1980s and the ’90s after the country emerged from the Cultural Revolution.

她经常描写年轻人反抗家庭和社会规范的故事。正因如此，她的小说在1987年国民党政府解除戒严令之前的台湾广受欢迎，又在文革结束后上世纪八九十年代的中国大陆流行。

In the 1980s, she started addressing social issues in novels like “Paradise on Fire” (1984), the story of an orphaned young girl who is abused and sexually assaulted by her stepfather. But those novels received little attention. She later focused more on film and TV production.

在20世纪80年代，她开始在小说中讨论社会问题，如《失火的天堂》（1984年）讲述了一个被继父虐待并性侵的孤女的故事。但这些小说很少受到关注。后来，她将更多的精力放在了电影和电视制作上。

“While Chiung Yao was criticized by intellectuals for her dreamy, romanticized novels as being divorced from reality, her attempts to tackle domestic violence and sexual assault were met with indifference from a society unprepared to confront such heavy topics,” Fang-mei Lin, a literature professor at National Taiwan Normal University who wrote her doctoral dissertation on Chiung Yao’s novels, posted on Facebook. “As a result, these works were largely overlooked.”

“琼瑶写梦幻的爱情小说，被知识分子批评为违背现实。当她处理家暴与性侵，又因社会尚未准备好面对这么沉重的议题，使得此书未获重视，”国立台湾师范大学文学教授林芳玫在Facebook上写道。她的博士论文是关于琼瑶小说的。

Many of the films and TV series adapted from Chiung Yao’s work were blockbusters and gave early exposure to celebrated actors in both China and Taiwan, including Brigitte Lin, Zhao Wei and Fan Bingbing. She was the producer and screenwriter of many of them.

由琼瑶作品改编的许多电影和电视剧都轰动一时，并让林青霞、赵薇和范冰冰等中国和台湾的著名演员有了早期的曝光机会。她是其中许多电影和电视剧的制片人和编剧。

Chiung Yao was one of the first Taiwanese producers to tap into China’s massive film and TV market. “My Fair Princess,” a 1998 romantic comedy TV series that she wrote and produced, became the most viewed series in China. It was rerun many times in the next 20 years and still topped the ratings in 2018. The series, the story of two couples set in the imperial Qing court, has been compared to the popular American sitcom “Friends.”

琼瑶是最早进入中国庞大影视市场的台湾制片人之一。1998年，由她编剧并担任制片人的浪漫电视喜剧《还珠格格》成为中国收视率最高的电视剧。在接下来的20年里，该剧多次重播，到2018年仍高居收视率榜首。《还珠格格》讲述了两对情侣在清朝宫廷里的故事，有人将其与美国热门情景喜剧《老友记》相提并论。

Chiung Yao was born Chen Che in Chengdu, in Sichuan Province, on April 20, 1938, months after Japan invaded China. Her family fled to Taiwan at the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949. Her father, Chen Zhiping, taught Chinese literature at universities, and her mother, Yuan Xinru, taught the same subject at a middle school. Her pen name, meaning beautiful jade, came from an ancient Chinese poem.

琼瑶原名陈喆，于1938年4月20日——日本入侵中国数月后——出生于四川省成都市。1949年中国内战结束时，她随家人逃到台湾。她的父亲陈致平在大学教授中国文学，母亲袁行恕亦在中学教授中国文学。“琼瑶”这个笔名的意思是美玉，来自一首中国古诗。

At 18, while in high school, Chiung Yao fell in love with her Chinese literature teacher, who was 25 years her senior. Her parents forced her to end it. To their further disappointment, she failed her college entrance examination, which seemingly doomed her future.

18岁时，还在上高中的琼瑶爱上了比她大25岁的国文老师。父母强迫她结束这段感情。更令他们失望的是，她没能考上大学，这让她的前途一片黯淡。

When she was 20, she married Ma Senqing, a fellow aspiring writer. They had a son two years later.

20岁时，她嫁给了同样有志于成为作家的马森庆。两年后，他们有了一个儿子。

When her son was 19 months old, she sent him to a nursery so she could write in the morning, according to her memoir, “My Stories,” first published in 1989. After publishing a few novels, she was able to afford a refrigerator so she would need to buy groceries only once a week, giving her more time for writing.

根据她1989年首次出版的回忆录《我的故事》，儿子19个月大的时候，她把他送到托儿所，这样她就可以在早上写作。出版了几部小说后，她可以买得起冰箱了，这样她每周只需要买一次菜，就有了更多时间来写作。

As her writing career was taking off, her marriage was falling apart. According to her memoir, her husband was jealous of her success. They divorced when she was 26.

当她的写作事业蒸蒸日上时，她的婚姻破裂了。根据她的回忆录，丈夫嫉妒她的成功。在她26岁那年，两人离婚了。

She then became entangled in an affair with her editor and publisher, Ping Hsin-tao, who was married and had three children. Feeling immense guilt, she wrote in her memoir, she tried to break it off many times, but he insisted. After acrimonious divorce proceedings that lasted eight years, he married her in 1979.

之后，她与她的编辑兼出版人平鑫涛发生了婚外情。已婚的平鑫涛有三个孩子。她在回忆录中写道，她感到无比内疚，多次试图分手，但他坚持不同意。经过长达八年的激烈离婚诉讼之后，他于1979年与她结婚。

She wrote in her memoir that many of her readers asked whether the love she wrote about existed in real life, adding, “Aren’t those earth-shattering romances just your fabrications?”

她在回忆录中写道，许多读者问她所写的爱情在现实生活中是否存在，还会问，“那些惊天动地的爱，不是你的杜撰吗？”

“Everyone has their own life experiences,” she said. “What puzzles me is why the love in my life comes so intensely, so powerfully and so dramatically.”

“每个人有每个人自己的人生，”她写道。“我只是很奇怪，为什么我生命里的爱，会来得如此强烈？如此震撼？而且如此戏剧化？”

Ms. Lin, the literature professor, wrote: “Writing about love was Qiong Yao’s career. But believing in love was her lifelong mission.”

文学教授林芳玫写道：“书写爱情是琼瑶的事业。信仰爱情则是她的志业。”

Chiung Yao and Mr. Ping remained married until he died at 92 in 2019. In addition to her son, she is survived by granddaughters.

两人的婚姻一直持续到平鑫涛于2019年92岁去世。除了儿子，她的遗属还包括几个孙女。

While Mr. Ping lay unconscious in bed after having a stroke, Chiung Yao and his children had a falling-out over whether to keep him on life support. In a Facebook post a week before her death, Chiung Yao wrote, “The final stretch of life should not be filled with such helplessness and misery!”

当平鑫涛中风卧床失去知觉时，琼瑶和他的孩子们就是否继续给他使用生命维持系统发生了争吵。去世前一周，琼瑶在Facebook上写道：“生命的最后一里路，不应该是这样‘无助、凄惨’的！”

In the post, she reflected on her life with Mr. Ping: “I honestly admit, ‘How deeply, deeply I miss you!’ The good you, and the bad you!”

在帖子中，她回顾了自己和平鑫涛的生活：“很坦白的承认：‘我多么多么的想你！’好的你，坏的你！”

“You have already departed,” she wrote, “Perhaps I should follow.”

“你，已然归去，”她写道，“我，不如归去。”

A week later, in a Facebook post, she referred to herself as a spark and said that she had done her best to burn brightly. “Now, as the flame is about to fade,” she wrote, “I choose to depart gracefully in this way.”

一周后，她在Facebook上发帖，说自己是火花，已经尽力燃烧过。“如今，当火焰将熄之前，”她写道，“我选择这种方式，翩然归去。”

On a Monday in March, in the heart of China’s capital, more than 2,000 delegates of a rubber-stamp advisory body to the authoritarian government of President Xi Jinping gathered for their annual meeting.

3月的一个星期一，在中国首都的中心地带，2000多名代表齐聚一堂参加年度会议，他们是习近平主席的威权政府的一个橡皮章顾问机构的成员。

One mission of the men and women in attendance was to spread the global influence of China’s Communist Party. Of the throngs of party officials, generals and business executives who watched as Mr. Xi took the stage, just 20 people had been invited to represent the country’s vast diaspora, including a single person from the United States: a 69-year-old man from Brooklyn named John Chan.

与会者的使命之一是传播中国共产党的全球影响力。在观看习近平登台演讲的大批党政官员、将军和企业高管中，仅有20人受邀代表中国广大侨民，其中一人来自美国：来自布鲁克林的69岁老人陈善庄(John Chan)。

Mr. Chan’s participation reflected a remarkable proximity to the highest levels of power in China, experts said, and marked him as a person on whom the country’s leaders might call for favors. But it was remarkable, too, because of his position at home: He has operated as a power broker in America’s largest city, with immense sway over an important subset of New York politics.

专家认为，陈善庄的参与反映了他与中国最高权力层非同寻常接近的关系，也标志着他是一个国家领导人可能会向其寻求帮助的人。但他的不寻常之处还在于他在美国的地位：他一直是美国最大城市的权力掮客，对纽约政治的某个重要群体有着巨大的影响力。

For years, Mr. Chan has exerted influence over the city’s ethnic Chinese communities — reaching into back rooms and political clubhouses from Sunset Park in Brooklyn to Manhattan’s Chinatown to Flushing in Queens — to help sway elections, all without drawing much attention.

多年来，陈善庄一直对纽约市的华裔社区施加着影响，从布鲁克林的日落公园到曼哈顿的唐人街，再到皇后区的法拉盛，他可以走入闭门会议和政治会所，帮助左右选举，而这一切都没有引起太多关注。

But lately, federal investigations into foreign influence efforts have swirled around city and state government in New York. Mayor Eric Adams has been charged with conspiring to accept illegal foreign campaign contributions from Turkey. He has pleaded not guilty. One of his top aides, an Asian affairs director with ties to China, had her homes searched in an investigation by Brooklyn federal prosecutors who have separately brought cases against people they suspect of being Chinese agents.

但最近，有关外国影响力的联邦调查围绕纽约市和州政府展开。市长埃里克·亚当斯被指控共谋收受来自土耳其的非法外国竞选捐款。他拒绝认罪。在布鲁克林联邦检察官对疑为中国特工的人士发起的另一项调查中，他的一名高级助手——与中国有关联的亚洲事务主管——的住宅遭到搜查。

The same prosecutors recently accused an aide to Gov. Kathy Hochul of serving the Chinese government by blocking Taiwanese officials from the governor’s office.

负责该调查的检察官最近还指控纽约州长凯西·霍格尔的一名助手为中国政府服务，阻断台湾官员与州长办公室的往来。

Mr. Chan, now 70, has not been accused of any wrongdoing in the investigations. But against the backdrop of recent events, he has stood out nonetheless, both for his overt connections to the Chinese government and for his ability to influence American elections up and down the ballot.

现年70岁的陈善庄并未在调查中被指控有任何不当行为。但在最近发生的事件中，他因与中国政府的公开关系及他影响美国选举的能力而引发关注。

2024年3月，陈善庄（前排右二）在一个政府顾问机构的会议上，他是一个代表中国广大海外侨民的小型代表团中唯一的美国人。

He has done it in part through a network of nonprofits that he and his allies control, directing money, staffing and votes to his favored candidates and organizing demonstrations against anyone opposed to Mr. Xi or his policies.

他与盟友控制着一个非营利组织网络，将资金、人员和选票投向他支持的候选人，并组织示威游行抗议任何反对习近平或其政策的人。

His targets have been politicians on either side of the aisle who might be perceived as acting against the interests of the Chinese government, records and interviews show — by supporting Hong Kong’s anti-Beijing protests, for instance, or attending a reception for a visiting dignitary from Taiwan, the island democracy that China claims as its own.

记录和访谈显示，他的目标是那些被认为可能有损中国政府利益的两党政客，比如支持香港的反北京抗议活动，或者出席来访台湾政要的招待会，台湾是中国声称拥有主权的民主岛屿。

Just weeks ago, he helped unseat a Taiwan-born Democratic incumbent in a State Senate race in Brooklyn. It was the only Senate seat the Democrats lost this cycle.

就在几周前，一位出生于台湾的民主党现任议员在布鲁克林的州参议院选举中落选，而陈善庄在其中发挥了作用。这是民主党人在本轮选举中失去的唯一一个参议院席位。

And in 2022, Mr. Chan’s support for a little-known congressional candidate in New York City probably influenced the outcome of the Democratic primary in the race, leading to the defeat of a Taiwan-born state assemblywoman.

2022年，陈善庄对纽约市一位名不见经传的国会候选人的支持可能影响了民主党初选的结果，导致一位出生于台湾的女性州议员落选。

Mr. Chan did not respond to repeated requests for comment, and he eventually declined, through his lawyer, to answer written questions sent in English and Chinese.

陈善庄没有回应多次置评请求，并最终通过律师拒绝了对以中英双语形式提出的书面问题作出答复。

Officials who have gotten on his bad side described him as a daunting political foe.

与他不和的官员将他描述为一个难以对付的政治对手。

“I’ve never seen a Chinese American go abroad and sit in these meetings that are openly C.C.P.-driven and then come back and brag about it,” said one of those officials, State Assemblyman Ron Kim, a Queens Democrat, using an acronym for the Chinese Communist Party. “This is a whole different level of brazen propaganda.”

“我从没见过一个美籍华人像他那样，到处参加那些公开由中共主导的会议，回来后还大肆吹嘘，”其中一名官员、皇后区民主党人、州议员罗恩·金说。“这是一种完全不同程度的无耻政治宣传。”

Mr. Chan has participated in trips to China, paid for by his business association and with the support of the Chinese Consulate, with more than a dozen state lawmakers and business executives. The most recent occurred last December.

陈善庄曾与十多位州议员和企业高管一起多次前往中国，出行资金由他的商会提供，且相关行程是在中国领事馆的支持下进行的。最近的一次是在去年12月。

Such trips are not illegal, and local, state and federal lawmakers have been making similar journeys for years.

这些行程不算非法，地方、州和联邦立法者多年来一直有类似的行程。

Still, the Beijing meeting that Mr. Chan attended in March was a session of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, the top organization in China’s United Front system — a network of groups that seek to deepen the Communist Party’s influence inside China and globally.

但陈善庄在3月参加的是中国人民政治协商会议，这是中国统一战线系统的最高组织，该系统是一个旨在增强中国共产党在中国和全球影响力的团体网络。

In New York, Mr. Chan founded a business association; a Brooklyn-based nonprofit advocating Asian American rights; and a group for people from his hometown in China. They have helped to promote Beijing’s political agenda, according to a New York Times review of Chinese-language articles and videos, which identified dozens of events in New York City attended by Chinese officials.

在纽约，陈善庄创办了一个商会、一个位于布鲁克林的非营利组织，倡导亚裔美国人的权利，以及一个为他的中国同乡服务的团体。据《纽约时报》对中文文章和视频的查阅，它们帮助推动了北京的政事议程，其中涉及中国官员在纽约市出席的数十场活动。

多年来，陈善庄通过总部设在布鲁克林的美国亚裔社团联合总会来帮助影响纽约市的选举，该组织举办的活动曾邀请市长亚当斯和其他政治人物参加。

Besides the trips Mr. Chan led to China, he has also appeared at several events with Ms. Hochul and Mr. Adams, most recently mingling with the mayor at a Brooklyn festival in February.

除了他带领的访华之旅外，他还与州长霍格尔和市长亚当斯一起参加了多次活动，最近一次是在2月与市长一起参加了布鲁克林的一个节日庆典。

Throughout it all, perhaps the most extraordinary element of Mr. Chan’s rise to prominence in New York politics was not his ties to the Chinese Communist Party, but a part of his personal history he has taken pains to hide from his supporters: that he was a felon, having pleaded guilty, in another life, to human smuggling and heroin trafficking.

在陈善庄的纽约政坛崛起过程中，最不寻常的也许不是他与中共的关系，而是他刻意向支持者隐瞒的一段个人经历：他曾经是重刑犯，曾承认犯下走私人口和贩运海洛因的罪行。

From smuggler to informant

从走私者到线人

When he first arrived in New York City more than 30 years ago, Mr. Chan had already been a member of a Chinese crime organization.

30多年前，当陈善庄第一次来到纽约时，他已经是一个华人犯罪组织的成员。

As a young man in the 1970s, he had escaped the poverty and chaos of China under Mao Zedong by sneaking into Hong Kong, then a British colony. There he joined a gang, according to a 2022 Chinese-language profile in which he was interviewed at a Brooklyn restaurant he owned.

上世纪70年代，年轻人的陈善庄逃离毛泽东统治下贫困和混乱的中国，偷渡到当时还是英国殖民地的香港。2022年的一篇介绍他的中文文章中，他在自己拥有的布鲁克林餐厅接受了采访，文中称他在香港加入了一个帮派。

Emigrating to New York, he joined the Wo Lee Kwan triad and got into the lucrative business of smuggling Chinese citizens into the United States, court documents show. In China such smugglers are known as “snakeheads,” and at the time they charged about $40,000 per person for the journey, with the migrants usually routed through other countries before arriving in the United States.

法庭文件显示，移民到纽约后，他加入了三合会组织“和利群”，并开始从事将中国人偷渡到美国的赚钱生意。在中国，这种走私者被称为“蛇头”，当时他们收取每人大约4万美元的路费，这些移民通常会经由其它国家抵达美国。

At the same time that he was running his criminal operation, Mr. Chan was emerging as an important figure in New York’s Chinese immigrant community — as a restaurateur and as an activist.

在从事犯罪活动的同时，作为餐馆老板和活动人士，陈善庄逐渐成为纽约华人移民社区的重要人物。

In 1999 he organized a protest of the U.S. bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, which American officials said was a targeting error but which many Chinese considered a deliberate act.

1999年，他组织了一次抗议美国轰炸中国驻南斯拉夫贝尔格莱德大使馆的活动，美国官员称该事件是一次目标选定失误，但许多中国人认为是蓄意行为。

In 2000, one of the companies he founded, a production firm, employed Winnie Greco, the Adams aide and Asian affairs liaison whose homes would be searched 24 years later by federal authorities, records show.

记录显示，2000年，他创办的一家制作公司雇佣了亚当斯的助手和亚洲事务联络员郑祺蓉(Winnie Greco)。24年后，联邦当局搜查了她的家。

His rise was interrupted in July 2001, when he and three of his accomplices were charged with, among other things, smuggling Chinese migrants inside shipping containers at ports in Washington State.

陈善庄的崛起在2001年7月一度中断，当时他和他的三名同伙被指控在华盛顿州的港口用集装箱偷运中国移民。

In September 2002, Mr. Chan, also known as Chen Shanzhuang and Ah Jong, stood before a federal judge in Lower Manhattan and prepared to take responsibility for what he had done.

2002年9月，又名“阿庄”(Ah Jong，音)的陈善庄站在曼哈顿下城的一位联邦法官面前，要面对自己的所作所为的后果。

He faced a potential lifetime prison sentence if convicted. But Mr. Chan also had information that could help bring down a murderous Chinatown crime boss named Frank Ma, whose hit man had once forced two men to kneel in front of a gravestone before he shot them in the head. One F.B.I. agent called Mr. Ma “the last of the Asian godfathers.”

如果罪名成立，他可能面临终身监禁。但陈善庄掌握着可以扳倒一个凶残的唐人街犯罪头目的信息，此人名叫弗兰克·马，他的杀手曾强迫两个人跪在墓碑前，然后开枪射他们的头。一名联邦调查局特工称其为“最后一个亚洲教父”。

In January 2008, after assisting investigators from jail for more than five years, Mr. Chan stood before the same judge again.

2008年1月，在狱中协助调查人员已有五年多的陈善庄再次站在同一位法官面前。

“I decided to cooperate with the government to begin to make up for the harm I have done,” Mr. Chan told the judge, Denny Chin. “If you allow me to return to my family, I will never again break the law.”

“我决定与政府合作，以弥补我造成的伤害，”陈善庄告诉法官陈卓光(Denny Chin)。“如果您允许我回到家人身边，我再也不会犯法。”

He had pleaded guilty to a charge of racketeering that included human smuggling and trafficking more than three kilos of heroin, and another charge of operating illegal gambling parlors. He was sentenced to time served and released. Mr. Ma was arrested and, in 2010, convicted and sentenced to life in prison.

他承认犯有敲诈罪，包括走私人口和贩运超过三公斤的海洛因，以及另一项经营非法赌场的罪名。他被判刑满获释。弗兰克·马被捕，并于2010年被定罪，判处终身监禁。

At Mr. Chan’s sentencing, Judge Chin noted his “extensive cooperation” in the case against Mr. Ma. “The results were quite good,” the judge said. “The Ma organization was dismantled.”

在对陈善庄的判决中，陈卓光提到了他在针对弗兰克·马的案件中的“广泛合作”。“结果相当好，”法官说。“马的组织被瓦解了。”

Through his lawyer, Joel Cohen, Mr. Chan declined to discuss his criminal past.

通过他的律师乔尔·科恩，陈善庄拒绝讨论自己的犯罪历史。

‘The King of Brooklyn’

“布鲁克林之王”

Fast-forward to 2014, and United States Representative Grace Meng, a Queens Democrat, was issuing a proclamation that declared July 26, “John Chan Day.”

时间快进到2014年，来自皇后区的民主党众议员孟昭文发布公告，宣布7月26日为“陈善庄日”。

“Since his arrival to the United States,” Ms. Meng wrote, “Mr. Chan has pursued and exemplified the American dream.”

“自从来到美国，”孟昭文写道，“陈先生就一直在追求并实践着美国梦。”

Asked recently about Mr. Chan’s efforts to influence U.S. elections, she said in a statement: “I am totally against any foreign government influencing or manipulating our democracy.” She said she had been unaware of his criminal record.

最近被问及陈善庄影响美国选举的行动时，孟昭文在一份声明中表示：“我完全反对任何外国政府影响或操纵我们的民主。”她说她不知道他有犯罪记录。

The main vehicle for Mr. Chan’s transformation was a nonprofit he had formed to raise the profile of Asian Americans in New York politics and call attention to anti-Asian hate crimes.

陈善庄脱胎换骨的主要工具是他成立的一个非营利组织，该组织旨在提高亚裔美国人在纽约政界的地位，并呼吁人们关注反亚裔仇恨犯罪。

Operating from his now-shuttered restaurant in Brooklyn’s Sunset Park, the group, Asian American Community Empowerment, and other organizations he founded worked to help Chinese immigrants navigate the city’s bureaucracy.

他在布鲁克林日落公园的一家现已关门的餐馆里开展工作，他创立的组织美国亚裔社团联合总会和其他组织致力于帮助中国移民应对纽约的官僚机构。

Soon, the Chinese-language press was calling Mr. Chan “The King of Brooklyn,” and letters of support were pouring in from Hillary Clinton, Senator Chuck Schumer and other prominent figures.

很快，中文媒体开始称陈善庄为“布鲁克林之王”，希拉里·克林顿、参议员查克·舒默和其他知名人士也纷纷来信表示支持。

尽管有过犯罪前科，陈善庄（左）还是与前中国驻纽约总领事黄屏以及其他中国高级官员建立了关系。

From this perch, Mr. Chan has promoted his favored candidates and gone after those who displeased him. His effort to unseat Iwen Chu was a prime example of both.

从这个位置上，陈善庄为他喜欢的候选人助选，并打压那些他不喜欢的人。他出力促成曲怡文连任失败一事就是对这两种做法的最佳体现。

As a newly elected Democratic state senator from Brooklyn, Ms. Chu attended a Manhattan banquet held by Tsai Ing-wen, then Taiwan’s president, in March 2023.

2023年3月，作为布鲁克林新当选的民主党州参议员，曲怡文参加了时任台湾总统蔡英文在曼哈顿举办的宴会。

During the same visit by Ms. Tsai, Mr. Chan led protests outside Ms. Tsai’s hotel, and, speaking into a microphone, had said she “will surely become a sinner for all eternity” — an insult commonly used by the Chinese government.

在蔡英文来访期间，陈善庄在蔡英文下榻的酒店外领导了抗议活动，并对着麦克风说，她“必将成为千古罪人”——这是中国政府常用的一种侮辱。

When Ms. Chu, who was born in Taiwan, came up for re-election this year, Mr. Chan threw his support behind her Republican opponent, Steve Chan, a former New York City police sergeant who was born in Hong Kong. (He is not related to John Chan.)

当出生于台湾的曲怡文今年竞选连任时，陈善庄支持了她的共和党对手、出生于香港的前纽约市警长陈学理。（他与陈善庄没有亲属关系。）

In an interview in September, Steve Chan attempted to distance himself from Mr. Chan, and his campaign manager noted that he had returned a donation from Mr. Chan.

在9月的一次采访中，陈学理试图与陈善庄保持距离，他的竞选经理表示，他退回了陈善庄的一笔捐款。

“If the man is associated with the C.C.P.,” Steve Chan said, “the best we can do is remain cordial.”

“如果这个人与中共有关的话，”陈学理说，“我们最多只能做到与他保持友好。”

“Can we be allies? No. Can we be friends? Sure,” he added. “But it ends right there.”

“我们能结盟吗？不。我们能做朋友吗？当然，”他补充道。“但关系也就到此为止了。”

Two weeks later, he joined John Chan onstage at an event celebrating the 75th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China. With a hand draped over the candidate’s shoulder, John Chan said to a crowd in Mandarin, “You must vote for him, and send him to the State Senate!”

两周后，他在庆祝中华人民共和国成立75周年的纪念活动中和陈善庄一起出现在台上。陈善庄的手搭在陈学理的肩膀上，用普通话对台下的观众说，“一定把你的票投他一票，让（把）他送到参议院宝座！”

Steve Chan defeated Ms. Chu on Nov. 5.

11月5日，陈学理在竞选中击败了曲怡文。

陈善庄将矛头对准布鲁克林民主党人曲怡文以及其他支持台湾的政界人士。中国认为台湾是其领土的一部分。

It was far from the only race Mr. Chan has involved himself in.

这远不是陈善庄介入的唯一一场选举。

He backed a candidate to run against Mr. Kim, a Korean American who has represented Flushing in the State Assembly for the past 12 years, in this summer’s Democratic primary. Mr. Kim, who had taken delegations to Taiwan and sponsored a resolution celebrating Taiwan Heritage Day, prevailed, but he said Mr. Chan had made life more difficult for him by endorsing his opponent through several groups and fund-raising for him.

在今年夏天的民主党初选中，他支持了一名挑战金兑锡的候选人。过去12年里一直在州议会中代表法拉盛的韩裔美国人金兑锡曾率代表团访问台湾，并促成了一项庆祝“台湾传统日”的决议。金兑锡最后在选举中胜出，但他表示，陈善庄通过多个组织为他的竞选对手背书，并帮其筹款，这给他的胜选增加了难度。

In another race, for a congressional seat representing parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn in 2022, Mr. Chan targeted a candidate, Yuh-Line Niou, who, as a state assemblywoman, had taken part in events with Taiwan officials. Mr. Chan backed a lesser-known contender in the Democratic primary who most likely siphoned off votes in the Chinese American community. Ms. Niou’s major opponent, Mr. Goldman, a former prosecutor who is an heir to the Levi Strauss fortune, won the seat and still holds it.

在另一场2022年竞选代表曼哈顿部分地区和布鲁克林的国会众议员席位的选举中，陈善庄将目标对准了候选人牛毓琳，她在任州议员期间曾参与过有台湾官员参加的活动。陈善庄在民主党初选中支持了一位没什么名气的参选人，后者的参选在很大程度上只有分裂华裔美国人社区选票的作用。牛毓琳的主要对手古德曼赢得了该席位，后者是一名前检察官，也是利维·斯特劳斯财富的继承人，他直到今天仍是代表该区的众议员。

And when Mr. Chan wished to see another person take control of a Brooklyn State Assembly seat that had been held by Peter J. Abbate, a Democrat, for more than 30 years, the incumbent’s lengthy time in office served as little obstacle.

民主党人彼得·J·阿巴特任职布鲁克林州议员已超过30年，而当陈善庄想要看到另一个人坐上这一席位时，长期在职的履历并不是什么障碍。

Mr. Chan supported his candidate, Lester Chang, with donations and fund-raisers, and Mr. Chang, a Republican, defeated Mr. Abbate in 2022. During his time as an assemblyman, Mr. Chang has led a delegation to China. The trip was attended by John Chan and was paid for by a business group he founded.

陈善庄支持的候选人是郑永佳，陈为他捐款并帮其筹款。共和党人郑永佳在2022年的选举中战胜了阿巴特。在担任州议员期间，郑永佳率领了一个代表团访问中国。此行由陈善庄创立的一个商业组织出资，他本人也一同前往。

After the election, Mr. Chan took credit for the upset, bragging, “We defeated the fool who had been in office for 35 years.”

那次选举后，陈善庄并不讳言自己在把阿巴特拉下马这件事上起到的作用，他自夸说，“我们打败了（在任）35年的一个笨蛋。”

Mr. Chang did not respond to requests for comment.

郑永佳没有回复置评请求。

Celebrating ‘the motherland’

歌颂“祖国”

Along the way, Mr. Chan has also taken to the streets himself, sometimes even clashing with Chinese dissident demonstrators.

一直以来，陈善庄自己也经常走上街头，有时甚至会与中国异见示威者发生冲突。

After the protest aimed at Taiwan’s president in March 2023, he traveled to San Francisco last November to organize groups welcoming a visit by Mr. Xi. The demonstrations turned violent as supporters of the Chinese leader, including one of Mr. Chan’s close associates, clashed with protesters. Mr. Chan was recorded while arguing with protesters, The Washington Post reported. On the same visit, he attended an invitation-only reception with Mr. Xi.

在2023年3月那次针对台湾总统的抗议活动之后，陈善庄在11月来到旧金山，组织团体欢迎习近平到访。那次游行演变为暴力事件，中国领导人的支持者（包括一名陈善庄的亲信）与抗议者发生冲突。据《华盛顿邮报》报道，陈善庄被拍到与抗议者发生争执。在那次访问中，他还参加了一场与习近平见面的邀请制招待会。

去年在旧金山，陈善庄（中）把手放在中国国旗上，他参加了一场有习近平出席的邀请制招待会。

In July, Mr. Chan’s nonprofit hosted a “pop-up” branch of the Chinese Consulate in Brooklyn staffed by four consular officials. Such unofficial outposts of China’s foreign ministry are part of a “gray zone” of Chinese government efforts to reach into diaspora communities, according to a report by the Jamestown Foundation, which studies Chinese government influence.

 7月，陈善庄的非盈利组织在布鲁克林主办了一场中国领事“快闪”活动，四名领事官员站台。根据研究中国政府影响力的詹姆斯敦基金会的一份报告，这种中国外交部的非官方前哨是中国政府努力接触侨民社区这一努力的“灰色地带”的一部分。

And after the arrest of the Hochul aide, Linda Sun, in September focused attention on possible influence efforts emanating from the Chinese Consulate in New York, and Ms. Hochul called for the consul general, Huang Ping, to be expelled, Mr. Chan threw him an elaborate farewell ceremony. (Ms. Sun has pleaded not guilty.)

在霍格尔的助理孙雯9月被捕后，人们开始关注中国驻纽约领事馆发起的潜在影响力活动。在霍格尔要求驱逐总领事黄屏后，陈善庄为黄屏举办了一场精心组织的欢送仪式。（孙雯已拒绝认罪。）

At a restaurant in Flushing, a crowd gathered as Mr. Chan led the consul general onto the stage. They posed for photos with Lester Chang, the assemblyman Mr. Chan had backed.

在法拉盛的餐馆里，陈善庄将黄屏领上台，台下挤满了人。他们与陈善庄支持的州议员郑永佳一起拍照。

网上发布的一段致敬纽约总领事黄屏的视频显示，陈善庄（右）与黄屏在欢送派对上。这张照片凸显了陈善庄与中国当局以及地方政界人士的深度联系。图片中还出现了陈善庄曾出力助选的州议员郑永佳（左二），以及华裔美国人社区领袖陈恒。

Mr. Chan praised Mr. Huang’s tenure as a top Chinese diplomat in New York City — and saluted the party that has ruled China since 1949.

陈善庄对黄屏作为中国在纽约最高外交官的任期予以称赞，并向1949年以来一直统治中国的共产党致敬。

“Under the strong leadership of the Chinese Communist Party,” Mr. Chan said in Mandarin, “the motherland has made tremendous achievements in the economy, science and technology, culture and stability, making overseas Chinese feel very proud.”

“在中国共产党的强大领导下，”陈善庄用普通话说道，“祖国在经济、科技、文化和稳定方面取得了卓越成就，让海外华人深感自豪。”

Months after a low-level aide in the administration of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo returned from a visit to China in 2019, she got a curious inquiry from federal investigators.

2019年，纽约州州长安德鲁·库莫的一名低级助手去了一趟中国，回国几个月后，她接到联邦调查人员的一个不寻常的问询。

The F.B.I. wanted to know about the nature of the trip that the aide, Linda Sun, had taken.

联邦调查局想了解这位名叫孙雯的助理的旅行性质。

The interaction in 2020 was one of the first known instances of governmental interest in Ms. Sun’s activities, according to a federal indictment unsealed on Tuesday. But it was not the last.

周二公布的一份联邦起诉书显示，2020年的那次互动是政府最早开始注意孙雯的活动的一个事例。但不是最后一次。

In February 2023, Ms. Sun was interviewed by the state’s Office of the Inspector General about her unauthorized procurement of official proclamations from the governor’s office, according to the indictment.

起诉书称，2023年2月，该州监察长办公室就她未经授权促成州长办公室发布官方公告一事约谈了孙雯。

And when Ms. Sun was fired by Gov. Kathy Hochul’s administration weeks later, state officials’ suspicions surrounding Ms. Sun were “reported immediately to law enforcement,” the governor said on Wednesday.

几周后，州长凯西·霍格尔的政府解雇了孙雯，州长于周三表示，州政府官员对孙雯的怀疑“被第一时间报告给执法部门”。

Before her dismissal, even as questions were repeatedly raised, Ms. Sun continued to use her positions in state government to benefit the People’s Republic of China and its Communist Party in exchange for millions of dollars in benefits, according to prosecutors with the U.S. attorney’s office in Brooklyn.

据布鲁克林联邦检察官办公室的检察官说，在她被解职之前，尽管一再出现质疑，孙雯仍继续利用她在州政府的职位为中华人民共和国及中共谋取利益，以换取数百万美元的利益。

In a 65-page indictment, prosecutors laid out a yearslong scheme in which Ms. Sun blocked Taiwanese officials from having access to the governor’s office, eliminated references to Taiwan and Uyghurs from state communications and quashed meetings with Taiwanese officials, all in an effort to bolster Chinese government positions.

在一份65页的起诉书中，检方列出了长达数年的密谋：孙雯阻止了台湾官员与州长办公室的往来，在州政府通讯中删除提及台湾和维吾尔人的内容，并取消与台湾官员的会面，所有这些都是为了巩固中国政府的地位。

In return, Ms. Sun, 40, and her husband, Chris Hu, 41, received payoffs that included millions of dollars in transactions with China-based businesses tied to Mr. Hu, prosecutors said. They also included travel benefits, tickets to events, a series of Nanjing-style salted ducks prepared by a Chinese consulate official’s private chef and employment for Ms. Sun’s cousin in China, officials said.

检方说，作为回报，40岁的孙雯和她41岁的丈夫胡骁通过与胡骁有关联的中国企业获得了数百万美元的报酬。官员们说，她收受的好处还包括旅行费用、活动门票、一名中国领事馆官员的私人厨师制作的一系列南京风味盐水鸭，以及为孙雯在中国的表亲提供的就业机会。

Ms. Sun, 40, was charged with 10 criminal counts that included visa fraud, money laundering and other crimes. Her husband was charged with money laundering. Both pleaded not guilty in federal court on Tuesday, were released on bond and were required to surrender their passports.

40岁的孙雯被控10项刑事罪名，包括签证欺诈、洗钱和其他罪行。她的丈夫被控洗钱。周二，两人都在联邦法院否认有罪，得到保释，并被要求交出护照。

In interviews, officials and people who worked with her at varying stages of her career offered differing impressions of Ms. Sun. Some saw her as a quiet but knowledgeable employee who made a name for herself as a political operator in New York City’s Asian American community and in the Democratic circles of power in Queens, where she appeared to have gotten her start.

在采访中，曾在孙雯职业生涯的不同阶段与她共事过的官员和人士对她的印象各不相同。有些人认为她是一个沉默寡言但知识渊博的雇员；在纽约市亚裔美国人社区，以及在她起步的皇后区民主党权力圈子里，她的政治运作小有名气。

But to the Chinese government, someone of Ms. Sun’s stature would have been seen as a logical and desirable target to win over, according to James Lewis, a researcher at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who studies Chinese espionage abroad.

但战略与国际研究中心研究中国海外间谍活动的研究员詹姆斯·刘易斯说，对中国政府而言，像孙雯这样的人会被视为合乎逻辑、值得争取的目标。

Ms. Sun’s alleged behavior fit into a common tactic of attempting to buy influence in countries including Canada, Australia or the United States.

孙雯被指控的行为符合中国试图在加拿大、澳大利亚或美国等国收买影响力的常见策略。

The charges are the latest in the effort by the Justice Department to stop efforts by the Chinese government to wield its influence secretly across the United States. In another recent case, Shujun Wang, 75, a Queens man who billed himself as a democracy activist and scholar, was convicted last month in Brooklyn federal court of acting as a spy for the Chinese Communist Party.

这些指控是司法部为阻止中国政府在美国各地秘密施加影响而采取的最新行动。在最近的另一起案件中，75岁的皇后区男子、自称民主活动人士和学者的王书军上月在布鲁克林联邦法院被判为中共充当间谍罪名成立。

Mr. Lewis said that the expense of these operations would have been a pittance for China. Ms. Sun may have been a midlevel aide, but to diplomats reporting back to Beijing, he said, “it’s a big coup to recruit the deputy chief of staff.”

刘易斯说，这些行动的费用对中国来说微不足道。他说，孙雯可能只是一名中层助理，但对于向北京汇报工作的外交官来说，“能招募到副幕僚长是一个重大突破。”

“She was a good get,” Mr. Lewis said. “If the C.I.A. had recruited the Chinese equivalent, officials in Beijing would have flipped out, and we would have seen it as a success.”

“她是个不错的成果，”刘易斯说。“如果中情局能招募到中国的同级官员，北京的官员会勃然大怒，而我们会认为是一次成功。”

Ms. Sun entered the political world when she worked as Representative Grace Meng’s chief of staff when Ms. Meng represented a Queens district in the State Assembly. She became known for fiercely defending her boss in the district, and later worked on Ms. Meng’s successful campaign for Congress in 2012, which made her the state’s first Asian American elected to the House.

初入政界时，孙雯曾担任众议员孟昭文的办公室主任，当时孟昭文在州议会代表皇后区的一个选区。孙雯因在该地区激烈地为自己的上司辩护而闻名，后来又参与了孟昭文在2012年成功竞选国会议员的工作，孟昭文由此成为该州第一位当选众议员的亚裔美国人。

Following her stint with Ms. Meng, she went to work for Mr. Cuomo’s administration — at one point holding a deputy chief position in the diversity office and becoming a co-director of the governor’s Asian American Advisory Council, according to prosecutors. After taking office, Ms. Hochul promoted Ms. Sun to deputy chief of staff.

检察官称，在与孟昭文共事之后，孙雯为库莫政府工作，一度担任多元办公室副主任，并成为州长亚裔美国人咨询委员会的联席主任。霍格尔上任后将孙雯提升为副幕僚长。

Ms. Sun’s job of liaison to the Asian American community was demanding, requiring her to attend community meetings late into the night, and Ms. Sun was tireless, according to her former colleagues.

据前同事说，孙雯负责的亚裔美国人社区联络工作是份苦差事，她需要参加社区会议到深夜，前同事说，孙雯仿佛不知疲倦。

But some officials who had more frequent interactions with Ms. Sun said they began to notice a change as her role in state government grew.

但一些与孙雯交往更频繁的官员说，随着她在州政府中的角色越来越重要，他们开始注意到她的变化。

One state lawmaker and one former state lawmaker, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that during the time Ms. Sun served under Mr. Cuomo, the governor’s office appeared notably sensitive to issues related to Taiwan. The governor’s office expressed resistance and pushed back against symbolic pro-Taiwan resolutions that were regularly introduced in the State Legislature, according to one of the lawmakers.

一名不愿透露姓名的州议员和一名前州议员表示，孙雯在库莫手下任职期间，州长办公室似乎对涉台湾问题格外敏感。据其中一名议员说，州长办公室对州立法机构定期提出的象征性亲台决议表示抵制和反对。

The lawmaker also said Ms. Sun and her husband were a regular presence at events and fund-raisers organized by mainland Chinese groups in Queens and Albany, and led a more extravagant lifestyle than most in her position.

这位议员还说，孙雯和她的丈夫经常出席中国大陆团体在皇后区和奥尔巴尼组织的活动和筹款活动，他们的生活方式比她这一职位的大多数人都要奢侈。

Her trip in 2019 to China included a reception in Beijing to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China in Beijing. Prosecutors now say the trip was orchestrated by a Chinese government official, who also paid for Ms. Sun’s hotel accommodations.

她2019年的中国之行包括在北京参加庆祝中华人民共和国成立70周年的招待会。如今，检察官说，这次旅行由一名中国政府官员精心安排，还支付了孙雯的酒店住宿费用。

And as New York became the epicenter of the emerging Covid crisis, Ms. Sun was one of the few members of the governor’s senior staff with Mandarin language skills and relationships across the Pacific. She became part of an ad hoc team dedicated to securing PPE and other supplies from China.

当纽约成为新出现的新冠危机的中心时，孙雯是州长高级职员中为数不多的会说普通话、拥有跨太平洋关系的成员之一。她成了一个专门负责从中国获取个人防护装备和其他物资的特别小组的成员。

In January 2020, Ms. Sun wrote to a Chinese government official to “provide an update on PPE donated by members of a U.S.-based Chinese overseas association to Wuhan,” according to the indictment, and told the official that a company that she said her husband owned would “provide free shipping services for shipments to epidemic areas and offered to provide free shipping services for other Chinese overseas associations.” The company actually belonged to a friend of Ms. Sun and her husband.

根据起诉书，2020年1月，孙雯写信给一名中国政府官员，“提供美国华人海外协会成员向武汉捐赠个人防护装备的最新情况，”并告诉该官员，她声称由她丈夫拥有的一家公司将“为运往疫区的货物提供免费运输服务，并提出为其他华人海外协会提供免费运输服务”。这家公司实际上属于孙雯和她丈夫的一个朋友。

In reference to the same donation, a Chinese government official sent Ms. Sun a link to a media statement from the government, which referenced the company, and wrote “please say thank you to your husband and his company.”

同样是关于这笔捐赠，一名中国政府官员给孙雯发了一份政府媒体声明的链接，其中提到了这家公司，并写道：“请向您的先生和他的公司表示感谢。”

Still, her influence was limited. She was never in charge of lucrative state contracts or procurement decisions.

不过，她的影响力是有限的。她从未负责过利润丰厚的国家合同或采购决策。

Beyond her official duties, some who spoke to The New York Times were puzzled by aspects of Ms. Sun’s personal life.

除了公务之外，一些接受《纽约时报》采访的人对她个人生活的方方面面感到困惑。

For years she had lived in Linden Towers, a middle-class co-op in Flushing, Queens. Several people who worked with her said they were left with the impression her husband was unemployed, and Ms. Sun frequently told superiors she needed a raise, according to two people familiar with the requests who were granted anonymity to discuss personnel matters.

多年来，她一直住在皇后区法拉盛的中产阶级共管公寓林登大厦。据两名知情人士透露，几名与她一起工作的人说，他们得到的印象是，她的丈夫失业了，孙雯经常对上级说她需要加薪。由于讨论人事问题，两名知情人士要求匿名。

At the same time, she often arrived at a state office building in Midtown Manhattan, where she had an office just below the governor’s, dressed in designer outfits.

与此同时，她经常穿着名牌服装来到位于曼哈顿中城的州办公大楼，她的办公室就在州长办公室的楼下。

“I do remember her being a little more polished than other government employees,” said Brandon Hicks, who worked closely with Ms. Sun when he was Mr. Cuomo’s director of African American affairs. “The way she dressed. The bags she carried. She seemed like she must have a husband with a good outside job.”

“我确实记得，她比其他政府雇员光鲜一点，”布兰登·希克斯说。他在担任库莫的非裔美国人事务主管时，曾与孙雯密切合作。“她的穿着。她背的包。她丈夫看起来一定有个好工作。”

After Mr. Cuomo’s resignation, there was a scramble to fill senior staff positions, and Ms. Sun was brought in by Jeff Lewis, who was serving as Ms. Hochul’s chief of staff. Several officials said that Ms. Sun’s role was mostly confined to facilitating events, and that senior administration officials soon decided that she should be reassigned.

库莫辞职后，各方争相填补高级幕僚职位的空缺，孙雯被当时担任霍格尔幕僚长的杰夫·刘易斯请来担任副幕僚长。几名官员说，孙雯的角色主要限于筹办活动，高级政府官员很快就决定将她调任。

She moved to the Department of Labor and left state government in 2023.

她在2023年调到劳工部，离开了州政府。

Mr. Lewis did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

刘易斯没有回应记者的多次置评请求。

At a news conference on Wednesday, Ms. Hochul expressed her anger over the charges. “I’m outraged by this behavior,” she said. “She used that position to deteriorate the trust as outlined in the indictment.”

在周三的新闻发布会上，霍格尔表达了对这些指控的愤怒。“我对这种行为感到愤怒，”她说。“正如起诉书中所说，她利用这个职位破坏了信任。”

The governor disclosed that she had asked a State Department official to expel China’s consul general during a phone call set up by Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

州长透露，自己曾在国务卿布林肯安排的电话会议中要求国务院驱逐中国总领事。

She said she was “informed that the consul general is no longer in the New York mission.” Matthew Miller, a State Department spokesman, said at a news briefing on Wednesday that the consul general had not been expelled but had left the consulate because his rotation had ended.

她说，她“被告知该总领事已不在纽约使团工作”。国务院发言人马修·米勒在周三的新闻发布会上表示，该总领事并非被驱逐出境，而是因为轮值结束而离开领事馆。

Syrian rebel forces have taken Damascus in a lightning offensive and President Bashar al-Assad has fled the country, in a stunning turn of events after 13 years of civil war.

叙利亚反政府武装在闪电攻势中占领了大马士革，总统巴沙尔·阿萨德逃离该国，这是该国经历了13年内战后令人震惊的形势转变。

The rebels swept through the country in less than 10 days, after more than decade in which various factions had tried to unseat Mr. al-Assad.

十多年来，各个派别一直试图推翻阿萨德，而叛军在不到十天的时间里就席卷了整个国家。

The Syrian civil war began during the Arab Spring and escalated into a bloody, multifaceted conflict involving domestic opposition groups, extremist factions and international powers, including the United States, Iran and Russia. More than 500,000 Syrians have died, and millions more have fled their homes.

叙利亚内战始于阿拉伯之春，后来升级为一场多层面的血腥冲突，涉及国内反对派、极端主义派别，以及包括美国、伊朗和俄罗斯在内的国际力量。超过50万叙利亚人丧生，数百万人逃离家园。

Here’s a guide to understanding how the rebels unseated Mr. al-Assad, and what may come next.

本文帮助您了解叛军如何推翻了阿萨德，以及接下来将发生什么。

What is the situation on the ground?

当地情况如何？

In just over a week, Syrian rebel forces seized much of Syria’s northwest. First, the rebels captured Syria’s largest city, Aleppo, then Hama and Homs. On Sunday, they entered Syria’s capital, Damascus, taking the city without a fight as government forces fled.

仅用了一周多时间，叙利亚叛军就占领了叙利亚西北部大部分地区。首先，叛军占领了叙利亚最大的城市阿勒颇，然后是哈马和霍姆斯。周日，他们进入叙利亚首都大马士革，政府军溃逃，叛军不战而胜。

Videos shared on social media and verified by The New York Times show Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, who spearheaded the lightning offensive, entering the Umayyad mosque in Damascus, as crowds gathered around him.

社交媒体上分享并经《纽约时报》证实的视频显示，带头发起闪电攻势的阿布·穆罕默德·戈拉尼在人群簇拥下进入了大马士革的伍麦叶清真寺。

Where is Bashar al-Assad?

巴沙尔·阿萨德在哪里？

Syria’s president fled to Russia, according to Russian state media outlets and two Iranian officials. The reports could not be immediately confirmed, and there was no comment from Mr. al-Assad. His former prime minister, Mohammad Ghazi al-Jalali, stayed behind and said he was ready to cooperate with the rebels.

据俄罗斯国家媒体和两名伊朗官员称，叙利亚总统已逃往俄罗斯。这些报道无法立即得到证实，阿萨德也未发表公开言论。他的前总理穆罕默德·加齐·贾拉利留在了叙利亚，表示愿与叛军合作。

Mr. al-Assad’s government kept rebel forces at bay for more than a decade with Iranian and Russian military support. But it collapsed with astonishing speed over the last week, culminating with rebels taking control of Damascus on Sunday morning.

在伊朗和俄罗斯的军事支持下，阿萨德政府十多年来一直成功压制了叛军。但在上周，阿萨德政府以惊人的速度垮台，最终导致叛军于周日上午控制了大马士革。

周日，阿萨德的官邸。

Mr. al-Assad was central to the protracted and devastating civil war that began in 2011. His family — who are Alawites, a minority sect that is an offshoot of Shiite Islam — had run Syria since a 1970 coup.

这场旷日持久、破坏性极强的内战始于2011年，阿萨德是其核心人物。他的家族属于阿拉维派，是什叶派伊斯兰教的一个小分支，自1970年政变以来一直统治着叙利亚。

Mr. al-Assad initially portrayed himself as a modern reformist, but he responded to peaceful protests during the Arab Spring with brutal crackdowns, sparking a nationwide uprising.

阿萨德最初将自己描绘成现代改革派，但他在阿拉伯之春期间对和平抗议活动进行了残酷的镇压，在全国各地引发起义。

His family’s dynasty bombed and detained thousands of opponents, building fearsome internal security agencies to quash unrest. As the rebels advanced this weekend, they took over many of the notorious prisons where the Assad regime had for decades imprisoned, tortured and executed political prisoners.

他的家族王朝轰炸并拘禁了数以千计的反对者，建立了可怕的内部安全机构来平息动乱。本周末，叛军在推进过程中占领了许多臭名昭著的监狱，几十年来，阿萨德政权一直在那里监禁、折磨和处决政治犯。

Who are the rebels?

叛军是谁？

The main rebel group behind Assad’s ouster is Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, whose name means Organization for the Liberation of the Levant. It began to come together at the beginning of Syria’s civil war, when jihadists formed the Nusra Front to fight pro-Assad forces with hundreds of insurgent and suicide attacks.

推翻阿萨德政权的主要反叛组织是“沙姆解放组织”——这一名称意为黎凡特解放组织。该组织在叙利亚内战初期开始组建，当时圣战分子组建了“努斯拉阵线”，以数百次叛乱和自杀式袭击对抗亲阿萨德的武装力量。

The group had early links to the Islamic State, and then to Al Qaeda. But by mid-2016, the Nusra Front was trying to shed its extremist roots, banding together with several other factions to establish Hayat Tahrir al-Sham. The United States and other Western countries still consider it a terrorist group.

该组织最初与伊斯兰国有联系，后来又与基地组织有联系。但到了2016年年中，“努斯拉阵线”试图摆脱极端主义根源，与其他几个派别联合成立了“沙姆解放组织”。美国和其他西方国家仍将其视为恐怖组织。

2021年，“沙姆解放组织”的战士在叛军控制的伊德利前线阵地。

The group’s leader, Mr. al-Jolani, told The New York Times his primary goal was to “liberate Syria from this oppressive regime.” He has tried to gain legitimacy by providing services to residents in his stronghold of Idlib.

该组织头目戈拉尼告诉《纽约时报》，他的首要目标是“将叙利亚从压迫政权中解放出来”。他试图通过为其大本营伊德利卜的居民提供服务来获得合法性。

Who is the rebel leader?

叛军首领是谁？

Mr. al-Jolani, 42, was born Ahmed Hussein al-Shara in Saudi Arabia, the child of Syrian exiles, according to Arab media reports. In the late 1980s, his family moved back to Syria, and in 2003, he went to neighboring Iraq to join Al Qaeda and fight the U.S. occupation.

据阿拉伯媒体报道，现年42岁的戈拉尼出生于沙特阿拉伯，本名艾哈迈德·侯赛因·沙雷，父母都是叙利亚流亡者。20世纪80年代末，他和家人搬回叙利亚，2003年，他前往邻国伊拉克加入基地组织，反抗美国的占领。

He spent several years in an American prison in Iraq, according to the Arab media reports and U.S. officials. He later emerged in Syria around the start of the civil war and formed the Nusra Front, which eventually evolved into Hayat Tahrir al-Sham. At some point, he took on the nom de guerre Abu Mohammad al-Jolani.

据阿拉伯媒体报道和美国官员的说法，他在伊拉克的美国监狱中服刑数年。后来，他在叙利亚内战开始时出现在叙利亚，组建了“努斯拉阵线”，该组织最终演变为“沙姆解放组织”。在某个时期，他开始使用阿布·穆罕默德·阿尔-戈拉尼这一化名。

Since breaking ties with Al Qaeda, Mr. al-Jolani and his group have tried to gain international legitimacy by eschewing global jihadist ambitions and focusing on organized governance in Syria.

自从与基地组织切断关系以来，戈拉尼和他的组织一直回避全球圣战野心、专注于叙利亚的有组织治理，试图以此获得国际合法性。

周日，在领导此次进攻的叛军头目戈拉尼（中间左二）在清真寺发表讲话之前，人们与他拍照。

Questions have emerged about what kind of government Mr. al-Jolani would support and whether Syrians would accept it. In Idlib, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham has espoused a government guided by a conservative and at times hard-line Sunni Islamist ideology.

戈拉尼会支持什么样的政府，以及叙利亚人是否会接受这个政府已成为人们关注的问题。在伊德利卜，“沙姆解放组织”支持一个保守的、有时强硬的逊尼派伊斯兰主义意识形态指导的政府。

Since the rebel offensive began, Mr. al-Jolani has sought to reassure minority communities from other sects and religions. Some analysts say he now faces the test of his life: whether he can unite Syrians.

自从叛军发起攻势以来，戈拉尼一直试图安抚其他教派和宗教的少数群体。一些分析人士表示，他现在面临着人生最大考验：他能否团结叙利亚人。

Who else is fighting in Syria?

还有谁在叙利亚作战？

Kurdish forces

库尔德武装

Forces from Syria’s Kurdish ethnic minority became the United States’ main local partner in the fight against the Islamic State in Syria, under the banner of the Syrian Democratic Forces. After the extremist group was largely defeated, the Kurdish-led forces consolidated control over towns in the northeast, expanding an autonomous region they had built there. But Kurdish fighters still had to contend with their longtime enemy, Turkey, which regards them as linked to a Kurdish separatist insurgency.

来自叙利亚库尔德少数民族的部队成为美国在叙利亚打击伊斯兰国的主要当地合作伙伴，他们的称号是“叙利亚民主力量”。在极端组织基本被击败后，库尔德人领导的部队巩固了对东北部城镇的控制，扩大了他们在那里建立的自治区。但库尔德战士仍需与他们的长期敌人土耳其抗衡，土耳其认为他们与库尔德分裂主义叛乱有关。

Turkey

土耳其

Since the beginning of the civil war, the Turkish military has launched several military interventions across the border into Syria, mostly against the Syrian Kurdish-led forces. Turkey now effectively controls a zone along Syria’s northern border.

自叙利亚内战爆发以来，土耳其军队多次越境进入叙利亚，主要针对叙利亚库尔德人领导的武装力量。土耳其目前实际控制着叙利亚北部边境的一个地区。

Russia

俄罗斯

Throughout Syria’s civil war, Russia was one of Mr. Assad’s most loyal foreign backers, sending troops to support his forces and jets to bomb his enemies. It maintained a strategic military presence in Syria with air and naval bases, which it uses to support military operations in the region.

在叙利亚内战期间，俄罗斯一直是阿萨德最忠实的外国支持者之一，派军队支援阿萨德的军队，并派遣战机轰炸其敌人。俄罗斯在叙利亚保持着战略军事存在，拥有空军和海军基地，用于支持该地区的军事行动。

周一，示威者在德黑兰土耳其大使馆抗议土耳其总统埃尔多安。

Because of the war of attrition in Ukraine, analysts say, Russia was unable to support Syria’s government as forcefully as it had in the past, suffering one of its biggest geopolitical setbacks in the quarter-century rule of President Vladimir V. Putin.

分析人士称，由于乌克兰战争的消耗，俄罗斯无法像过去那样有力地支持叙利亚政府，从而遭受了普京总统执政四分之一个世纪以来最大的地缘政治挫折之一。

The future of Russia’s military presence in Syria is now in doubt.

俄罗斯在叙利亚军事存在的前景不明。

Iran and Hezbollah

伊朗和真主党

Syria has played a core role in Iran’s “axis of resistance,” a network of countries and groups that includes Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis in Yemen that hopes to destroy Israel and reduce American influence in the Middle East.

叙利亚在伊朗的“抵抗轴心”中发挥着核心作用。这是一个由真主党、哈马斯和也门胡塞武装等国家和组织组成的网络，旨在摧毁以色列，削弱美国在中东的影响力。

Iran smuggled weapons to Hezbollah across Iraq and Syria — a supply route that has now been destroyed. Iran and Hezbollah repaid the favor by sending thousands of militants to fight on Mr. al-Assad’s side during the civil war.

伊朗通过伊拉克和叙利亚向真主党走私武器——这条补给线现在已被摧毁。伊朗和真主党在叙利亚内战期间派遣数以千计的武装分子为阿萨德效力，以回报叙利亚的帮助。

On Friday, Iran began to evacuate its military commanders and personnel from Syria, according to regional officials and three Iranian officials.

据该区域的官员和三名伊朗官员称，伊朗周五开始从叙利亚撤离其军事指挥官和人员。

United States

美国

The United States maintains a force of about 900 troops in Syria, centered in Kurdish-controlled oil drilling areas in the northeast and a garrison in the southeast.

美国在叙利亚驻军约900人，主要驻扎在东北部库尔德人控制的石油钻探区和东南部的一个要塞。

The U.S. role in the Syrian civil war has shifted several times. The Obama administration initially supported opposition groups in their uprising against the government, providing weapons and training, with limited effect.

美国在叙利亚内战中的角色几经转变。奥巴马政府最初支持反对派组织发起的反政府起义，为其提供武器和训练，但收效甚微。

After the rise of the Islamic State in 2014, U.S. forces fought the terrorist group with airstrikes and assistance to Kurdish forces, and then stayed in northeastern Syria to prevent a resurgence. President Donald J. Trump withdrew many of those forces in 2019.

2014年伊斯兰国崛起后，美军通过空袭和援助库尔德武装与该恐怖组织作战，随后继续驻扎在叙利亚东北部，以防止其卷土重来。特朗普总统于2019年撤走了大部分驻军。

Israel

以色列

The Israeli military said on Sunday its troops had entered an internationally monitored buffer zone in the Golan Heights and ordered a curfew on Syrian villages there. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, said Israel was deploying there temporarily for defensive purposes.

以色列军方周日表示，其军队已进入戈兰高地的一个国际监控缓冲区，并下令对那里的叙利亚村庄实行宵禁。以色列总理内塔尼亚胡表示，以色列暂时在那里部署军队是为了防御目的。

2018年，美国士兵在叙利亚北部。

Israel’s military activities in Syria have been mostly focused on airstrikes against Hezbollah and Iranian targets, especially senior military personnel, weapons production facilities and the transport corridor that Iran uses to send weapons to Hezbollah.

以色列在叙利亚的军事活动主要集中在对真主党和伊朗目标的空袭，特别是针对高级军事人员、武器生产设施，以及伊朗向真主党运送武器的运输走廊。

President-elect Donald J. Trump announced on Thursday that he would nominate David Perdue, a businessman and former senator from Georgia, to be his ambassador to China.

候任总统特朗普周四宣布，他将提名商人、前佐治亚州参议员戴维·珀杜担任驻华大使。

“He will be instrumental in implementing my strategy to maintain Peace in the region, and a productive working relationship with China’s leaders,” Mr. Trump wrote in an online post.

特朗普发帖称：“他将在执行我的维护地区和平的战略中发挥重要作用，并与中国领导人建立富有成效的工作关系。”

If confirmed by the Senate, Mr. Perdue would take over the ambassadorship from Nicholas Burns, a veteran diplomat and former Harvard professor. Mr. Perdue would serve as a conduit between Mr. Trump and Chinese officials in Beijing, including Xi Jinping, the country’s leader. American officials in the Biden and first Trump administrations have said the U.S.-China relationship is the most consequential in the world.

如果得到参议院批准，珀杜将接替资深外交官、前哈佛大学教授尼古拉斯·伯恩斯出任驻华大使。珀杜将充当特朗普与中国官员（包括中国领导人习近平）之间的沟通渠道。拜登政府和特朗普第一届政府的美国官员都表示，中美关系是世界上最重要的关系。

The two nations are peer competitors, with the world’s two largest economies and most powerful militaries. American officials say that China is the only power capable of displacing the United States as the dominant nation in the world.

两国是势均力敌的竞争对手，是世界上两个最大的经济体，并拥有最强大的军事力量。美国官员称，中国是唯一有能力取代美国成为世界主导的国家。

Mr. Trump’s picks for the top national security posts have talked about confronting and constraining China: Marco Rubio, the designated secretary of state; Michael Waltz, tapped for national security adviser; and Pete Hegseth, Mr. Trump’s deeply imperiled choice for defense secretary. On Wednesday, Mr. Trump named Peter Navarro, a vocal critic of China, to be a senior adviser on trade and manufacturing.

特朗普挑选的几位国家安全高级官员都谈到了对抗和制约中国的问题，包括被提名为国务卿的马尔科·卢比奥、被任命为国家安全顾问的迈克尔·沃尔兹，以及深陷危机的特朗普国防部长人选皮特·海格塞斯。周三，特朗普任命公开批评中国的彼得·纳瓦罗担任贸易和制造业高级顾问。

But Mr. Trump’s pick for Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, and the one for commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, have not expressed strong animus toward China. Neither man has been a strong advocate of universal tariffs, which some of Mr. Trump’s supporters favor. Mr. Trump has threatened to impose tariffs of 60 percent or more on all Chinese goods and to revoke the nation’s preferred trade status, a move that would also lead to higher tariffs.

但特朗普挑选的财政部长斯科特·贝森特和商务部长霍华德·卢特尼克并没有对中国表现出强烈的敌意。两人都不像一些特朗普的拥趸那样，是普遍关税的坚定支持者。特朗普威胁要对所有中国商品征收60%或以上的关税，并取消中国的优惠贸易地位，此举也会导致更高的关税。

Mr. Trump has also praised Mr. Xi as a strong and “brilliant” leader and has called the Chinese autocrat a “very good friend.”

特朗普还称赞习近平是一位强大而“杰出”的领导人，并称这位中国威权领导人是他“非常好的朋友”。

Mr. Perdue represented Georgia in the Senate from 2015 to 2021, leaving after he lost re-election to Jon Ossoff. Mr. Perdue publicly questioned the election results, criticized Georgia’s election officials and supported a lawsuit brought by Mr. Trump’s supporters to try to overturn the 2020 results in Georgia, a pivotal state in the presidential race. With Mr. Trump’s backing, Mr. Perdue challenged Brian Kemp for the Republican nomination in the election for governor of Georgia in 2022 but lost by a wide margin in the primary.

珀杜曾于2015至2021年任佐治亚州参议员，在竞选连任中输给乔恩·奥索夫后下台。珀杜公开质疑选举结果，批评佐治亚州的选举官员，并支持特朗普支持者提起诉讼，试图推翻总统竞选中举足轻重的佐治亚州2020年的选举结果。在特朗普支持下，珀杜在2022年佐治亚州州长选举中挑战布莱恩·坎普的共和党提名，但在初选中以较大差距落败。

Mr. Perdue was the most prolific stock trader in the Senate during his six years there, a fact that raised questions about potential conflicts of interest. The Justice Department investigated him for possible insider trading in his sale of more than $1 million of stock in a financial-analysis firm, but prosecutors did not bring charges.

在担任参议员的六年期间，珀杜是参议院中股票交易量最大的参议员，这引发了人们对其可能存在利益冲突的质疑。司法部曾调查他在一家金融分析公司出售价值100多万美元股票时涉嫌内幕交易，但检察官并未就此提出指控。

Jensen Huang, the chief executive of Nvidia, is the 10th-richest person in the United States, worth $127 billion. In theory, when he dies, his estate should pay 40 percent of his net worth to the government in taxes.

英伟达首席执行官黄仁勋身家1270亿美元，在美国富豪榜中排名第10。理论上，如果他去世，其遗产净值的40%应用于缴税。

But Mr. Huang, 61, is not only an engineering genius and Silicon Valley icon whose company, the world’s second-most valuable, makes the chips that power much artificial intelligence. He is also the beneficiary of a series of tax dodges that will enable him to pass on much of his fortune tax free, according to securities and tax filings reviewed by The New York Times.

但现年61岁的黄仁勋不只是一位工程天才和硅谷标杆人物，执掌世界第二高市值公司，生产许多人工智能运转所需的芯片。根据《纽约时报》查阅的证券和税务报备文件，他还是一系列避税措施的受益人，让他可以将自己的相当一部分财富免税传给后人。

The savings for his family are on a pace to be roughly $8 billion. It likely ranks among the largest tax dodges in the United States.

他的家人可以省下的税金将达到大约80亿美元。这可能将成为美国最大规模的避税操作之一。

The types of strategies Mr. Huang has deployed to shield his wealth have become ubiquitous among the ultrawealthy. Blackstone Group’s Stephen A. Schwarzman, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and top executives at Google, Coinbase, Eli Lilly, Mastercard and Advanced Micro Devices have collectively shifted billions of dollars into financial vehicles in order to avoid the federal estate tax, according to a Times analysis of securities disclosures.

黄仁勋所采用的财富遮蔽策略在最富有的群体中已经无处不在。据时报对证券披露文件的分析，黑石集团的苏世民(Stephen A. Schwarzman)、Meta的马克·扎克伯格以及谷歌、Coinbase、礼来、万事达、AMD等企业的高管都在将亿万财富转化成金融工具，以规避联邦遗产税。

It is just one sign of how the estate tax — imposed solely on a sliver of the country’s multimillionaires — has been eviscerated.

这是遗产税——仅针对美国的亿万富翁中的一小部分征收——已经成为一具空壳的表现之一。

Revenue from the tax has barely changed since 2000, even as the wealth of the richest Americans has roughly quadrupled. If the estate tax had simply kept pace, it would have raised around $120 billion last year. Instead it brought in about a quarter of that.

美国的税收自2000年以来几乎没有改变过，尽管美国的极富阶层的财富大约增长了三倍。按照这样的增幅，去年可征得的遗产税本应在大约1200亿美元。然而实际所得只是这个数字的约四分之一。

2007年，黄仁勋、妻子洛丽和他们的孩子。

That missing revenue would be enough to simultaneously double the budget of the Justice Department and triple federal funding for cancer and Alzheimer’s research.

这些未能征得的税款将足以让司法部的预算加倍，同时将联邦对癌症和阿兹海默症研究的拨款增加至原来的三倍。

The story of Mr. Huang’s tax avoidance is a case study in how the ultrarich bend the U.S. tax system for their benefit. His strategies were not explicitly authorized by Congress. Instead, they were cooked up by creative lawyers who have exploited a combination of obscure federal regulations, narrow findings by courts and rulings that the Internal Revenue Service issues in individual cases that then served as models for future tax shelters. As such strategies became widespread, they effectively became the law.

透过黄仁勋的避税，我们可以了解极富阶层如何操控美国税收系统，令其符合自己的利益。他的策略并没有得到国会的明确授权，只是由一些别出心裁的律师谋划而成，他们利用了鲜有人知的联邦监管规则、有狭窄界定的法庭判决，以及国税局就个别案例发布的裁定——但随即成为未来避税措施的典范。随着这类策略的普及，它们实际已经成为法律。

“You have an army of well-trained, brilliant people who sit there all day long, charging $1,000 an hour, thinking up ways to beat this tax,” said Jack Bogdanski, a professor at Lewis & Clark Law School and the author of a widely cited treatise on the estate tax. “Don’t expect anyone in Congress to stop this.”

“你拥有一支训练有素、聪明绝顶的团队，他们整天坐在那里，一小时收费1000美元，就负责想出挡掉这笔税的办法，”路易斯克拉克法学院教授、著有一篇被广泛引用的遗产税论文的杰克·博格丹斯基说。“就别指望国会里的什么人能拦住他们了。”

The richest Americans are able to pass down approximately $200 billion each year without paying estate tax on it, thanks to the use of complex trusts and other avoidance strategies, estimated Daniel Hemel, a tax law professor at New York University.

纽约大学税法教授丹尼尔·亨梅尔说，通过使用复杂的信托和其它避税策略，最富有的美国人能在不交遗产税的情况下每年传下大约2000亿美元。

Enforcement of the rules governing the estate tax has eased in part because the I.R.S. has been decimated by years of budget cuts. In the early 1990s, the agency audited more than 20 percent of all estate tax returns. By 2020, the rate had fallen to about 3 percent.

遗产税规则执行上的松懈一定程度上是因为国税局在连年的预算裁减之下受到重创。上世纪90年代初，该局对超过20%的遗产税申报进行了审计。到了2020年，这个比例已经跌至大约3%。

税收减少，审计减少：尽管美国最富有的人所拥有的财富激增，但遗产税收入几乎没有变化。原因之一可能是美国国税局对遗产税申报的审计已降至几十年来的最低水平。

The trend is likely to accelerate with Republicans controlling both the White House and Capitol Hill. They are already slashing funding for law enforcement by the I.R.S. The incoming Senate majority leader, John Thune, and other congressional Republicans for years have been trying to kill the estate tax, branding it as a penalty on family farms and small businesses.

随着共和党控制白宫和两院，这一趋势可能加剧。他们已经在大幅削减国税局的执法经费。即将上任的参议院多数党领袖约翰·图恩和其他国会共和党人多年来一直试图除掉遗产税，他们称之为对家庭农场和小型商企的惩罚。

Yet Mr. Huang’s multibillion-dollar maneuver — detailed in the fine print of his filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and his foundation’s disclosures to the I.R.S. — shows the extent to which the estate tax has already been hollowed out.

然而黄仁勋的这种关乎数十亿美元的操作——其细节隐藏在他的美国证券交易委员会报备文件，以及他的基金会的国税局披露文件的角角落落——展现了遗产税在多大程度上已经被掏空。

“From an estate-tax-planning perspective, it’s a grand slam,” said Jonathan Blattmachr, a prominent trusts and estates lawyer who reviewed Mr. Huang’s disclosures for The Times. “He’s done a magnificent job.”

“从遗产税规划的角度看，这就是赢了个大满贯，”为时报查阅了黄的披露文件的知名信托和遗产律师乔纳森·布拉特马赫说。“他做得非常漂亮。”

An Nvidia spokeswoman, Stephanie Matthew, declined to discuss details of the Huangs’ tax strategies.

英伟达发言人斯蒂芬妮·马修拒绝就黄的税务策略细节置评。

黄仁勋今年在加利福尼亚州圣何塞。他的财富遮蔽策略在超级富豪中很常见。

‘Only Morons’

 “傻子才交”

The United States adopted the modern estate tax in 1916. In recent decades, congressional Republicans have successfully watered it down, cutting the rate and increasing the amount that is exempt from the tax. Today, a married couple can pass on about $27 million tax free; anything more than that is generally supposed to be taxed at a 40 percent rate.

美国在1916年引入了现代遗产税。过去几十年里，国会共和党人已经成功地削弱这一税项，降低税率，增加免税额。在今天，一对夫妇可以留下大约2700万美元的免税遗产；超出部分一般需要缴纳40%的税。

Billionaires have made a sport out of trying to avoid the tax. Gary Cohn, a former Goldman Sachs executive who was President-elect Donald J. Trump’s chief economic adviser during his first administration, once quipped that “only morons pay the estate tax.”

亿万富翁把避税当成一种乐趣。前高盛银行高管、候任总统特朗普的上一个任期的首席经济顾问盖里·科恩曾打趣说，“傻子才交遗产税。”

天文数字般的增长：英伟达的股价一直是股市中表现最好的股票之一，自2022年以来飙升了800%以上。

In 2012, Mr. Huang and his wife, Lori, took one of their first steps to shield their fortune from the estate tax.

2012年，黄和他的妻子洛丽首次开始了为规避遗产税而进行的财富遮蔽操作。

They set up a financial vehicle known as an irrevocable trust and moved 584,000 Nvidia shares into it, according to a securities disclosure that Mr. Huang filed. The shares at the time were worth about $7 million, but they would eventually generate tax savings many times greater.

从黄仁勋的证券披露文件可以看到，他们开设了一种名为“不可撤销信托”的金融工具，将584000股英伟达股票转入其中。这笔股份价值大约700万美元，但最终能规避的税金将是这个数字的几倍。

The Huangs were taking advantage of a precedent set nearly two decades earlier, in 1995, when the I.R.S. blessed a transaction that tax professionals affectionately nicknamed “I Dig It.” (The moniker was a play on the name of the type of financial vehicle involved: an intentionally defective grantor trust.)

黄氏夫妇是在利用近20年前的1995年立下的一项先例，当时国税局认可了一项操作，该操作被税务专业人士亲切地称为“我中意”（I Dig It。这个别称是从其中所涉金融工具类型的名称变化而来，即“故意缺陷授予人信托”。）（Intentionally defective grantor trust的首字母缩写为IDGT，音近I Dig It。——译注）

One of the beauties of I Dig It was that it had the potential to largely circumvent not only the estate tax but also the federal gift tax. That tax applies to assets that multimillionaires give to their heirs while they’re alive and essentially serves as a backstop to the estate tax; otherwise, rich people could give away all their money before they die in order to avoid the estate tax.

“我中意”的妙处之一是不但可以规避遗产税，还可以大幅规避联邦馈赠税。该税项适用于亿万富翁在世时赠予继承人的资产，本质上起到为遗产税补漏的作用，否则富人就可以在活着的时候把钱全给出去，从而避开遗产税。

“I’ve always called it the gift that keeps on giving,” said Michael D. Mulligan, a veteran trusts and estates lawyer in St. Louis who helped create the strategy.

“我总说这就是一件能不断给予回报的礼物，”圣路易斯资深信托和遗产律师、参与建立该避税策略的迈克尔·D·穆里根说。

In Mr. Huang’s case, the details in securities filings are limited. But multiple experts, including Mr. Mulligan, said it was almost certainly a classic I Dig It gift, loan and sale transaction.

具体在黄仁勋这一例中，从证券报备文件看不到多少细节。但包括穆里根在内的多位专家说，这几乎肯定是一次经典的“我中意”式馈赠、出借和出售交易。

The $7 million of shares that Mr. Huang moved into his trust in 2012 are today worth more than $3 billion. If those shares were directly passed on to Mr. Huang’s heirs, they would be taxed at 40 percent — or well over $1 billion.

黄仁勋2012年转入他信托基金的股票价值700万美元，如今价值超过30亿美元。如果这些股份直接传给黄仁勋的继承人，他们将被征收40%的税——远超10亿美元。

Instead, the tax bill will probably be no more than a few hundred thousand dollars.

然而现在的税款可能最多就几十万美元。

First-Name Basis

家喻户晓

The Huangs soon took another big step toward reducing their estate-tax bill.

很快，黄家在减少遗产税方面又迈出了一大步。

Nvidia was emerging as the main provider of chips for artificial intelligence technology, eventually capturing more than 90 percent of the market. Mr. Huang was becoming a Silicon Valley celebrity. He adopted an all-black dress code. Such was his renown that he was known in tech circles simply by his first name, along with luminaries like Tesla’s Elon, Meta’s Mark and Google’s Sergey and Larry.

英伟达开始成为人工智能技术芯片的主要供应商，最终占据了90%以上的市场份额。黄仁勋成了硅谷名人，穿上了一身全黑的装束。他的名气如此之大，以至于在科技圈，他和特斯拉的埃隆、Meta的马克、谷歌的谢尔盖和拉里等名人一样，只提一个名字就能知道他是谁。

In 2016, the Huangs set up several vehicles known as grantor retained annuity trusts, or GRATs, securities filings show.

证券报备文件显示，2016年，黄家设立了几家被称为授予人保留年金信托（简称GRAT）的投资工具。

In 2016, Mr. Huang and his wife put just over three million Nvidia shares into their four new GRATs. The shares were worth about $100 million. If their value rose, the increase would be a tax-free windfall for their two adult children, who both work at Nvidia.

2016年，黄仁勋和妻子将300多万股英伟达股票投入了他们的四个新GRAT之中。这些股票价值约1亿美元。如果这些资产的价值上升，他们的两个成年子女将获得一笔免税的横财，两人都在英伟达工作。

That is precisely what happened. The shares are now worth more than $15 billion, according to data from securities filings compiled for The Times by Equilar, a data firm. That means that the Huang family is poised to avoid roughly $6 billion in estate taxes.

事情果然就是这样发展的。数据公司Equilar为时报整理的证券文件显示，这些股票目前价值超过150亿美元。这意味着黄家可以避免缴纳大约60亿美元的遗产税。

If the Huangs’ trusts sell their shares, that will generate a hefty capital gains tax bill — more than $4 billion, based on Nvidia’s current stock price. Mr. and Mrs. Huang can pay that bill on behalf of the trusts, without it counting as a taxable gift to their heirs.

如果黄家的信托公司出售他们的股票，那将产生一笔巨额的资本利得税——根据英伟达目前的股价计算，将超过40亿美元。黄氏夫妇可以代表信托基金支付这笔费用，而不会将其计入对继承人的应税赠与。

A Charitable Tax Dodge

慈善避税

Starting in 2007, Mr. Huang deployed another technique that will further reduce his family’s estate taxes. This strategy involved taking advantage of his and his wife’s charitable foundation.

从2007年开始，黄仁勋采用了另一种方法，可以进一步减少家族的遗产税。这一策略包括利用他和他妻子的慈善基金会。

Mr. Huang has given the Jen Hsun & Lori Huang Foundation shares of Nvidia that were worth about $330 million at the time of the donations. Such donations are tax-deductible, meaning they reduced the Huangs’ income tax bills in the years that the gifts took place.

黄仁勋和他的“仁勋与洛丽·黄基金会”捐赠的英伟达股票在捐赠时价值约3.3亿美元。这样的捐赠是免税的，这意味着它们减少了黄氏夫妇在捐赠当年的所得税账单。

2008年，媒体大亨梅尔·卡马津。他的家人使用“我中意”策略来逃税。2005年，前底特律活塞队老板比尔·戴维森。他的财富保护也受益于“我中意”策略。

Foundations are required to make annual donations to charities equal to at least 5 percent of their total assets. But the Huangs’ foundation, like those of many billionaires, is satisfying that requirement by giving heavily to what is known as a donor-advised fund.

基金会每年必须向慈善机构捐出其总资产的至少5%。但黄家的基金会和许多亿万富翁的基金会一样，通过向所谓的捐赠者建议基金大量捐款来满足这一要求。

Such funds are pools of money that the donor controls. There are limitations on how the money can be spent. Buying cars or vacation homes or the like is off limits. But a fund could, say, invest money in a business run by the donor’s friend or donate enough money to name a building at a university that the donor’s children hope to attend.

这些基金是捐助者控制的资金池，其用途是有限的。购买汽车或度假屋之类是不允许的。但是，一个基金可以投资捐赠者的朋友经营的企业，或者捐出足够的资金，为捐赠人子女希望就读的大学建造一座命名大楼。

There is a gaping loophole in the tax laws: Donor-advised funds are not required to actually give any money to charitable organizations.

税法中有一个漏洞：捐赠者建议基金无需向慈善组织实际捐赠任何资金。

When the donor dies, control of the fund can pass to his heirs — without incurring any estate taxes.

当捐赠人去世时，基金的控制权可以传给他的继承人，而不会产生任何遗产税。

In recent years, 84 percent of the Huang foundation’s donations have gone to their donor-advised fund, named GeForce, an apparent nod to the name of an Nvidia videogame chip. The Nvidia shares that the Huangs have donated are today worth about $2 billion.

近年来，黄仁勋的基金84%的捐款都捐给了他们的捐赠者建议基金，基金名为GeForce，显然是向英伟达游戏芯片的名字致敬。黄仁勋夫妇捐赠的英伟达股票如今价值约20亿美元。

The fund is not required to disclose how its money is spent, though the foundation has said the assets will be used for charitable purposes. The Nvidia spokeswoman, Ms. Matthew, said those causes included higher education and public health.

该基金不需要披露其资金的使用情况，但基金会表示，这些资产将用于慈善目的。英伟达发言人马修说，用途包括高等教育和公共卫生。

But there is another benefit. Based on Nvidia’s current stock price, the donations to the fund have reduced Mr. Huang’s eventual estate-tax bill by about $800 million.

但是该基金还会带来一个好处。按照英伟达目前的股价计算，对该基金的捐赠，使得黄仁勋最终的遗产税减少了约8亿美元。

The fatal shooting on Wednesday of a top UnitedHealthcare executive, Brian Thompson, on a Manhattan sidewalk has unleashed a torrent of morbid glee from patients and others who say they have had negative experiences with health insurance companies at some of the hardest times of their lives.

周三，联合健康保险高管布莱恩·汤普森在曼哈顿的人行道上被枪杀，引发了患者和其他许多人病态的欢呼，他们表示，他们曾在生命中最艰难的时刻与健康保险公司有过不愉快的经历。

It is unclear what motivated the incident or whether it was tied to Mr. Thompson’s work in the insurance industry. The police have yet to identify the shooter who is still on the loose.

目前该事件的动机尚不明了，也不清楚这是否与汤普森在保险行业的工作有关。警方尚未查明在逃枪手的身份。

But that did not stop social media commenters from leaping to conclusions and from showing a blatant lack of sympathy over the death of a man who was a husband and father of two children.

但这并没有阻止社交媒体上的评论者们迅速就此事得出结论，并明显表现出对这位丈夫和两个孩子的父亲的死亡缺乏同情。

“Thoughts and deductibles to the family,” read one comment underneath a video of the shooting posted online by CNN. “Unfortunately my condolences are out-of-network.”

“向他的家人致以哀思和免赔额，”CNN在网上发布的一段枪击视频下，一条评论写道。“不幸的是，我的哀悼不在赔付范围之内。”

On TikTok, one user wrote, “I’m an ER nurse and the things I’ve seen dying patients get denied for by insurance makes me physically sick. I just can’t feel sympathy for him because of all of those patients and their families.”

在TikTok上，一位用户写道：“我是一名急诊室护士，我看到垂死的病人被保险拒绝，让我觉得恶心。因为这些病人和他们的家人，我实在没法同情他。”

The dark commentary after the death of Mr. Thompson, a 50-year-old insurance executive from Maple Grove, Minn., highlighted the anger and frustration over the state of health care in America, where those with private insurance often find themselves in Kafka-esque tangles while seeking reimbursement for medical treatment and are often denied.

50岁的保险公司高管汤普森来自明尼苏达州梅普尔格罗夫，他的死亡引发了如此阴暗的评论，凸显出人们对美国医疗保健现状的愤怒和不满。在美国，在寻求医疗报销时，自费投保者经常发现自己陷入卡夫卡式的纠纷，且经常遭到拒绝赔付。

Messages that law enforcement officials say were found on bullet casings at the scene of the shooting in front of a Midtown hotel — “delay” and “deny” — are two words familiar to many Americans who have interacted with insurance companies for almost anything other than routine doctor visits.

执法官员说，在市中心一家酒店前的枪击现场发现的弹壳上有“拖延”和“拒绝”字样，许多美国人都熟悉这两个词，在与保险公司打交道时，除了常规的就诊之外，几乎任何事情都要遭到“拖延”和“拒绝”。

Mr. Thompson was chief executive of his company’s insurance division, which reported $281 billion in revenue last year, providing coverage to millions of Americans through the health plans it sold to individuals, employers and people under government programs like Medicare. The division employs roughly 140,000 people.

汤普森是其所在公司保险业务的首席执行官，该业务通过向个人、雇主和联邦医疗保险等政府项目下的人员出售健康计划，为数以百万计的美国人提供保险，去年的收入为2810亿美元。这一部门约有14万名员工。

Mr. Thompson received a $10.2 million compensation package last year, a combination of $1 million in base pay and cash and stock grants. He was shot to death as he was walking toward the annual investor day for UnitedHealth Group, UnitedHealthcare’s parent company.

汤普森去年获得了1020万美元的薪酬，包括100万美元的基本工资，外加现金和股票奖励。他在前往参加联合健康保险母公司联合健康集团的年度投资者日的路上遭到枪杀。

Stephan Meier, the chair of the management division at Columbia Business School, said the attack could send shock waves through the broader health insurance industry.

哥伦比亚商学院管理系主任斯蒂芬·迈耶表示，这场袭击可能会对更广泛的医疗保险行业造成冲击。

About seven chief executives of publicly traded companies die each year, he said, but almost always from health complications or accidents. A targeted attack could have much larger implications.

他说，每年大约有七位上市公司的首席执行官去世，但几乎都是死于健康并发症或意外。有针对性的袭击可能会产生更大的影响。

“The insurance industry is not the most loved, to put it mildly,” Mr. Meier said. “If you’re a C-suite executive of another insurance company, I would be thinking, What’s this mean for me? Am I next?”

“保险这个行业，说得委婉一点，不是什么受人爱戴的行业，”迈耶说。“如果你是另一家保险公司的高管，我会想，这对我来说意味着什么？我会是下一个吗？”

A longtime employee of UnitedHealthcare said that workers at the company had been aware for years that members were unhappy. Mr. Thompson was one of the few executives who wanted to do something about it, said the employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the company does not allow workers to speak publicly without permission.

联合健康保险的一名长期雇员表示，该公司的员工多年来一直清楚投保者的不满。这名员工说，汤普森是少数几个想对此采取行动的高管之一。由于公司不允许员工在未经许可的情况下公开发言，这名员工要求匿名。

In speeches to employees, Mr. Thompson spoke about the need to change the state of health care coverage in the country and the culture of the company, topics other executives avoided, the employee said.

该员工说，在对员工的演讲中，汤普森曾谈到改变国家医疗保险覆盖状况和公司文化的必要性，其他高管回避了这些话题。

Already, there is heightened concern among some public-facing health care companies, said Eric Sean Clay, the president of the International Association for Healthcare Security and Safety. The trade group includes members that offer security to some of the largest health care companies in North America.

一些面向公众的医疗保险公司已经开始高度关注这一问题，国际医疗保障与安全协会主席埃里克·肖恩·克莱说，该行业组织的成员为北美一些最大的医疗保险公司提供安保服务。

“The C.E.O.s are quite often the most visible face of an organization,” he said. “Sometimes people hate on that individual, and wish to do them harm.”

“首席执行官往往是一个组织中最引人注目的人物，”他说。“有时人们会憎恨这个人，希望伤害他们。”

But few health care companies provide security for their executives, he said, in part to avoid bad optics, or because it may seem unnecessary.

但他说，很少有医疗保险公司为高管提供安全保障，部分原因是为了避免负面影响，或者因为似乎没有必要。

In the hours after the shooting early Wednesday morning, social media exploded with anger toward the insurance industry and Mr. Thompson.

在周三早间枪击事件发生后的几个小时里，社交媒体上爆发了对保险业和汤普森的愤怒。

“I pay $1,300 a month for health insurance with an $8,000 deductible. ($23,000 yearly) When I finally reached that deductible, they denied my claims. He was making a million dollars a month,” read one comment on TikTok.

“我每月支付1300美元的健康保险，免赔额为8000美元（每年23000美元）。当我最终达到免赔额时，他们拒绝了我的索赔。可他，一个月赚100万美元，”TikTok上的一条评论写道。

Another commenter wrote, “This needs to be the new norm. EAT THE RICH.”

另一位评论者写道：“这需要成为新常态。打倒富人。”

“The ambulance ride to the hospital probably won’t be covered,” wrote a commenter on a TikTok video in which another user featured an audio clip from the Netflix show “Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story.” In it, the queen makes a dramatic show of faux sorrow over a death.

“救护车去医院的费用可能无法报销，”TikTok的一个评论写道，另一位用户在视频中播放了Netflix剧集《夏洛特王后：布里杰顿的故事》(Queen Charlotte: a Bridgerton Story)的音频片段。在这首歌中，王后夸张地表达了对某人死去的虚假悲伤。

The shooting prompted a wrenching outpouring of patients and family members who also posted horror stories of insurance claim reimbursement stagnation and denials.

这起枪击事件引发了病人和家属的痛苦倾诉，他们还发表了关于保险索赔迟缓和拒绝的惨痛故事。

One woman expressed frustration with trying to get a special bed for her disabled son covered by UnitedHealthcare. Another user described struggling with bills and coverage after giving birth.

一位女性表示，她曾为残疾的儿子申请一张专用床，却难以获得联合健康保险公司的理赔。另一位用户描述自己生完孩子后在账单和理赔方面遇到的困难。

“It is so stressful,” the user said in a video. “I was sick over this.”

“当时压力太大了，”该用户在视频中说。“整件事都让我觉得恶心。”

A frantic manhunt is underway for a masked assailant who shot and killed the chief executive of UnitedHealthcare, one of the largest health insurers in the United States, outside a Midtown Manhattan hotel Wednesday morning in what the police called a brazen assassination.

周三上午，一名蒙面袭击者在曼哈顿中城一家酒店外枪杀了美国最大的医疗保险公司之一联合健康保险的首席执行官，警方称这是一起极为大胆的暗杀行动，目前正在紧急搜捕这名袭击者。

The executive, Brian Thompson, was shot from behind as he arrived at the New York Hilton Midtown on West 54th Street for an investors’ gathering.

这位高管布莱恩·汤普森在抵达西54街的纽约希尔顿中城酒店参加投资者聚会时被人从背后开枪击中。

After firing at least three shots at Mr. Thompson, 50, and hitting him in the calf and back, the shooter ran through a nearby passageway to West 55th Street, where the police said he jumped on a bike and rode off into Central Park.

枪手向50岁的汤普森至少开了三枪，击中了他的小腿和背部，然后穿过附近的一条通道跑到了西55街，警方说他在那里跳上一辆自行车，骑车进入了中央公园。

The police are now investigating whether the gunman escaped on an unmarked e-bike, rather than a Citi Bike as they first said, according to two people familiar with the investigation.

据两名了解调查情况的人士透露，警方目前正在调查枪手是否骑着一辆没有标志的电动自行车逃跑，而不是他们最初所说的花旗自行车。

On Thursday, the police released two photos of the man who is believed to be the shooter with his mask down that appear to have been taken at a hostel he was staying at. A senior law enforcement official said the shooter had been sharing a room with two strangers at the hostel, which is on the Upper West Side of Manhattan near 103rd Street and Amsterdam Avenue. It remains unclear when the photos were taken.

周四，警方公布了两张据信是枪手的男子未戴口罩的照片，似乎是在他住的旅舍拍摄的。该旅舍位于曼哈顿上西区，靠近103街和阿姆斯特丹大道。一名高级执法官员表示，枪手在该旅舍与两名陌生人合住一间房间。目前还不清楚这些照片是何时拍摄。

The police were also investigating messages left on bullet casings at the scene of the shooting, according to two law enforcement officials. Authorities are running ballistics tests on the casings, which appear to have had the words “delay” and “deny” on them, the official said.

据两名执法官员称，警方还在调查枪击现场弹壳上留下的信息。这名官员说，当局正在对弹壳进行弹道测试，弹壳上似乎有“拖延”和“拒绝”的字样。

While the meaning of the message was not immediately clear, “Delay, Deny, Defend” is the title of a 2010 book by Jay M. Feinman, a professor emeritus at Rutgers Law School, that discusses ways that health insurance companies avoid paying for patients’ claims.

虽然这些信息的含义还不清楚，但“拖延、拒绝、辩护”是罗格斯大学法学院名誉教授杰伊·费曼2010年一本书的书名，该书讨论了医疗保险公司如何避免支付患者的索赔。

Who was Brian Thompson?

布莱恩·汤普森是谁？

Mr. Thompson became UnitedHealthcare’s chief executive in April 2021. The company, which is based in a Minneapolis suburb, is a unit of UnitedHealth Group, whose market valuation of $560 billion makes it one of the country’s largest publicly traded companies.

汤普森于2021年4月成为联合健康保险的首席执行官。这家总部位于明尼阿波利斯郊区的公司是联合健康集团的子公司，该集团市值约为5600亿美元，是美国最大的上市公司之一。

Mr. Thompson spent more than 20 years rising through the ranks at UnitedHealthcare, which offers insurance to companies and individuals, employs about 140,000 people and had $281 billion in revenue in 2023.

在联合健康保险工作的20多年里，汤普森不断晋升。该公司为企业和个人提供保险，员工约14万人，2023年的收入为2810亿美元。

He received total compensation of $10.2 million last year, with $1 million in base pay augmented by substantial cash and stock grants. The company’s profits rose on his watch, jumping to more than $16 billion last year from $12 billion in 2021.

他去年的薪酬总额为1020万美元，其中100万美元是基本工资，另外还有大量的现金和股票奖励。在他任内，该公司利润上升，从2021年的120亿美元跃升至去年的160多亿美元。

But amid the growth, the company and its parent also attracted scrutiny from lawmakers and regulators who accused them of systematically refusing to authorize health care procedures and treatments.

但在增长的同时，该公司及其母公司也受到了立法者和监管机构的审查，被指责系统性地拒绝批准医疗程序和治疗。

UnitedHealth Group’s size and scope have attracted the attention of the Justice Department, which is examining whether it has engaged in anti-competitive behavior.

联合健康集团的规模和范围引起了司法部的注意，后者正在调查该公司是否存在反竞争行为。

According to regulatory filings, Mr. Thompson owned about $20 million of UnitedHealth Group shares as of late September. Bloomberg reported in April that he was one of several company executives who sold shares before the Justice Department antitrust investigation was disclosed to investors — about $15 million worth, in Mr. Thompson’s case. The company told Bloomberg at the time that the sales had been approved.

据监管文件显示，截至9月底，汤普森持有约2000万美元的联合健康集团股票。彭博新闻社4月报道，他是在司法部向投资者披露反垄断调查之前出售股票的几位公司高管之一，汤普森的股票价值约为1500万美元。该公司当时对彭博新闻社表示，这笔交易已获得批准。

UnitedHealthcare has drawn criticism from patients, lawmakers and others over its denial of claims that have, at times, left people stuck with sizable medical bills that they have to pay out of their own pockets.

联合健康保险因拒绝索赔而受到患者、立法者和其他人士的批评，拒绝理赔有时会让患者不得不自掏腰包支付巨额医疗账单。

UnitedHealthcare was the subject of a scathing report released by a Senate panel that documented insurers’ refusal to pay for the care of older people who suffered a fall or stroke. The report was part of Senate investigations into denial rates of private Medicare Advantage plans. Mr. Thompson’s company, in particular, was cited for a surge in denials in post-acute care when it increased to 22.7 percent in 2022 from 10.9 percent in 2020.

参议院一个小组曾发布一份关于联合健康保险的报告，措辞非常严厉，它记录了保险公司拒绝为跌倒或中风的老年人支付护理费用。这份报告是参议院对私人医疗保险优惠计划拒付率调查的一部分。特别是汤普森的公司，被指在急症期后护理方面的拒付率大幅上升，从2020年的10.9%上升到2022年的22.7%。

Before joining UnitedHealthcare, Mr. Thompson spent nearly seven years at the accounting and consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, now known as PwC.

在加入联合健康保险之前，汤普森在会计和咨询公司普华永道工作了近七年。

He graduated from the University of Iowa with an accounting degree in 1997 and lived in a Minneapolis suburb with his wife, Paulette R. Thompson, a physical therapist, and two children.

他于1997年毕业于艾奥瓦大学，获得会计学学位，与妻子、物理治疗师波莱特·汤普森和两个孩子住在明尼阿波利斯郊区。

Why was he in Manhattan?

他为什么在曼哈顿？

The shooting occurred as Mr. Thompson arrived early at the hotel to prepare for a UnitedHealthcare investors’ day gathering.

枪击发生时，汤普森提前抵达酒店，准备参加联合健康保险的投资者日聚会。

Such events, which are common for publicly traded companies, give major shareholders and analysts who track the companies a chance to hear from executives and pepper them with questions.

这类活动对于上市公司来说很常见，大股东和跟踪公司的分析机构在会上听取高管的意见，并向高管们提出大量问题。

The New York Hilton Midtown, one of New York City’s largest hotels, is in a busy tourist area, close to the Museum of Modern Art and Rockefeller Center, where the famous Christmas tree was lit Wednesday night.

纽约希尔顿中城酒店是纽约市最大的酒店之一，位于繁华的旅游区，靠近现代艺术博物馆和洛克菲勒中心，星期三晚上，著名的圣诞树就在那里点亮。

How did the shooting unfold?

枪击事件是如何发生的？

The killer, according to images released by the police and security-camera footage, was a man wearing a dark hooded jacket, a gray backpack and a mask covering the bottom of his face.

根据警方公布的图像和监控录像，凶手是一名身穿深色连帽夹克、背着灰色背包、脸部下方戴着口罩的男子。

Apparently knowing which door Mr. Thompson planned to enter, the shooter arrived outside the hotel about 10 minutes before his intended target and ignored passers-by as he lay in wait.

枪手显然知道汤普森打算从哪扇门进入，他比预定目标早10分钟到达酒店外，埋伏等待时无视路人。

As Mr. Thompson, in a blue suit, walked toward the hotel entrance, the shooter approached him from behind and fired at least three shots with a pistol that appeared to be fitted with a silencer. The pistol jammed during the shooting, but the gunman cleared the jam quickly and continued firing.

身穿蓝色西装的汤普森走向酒店入口时，枪手从后面接近他，用一把似乎装有消音器的手枪至少开了三枪。手枪在射击过程中卡壳，但枪手迅速排除状况，继续射击。

Struck by the bullets, Mr. Thompson took several steps, turned to face his assailant and then collapsed on the sidewalk.

被子弹击中后，汤普森走了几步，转身面对袭击者，然后倒在人行道上。

With his victim crumpled against a wall, the shooter walked toward him slowly. He seemed to point the gun at Mr. Thompson one more time, then walked away. He began to run only as he was crossing the street.

汤普森瘫在墙边，枪手慢慢地向他走近，他似乎再次用枪指向汤普森，然后走开了。过了马路之后才开始奔跑。

警察局长杰西卡·蒂施说，在抓获枪手之前，警察们 “不会休息”。

Where does the investigation stand?

调查进展如何？

The police commissioner, Jessica Tisch, who was sworn into the job just last week, said her department would “not rest until we identify and apprehend the shooter in this case.”

上周刚刚宣誓就职的警察局长杰西卡·蒂施表示，她的部门“在找到并逮捕这起案件中的枪手之前不会休息”。

Officers recovered a cellphone near the shooting site, and detectives were conducting a forensic analysis to see whether it was linked to the killing, the police said.

警方表示在枪击现场附近发现了一部手机，探员们正在进行鉴证分析，确定它是否与这起谋杀案有关。

Investigators were also expected to comb through footage from the many security cameras on the surrounding blocks that might offer leads as to where the shooter came from and where he went.

调查人员还将梳理附近街区的安全摄像头拍摄的画面，这可能会为枪手从哪里来、向哪里去提供线索。

One place he apparently stopped before the shooting was a nearby Starbucks on Sixth Avenue. Several images released by the police from inside the coffee shop showed what appeared to be a man dressed the same way as the shooter.

枪击发生前，他显然去过附近第六大道的一家星巴克。警方公布的几张咖啡店内的照片显示，一名男子的穿着似乎与枪手相同。

The police released additional images of who they believe to be the shooter on Thursday morning. The images show a man, smiling and wearing a green jacket, backpack and what looks like the black face mask he was seen wearing in previous photos around his neck.

星期四上午，警方公布了更多他们认为是枪手的照片。照片中，一名男子面带微笑，身穿绿色夹克，背着双肩包，脖子上似乎戴着在前几张照片中可以看到的黑色口罩。

Law enforcement officials were also investigating the purchase of a gun in Connecticut that they believe resembles the one used in the shooting, two officials briefed on the investigation said. They are trying to determine if that gun was bought by the person they suspect to be the shooter, the officials added.

两名了解调查情况的官员表示，执法官员还在调查在康涅狄格州出售的一把枪，他们认为那把枪与枪击案中使用的枪很相似。官员们还说，他们正在试图确定这把枪是否被他们怀疑是枪手的人购买了。

Investigators were also examining Mr. Thompson’s background for signs of a possible motive.

调查人员还在调查汤普森的背景，寻找可能动机的迹象。

He had recently received several threats, according to a law enforcement official familiar with the investigation; the source and precise nature of the threats was unclear.

据一名熟悉调查情况的执法官员说，汤普森最近收到了几次威胁；这些威胁的来源和确切性质尚不清楚。

Police officers in Maple Grove, Minn., where Brian Thompson lived, responded to a bomb threat targeting his home on Wednesday, just hours before he was gunned down, a police report released Thursday said. The small suburban police department asked the Minneapolis bomb squad for help searching two residences, which did not turn up and explosives, according to the report. It remains unclear if that threat was related to his killing.

周四公布的一份警方报告称，周三，在汤普森居住的明尼苏达州梅普尔格罗夫，警方对针对他家的炸弹威胁做出了反应，当时距离他被枪杀只有几个小时。据报道，这个位于郊区的小警察局请求明尼阿波利斯拆弹小组帮助搜查两处住宅，但没有发现爆炸物。目前尚不清楚这一威胁是否与他的遇害有关。

In May 2010, Laszlo Hanyecz, an early cryptocurrency enthusiast, used Bitcoin to buy two pizzas from Papa John’s. He spent 10,000 Bitcoins, or roughly $40 at the time, in one of the first purchases ever made with the digital currency.

2010年5月，早期的加密货币爱好者拉斯洛·汉耶奇用比特币从“棒！约翰”买了两个披萨。他花了一万个比特币，当时约合40美元，这是用数字货币做的首笔买卖之一。

It has turned out to be the most expensive dinner in history.

结果它成了历史上最昂贵的晚餐。

On Wednesday, the price of a single Bitcoin rose to more than $100,000, a remarkable milestone for an experimental financial asset that had once been mocked as a sideshow and a fad. The total cost of those pizzas today: $1 billion.

单个比特币的价格已在周三突破10万美元，对这个实验性金融产品来说是一个引人注目的里程碑，它曾被嘲笑为小打小闹和一时的时髦。那两个披萨用今天的价格计算值10亿美元。

Bitcoin now stands as arguably the most successful investment product of the last 20 years. The value of all the coins in circulation is $2 trillion, more than the combined worth of Mastercard, Walmart and JPMorgan Chase. The motley assortment of hackers and political radicals who embraced Bitcoin when it was created by an anonymous coder in 2008 have become millionaires many times over. And the invention has spawned an entire industry anchored by publicly traded companies like Coinbase, a cryptocurrency exchange, and promoted by celebrities, athletes and Elon Musk.

比特币现在可以说是过去20年里最成功的投资产品。流通的比特币总量目前已达2万亿美元，超过了万事达卡、沃尔玛和摩根大通的市值总额。一个不知姓名的程序员在2008年创建了比特币，那些当时就接受了它的形形色色的黑客和政治激进分子现在已是超级富翁了。这项发明还催生了一个完整行业，它由Coinbase加密货币交易所等上市公司支撑，其推销员包括名人、运动员，以及埃隆·马斯克。

Even the president-elect says he is a believer. During the campaign, Donald J. Trump marketed himself as a Bitcoin enthusiast, vowing to create a federal stockpile that could push its price even higher.

就连候任总统也表示极力推崇比特币。特朗普在总统大选期间把自己标榜为比特币爱好者，誓言要建立一个比特币联邦储备，这会进一步推高其价格。

Bitcoin began as “essentially an experimental hobbyist project,” said Finn Brunton, the author of a 2019 book about the history of cryptocurrency. “To see where it is now is to see a really impressive feat.”

比特币刚开始时“本质上是一个业余爱好者的实验项目”，芬恩·布鲁顿说，他曾在2019年出版了一本关于加密货币历史的书。“它今天的样子让人看到一个真令人折服的成就。”

Bitcoin’s rise to $100,000 signals its now-undeniable status in the global economic system. The virtual currency has become a staple of financial markets, embraced by Wall Street giants and amateur investors alike. Its surge also caps an astonishing turnaround after its price dropped below $17,000 in 2022, as the collapse of the FTX crypto exchange sent the industry into a tailspin.

比特币升值到10万美元标志着它在全球经济体系中不可否认的地位。这种虚拟货币已成为金融市场的主要产品，受到华尔街巨头和业余投资者的青睐。2022年，FTX加密货币交易所的崩盘曾导致该行业失控，使比特币的价格跌破1.7万美元，这次巨幅升值是比特币价格的惊人回转。

This year, Bitcoin has come roaring back. Federal regulators allowed Wall Street firms to offer a popular financial product tied to the coin, attracting billions of dollars in fresh investment. Then, Mr. Trump’s election victory sent its price even higher, as crypto enthusiasts branded him the first “Bitcoin president.”

今年，比特币价格出现强劲反弹。联邦监管机构允许华尔街的公司推出与比特币挂钩的热门金融产品，吸引了数十亿美元的新投资。特朗普后来的胜选进一步推高了比特币的价格，加密货币爱好者已给他贴上了首位“比特币总统”的标签。

In a matter of months, Bitcoin investors went from bemoaning tough regulation under the Biden administration to shopping for Lamborghinis and gloating on social media. Top crypto executives spent about $135 million to influence the U.S. election, and they are now enjoying the spoils.

比特币投资者几个月前还在抱怨拜登政府的严厉监管，如今在购买兰博基尼并在社交媒体上炫富。最有钱的加密货币高管们在影响美国大选上总共花了约1.35亿美元，现在，他们正在享受成功所带来的好处。

Last month, Gary Gensler, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission and a crypto critic who had led a crackdown on the industry, said he would step down on Jan. 20. A few hours before Bitcoin hit its milestone, Mr. Trump picked Paul Atkins, a former regulator and founder of a financial consulting firm, as the next S.E.C. leader. Mr. Atkins has advised a crypto industry group, and is viewed as an advocate for digital assets.

上个月，美国证券交易委员会主席加里·根斯勒说，他将于明年1月20日辞职，他是加密货币的批评者，曾领导打击该行业的行动。在比特币的价格升到里程碑水平的几小时前，特朗普提名保罗·阿特金斯为美国证券交易委员会的下任领导人，阿特金斯曾是一名监管者，也是一家金融咨询公司的创始人，他曾为一个加密货币行业组织做过咨询，被视为数字资产的倡导者。

“There’s an enormous amount of excitement in the industry right now,” said Jeremy Allaire, the chief executive of Circle, an influential U.S. crypto company. “A lot of positive energy.”

“这个行业现在充满了巨大的兴奋，”杰里米·阿莱尔说，他是美国一家颇具影响力的加密货币公司Circle的首席执行官。“有很多正能量。”

Still, Bitcoin remains prone to extreme volatility. Its price sometimes drops when the global economy struggles. Environmental groups have raised concerns that the energy required to run Bitcoin’s software contributes to climate change, and the technology has long been used by scammers and thieves.

尽管如此，比特币仍易受极度波动的影响。全球经济陷入困境时，比特币的价格有时会跌。环保组织对运行比特币软件所需的能源对气候变化的影响表示担忧，而且，这项技术长期以来一直为骗子和盗贼所用。

While some of that illicit activity has fallen off, cybercriminals used digital currencies to facilitate about $500 million in ransom payments over the first six months of the year, according to the crypto forensics firm Chainalysis.

尽管这种非法活动已在数量上有所减少，但据加密货币取证公司Chainalysis的数据，网络犯罪分子在今年前六个月用数字货币促成了约5亿美元的赎金支付。

Before it became a cultural and financial phenomenon, Bitcoin was just an idea sketched out in a nine-page white paper posted on an internet mailing list on Halloween in 2008. The author was a mysterious coder who used the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. At its most basic, Satoshi’s vision was a type of digital money that people could exchange without relying on banks to process the transfers. Every transaction would be recorded on a publicly visible ledger known as a blockchain.

在成为一种文化和金融现象之前，比特币只是个想法，一个在2008年万圣节发到一个互联网邮寄名单的九页白皮书中勾勒出来的想法。白皮书的作者是一个化名中本聪(Satoshi Nakamoto)的神秘程序员。从最基本的意义上讲，中本聪的愿景是一种人们不需要依赖银行来处理转账就可交换的数字货币。每笔交易都将记录在一个公开可见的、被称为“区块链”的账本上。

Early enthusiasts envisioned Bitcoin as the foundation for a new kind of financial system that would be governed by code and exist outside the supervision of Wall Street firms and government regulators. They also viewed Bitcoin as a long-term store of value — it was programmed to have a fixed supply, so it would be resistant to inflation.

早期的爱好者们将比特币设想为一种新型金融系统的基础，这种金融系统将由代码管理，存在于华尔街的公司之外，不受政府监管机构的监管。他们还将比特币视为一种长期的保值手段——比特币的供应量在程序中被固定下来，因此它有抵制通货膨胀的能力。

The Wall Street establishment dismissed Bitcoin as a passing trend and a tool for criminals. Jamie Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, called Bitcoin “a fraud” and a “Ponzi scheme.” Mr. Trump once decried it as “a scam” devised to undermine the U.S. dollar.

当时，华尔街的主流机构对比特币不屑一顾，认为这只是一时潮流，是犯罪分子的工具。摩根大通首席执行官杰米·戴蒙称比特币是“欺诈”和“庞氏骗局”。特朗普曾谴责比特币是“骗局”，是被设计出来破坏美元的。

2022年5月，瑞士达沃斯世界经济论坛前夕，在比特币披萨日上，为人们免费提供的披萨。

But believers thought Bitcoin might someday facilitate real-world transactions. On May 18, 2010, Mr. Hanyecz posted in a popular Bitcoin forum, offering to send 10,000 Bitcoins to anyone who ordered him pizza from Papa John’s. “Like maybe 2 large ones so I have some left over for the next day,” he wrote.

但支持者们认为比特币有朝一日可能会促进现实世界的交易。2010年5月18日，汉耶奇在一个受欢迎的比特币论坛上发帖，表示如果有人从“棒！约翰”给他订披萨，他就给那个人一万比特币。“可能订两个个大号披萨吧，这样我还能剩下一些留到明天吃，”他写道。

A deal was struck, and the event became known as Bitcoin Pizza Day. Over the next decade, Bitcoin inspired thousands of other digital currencies with names like Ether, Solana and Dogecoin, some of which also became enormously valuable.

有人与他达成了协议，而这一事件也被称为比特币披萨日。在接下来的十年里，比特币激发了数以千计其他数字货币的诞生，其中包括以太币、索拉纳币和狗狗币，其中一些也变得价值连城。

In November 2021, Bitcoin’s price soared to nearly $70,000, setting a record. The crypto world was ascendant. Kim Kardashian encouraged her Instagram followers to buy the coins, and athletes like Tom Brady and Steph Curry promoted crypto companies in splashy television commercials.

2021年11月，比特币的价格飙升至近七万美元，创下纪录。当时，加密货币世界开始日益壮大。金·卡戴珊鼓励她的Instagram粉丝购买这些代币，汤姆·布雷迪和斯蒂芬·库里等运动员在引人注目的电视广告中宣传加密货币公司。

Then the bubble burst. In 2022, FTX and other prominent crypto firms filed for bankruptcy, causing the prices of Bitcoin and other digital assets to plummet by as much as 96 percent. Amateur investors who had poured money into crypto saw their savings vanish. In Washington, Mr. Gensler of the S.E.C. embarked on a wide-ranging clampdown.

然后泡沫破灭了。2022年，FTX等知名加密货币公司申请破产，导致比特币和其他数字资产的价格暴跌96%。那些将资金投入加密货币的业余投资者眼睁睁地看着他们的积蓄化为乌有。在华盛顿，美国证券交易委员会的根斯勒开始了一场广泛的打击行动。

But the industry’s fortunes changed again this year, after the S.E.C. lost a court battle to block a new financial product tied to Bitcoin. In January, major Wall Street firms, including BlackRock, Franklin Templeton and Fidelity, started offering exchange-traded funds linked to Bitcoin, attracting a wave of investment. Bitcoin’s price skyrocketed to another record in March.

但今年，在一场阻止与比特币相关的新金融产品的诉讼中，美国证券交易委员会败诉，比特币行业的命运也再次发生改变。今年1月，包括贝莱德、富兰克林邓普顿和富达在内的大型华尔街公司开始提供与比特币挂钩的交易所交易基金，吸引了一波投资浪潮。3月份，比特币的价格飙升至另一个创纪录水平。

Wealthy investors who had held onto their Bitcoin became even richer. Michael Saylor, the chief executive of the software firm MicroStrategy, had been widely mocked for borrowing hundreds of millions of dollars to buy Bitcoin for his company. Now his stash is worth more than $30 billion.

持有比特币的富有投资者变得更加富有。软件公司“微策略”的首席执行官迈克尔·塞勒曾因借款数亿美元为公司购买比特币而受到外界嘲笑。现在他的比特币储备价值超过300亿美元。

On the campaign trail, Mr. Trump proclaimed himself a Bitcoin enthusiast, promising to fire Mr. Gensler and end the S.E.C.’s crackdown. A few weeks before the election, Mr. Trump and his sons started their own crypto business, World Liberty Financial, putting the family in a position to benefit personally from softer regulations.

在竞选期间，特朗普宣称自己是比特币爱好者，并承诺解雇根斯勒并结束美国证券交易委员会的打击行动。选举前几周，特朗普与儿子们创办了自己的加密货币公司World Liberty Financial，让特朗普家族能够从更宽松的监管中获益。

Suddenly, a financial asset designed to circumvent the U.S. government was surging in value because a U.S. presidential candidate had embraced it.

突然之间，一项原本旨在规避美国政府的金融资产市值飙升，而这都是因为美国总统候选人对它的接纳。

Bitcoin has risen in “exactly the opposite way that it was intended,” said Mr. Brunton, the crypto author. “By being something where its real value comes from its association with a politician and a state actor.”

此次比特币的市值上涨“违背了它原本的目的”，加密货币作者布鲁顿说。“因为其真实价值来自于与一名政治人物和国家行为者的联系。”

China imposed sanctions on more than a dozen U.S. defense firms and several American defense industry executives on Thursday in retaliation for the Biden administration’s latest batch of arms sales to Taiwan, the self-governing island claimed by Beijing.

周四，中国对十多家美国军工企业及数名高级管理人员采取制裁措施，以报复拜登政府再次向台湾出售武器。中国宣称对自治的台湾拥有主权。

China’s Foreign Ministry said Washington’s approval last month of a $387 million defense package for Taiwan, which included spare parts for fighter jets, had “seriously damaged China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

拜登政府上个月批准了一项价值3.87亿美元的对台军售计划，其中包括战斗机备件。中国外交部称这一决定“严重损害中国主权和领土完整”。

China named 13 American firms in its action on Thursday, including the drone makers RapidFlight and BRINC Drones. Six executives were also sanctioned, including Barbara Borgonovi, president of Naval Power at Raytheon, and Blake Resnick, the founder and chief executive of BRINC Drones.

中国周四宣布制裁时点名13家美国公司，包括无人机制造商急速飞行公司和BRINC无人机公司。六名受制裁的高管包括雷神公司海军力量战略业务部总裁芭芭拉·博尔戈诺维，以及BRINC无人机公司创始人兼首席执行官布莱克·雷斯尼克。

In announcing the sanctions, Beijing invoked its recently established Anti-Foreign Sanctions Law, which is part of an expanding assortment of countermeasures mirroring many of the punitive actions that the United States takes against China.

中国政府说，制裁的依据是最近颁布的《反外国制裁法》，面对美国对其实施的许多惩罚性措施，该法是一系列不断扩大的反制措施的一部分。

China last imposed sanctions on U.S. defense firms in response to arms sales to Taiwan in September.

中国上次对美国军工企业实施制裁是在今年9月，以回应美国对台军售。

The moves, which forbid the companies from doing business in China and the executives from traveling there, typically have little practical effect, because U.S. companies that make armaments are already largely barred from doing business in China by U.S.-imposed restrictions.

制裁措施包括禁止这些企业在中国开展业务，禁止这些企业的高管去中国旅行，但通常没有什么实际效果，由于美国政府实施的限制措施，这些军火公司已基本被禁止在华开展业务。

“The P.R.C. under Xi Jinping has been increasingly open to using economic levers to exert pressure on external parties,” said Ja Ian Chong, an associate professor of political science at the National University of Singapore, referring to the People’s Republic of China and its top leader.

“中国在习近平领导下已越来越公开地使用经济手段向外部施加压力，”新加坡国立大学政治学副教授庄嘉颖说。

“That said, given that U.S. defense contractors have restrictions in what business they can do with the P.R.C., the sanctions are largely symbolic and perhaps intend to warn defense firms from other countries against selling equipment and services to Taiwan,” Mr. Chong continued.

“话虽如此，但考虑到美国国防承包商已在对华开展业务方面受到限制，这些制裁在很大程度上是象征性的，或许是为了警告其他国家的军工企业不要向台湾出售设备和服务。”

China regards Taiwan as the “core of its core interests.” Mr. Xi has called reunification with the island “inevitable,” and said that Beijing would use force if necessary.

中国将台湾问题视为“核心利益中的核心”。习近平称两岸统一“不可避免”，并表示中国将在必要时使用武力。

The question of arms sales has been one of the most disputed aspects of how Washington and Beijing interpret Taiwan’s status. The United States adheres to the terms of the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979 that obligate it to provide Taiwan with defensive weapons to ensure its stability. In 1982, Washington and Beijing issued a communiqué agreeing that arms sales would decrease as the status of Taiwan approached a peaceful resolution.

对台军售一直是中美两国政府在如何解释台湾地位时最具争议的问题之一。美国根据1979年《台湾关系法》的条款向台湾提供防御性武器，以确保其稳定。中美两国政府曾在1982年发表联合公报，称美国愿意逐步减少对台军售，这取决于中国持续承诺和平解决台湾问题。

China says that the United States has violated that promise. The United States says that China’s growing military pressure, including daily flybys and war games encircling the island, has made it ever more important that Taiwan is sufficiently armed.

中国称美国违背了这项承诺。美国则表示，中国正在对台湾施加越来越大的军事压力，包括每天派飞机在台湾附近飞行以及越来越频繁的绕台军演，这已使得台湾拥有足够多的武装变得比以往任何时候都更加重要。

It remains to be seen how the incoming Trump administration will deal with the issue. President-elect Donald J. Trump has sent mixed signals about his support for the island democracy. He has called for Taiwan to sharply increase its spending on defense and complained about its dominance in the global semiconductor industry. At the same time, he has proposed cabinet members who are sympathetic toward Taiwan, including Senator Marco Rubio of Florida as secretary of state.

即将上任的特朗普政府将如何处理这个问题还有待观察。候任总统特朗普已对是否支持台湾民主发出了矛盾的信号。他已要求台湾大幅增加国防开支，还曾抱怨台湾在全球半导体行业的主导地位。与此同时，他提名同情台湾的人为内阁成员，包括佛罗里达州联邦参议员马可·卢比奥为国务卿人选。

In September 1983, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fell ill on a flight to Rapid City, South Dakota. The pilot radioed ahead for medics. By dint of his famous name, Kennedy, then 29 and fresh out of law school, was taken to a VIP room at the airport, where investigators found heroin in his luggage.

1983年9月，小罗伯特·F·肯尼迪在飞往南达科他州拉皮德城的航班上突发急症。飞行员用无线电提前通知了医护人员。肯尼迪当时29岁，刚从法学院毕业，凭借这个赫赫有名的姓氏，他被送到机场的贵宾室，在那里，调查人员发现了他行李中的海洛因。

By his own account, Kennedy, who later pleaded guilty to a felony charge of possessing heroin, had become addicted to the drug in his teens, as he struggled to cope with the assassination of his father. Two days after the airplane episode, he checked himself into a New Jersey drug treatment center. He says he has been sober ever since.

肯尼迪后来承认犯下持有海洛因的重罪，按他的说法，自己在十多岁时因为父亲遇刺身亡而备受打击，因此染上了毒瘾。飞机上那一幕发生两天后，他进了新泽西州的一家戒毒中心。他说，从那以后自己没有再碰过毒品。

Now Kennedy is President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to be health secretary, a nomination he landed after a renegade presidential campaign in which he cast his life as a redemption story. He told a conservative Christian radio host this year that as an addicted and troubled young man he had undergone a “spiritual awakening” and “knew he had to change at a deep, fundamental way.”

现在，肯尼迪是候任总统特朗普的卫生部长人选，这一提名是在他进行了一次背叛原党派的总统竞选后获得的，在竞选中，他把自己的人生描绘成一个关于救赎的故事。今年，他告诉一位保守派基督教电台主持人，作为一个吸毒成瘾、麻烦缠身的年轻人，他曾经历了一次“精神觉醒”，“知道自己必须从根本上进行深刻的改变。”

Yet Kennedy’s early fight for sobriety was far from the end of his battles with demons and self-destructive impulses. An examination of his life, gleaned through interviews with more than a dozen people, court filings and his own statements, reveals his distinct pattern of cycling through extremes — including his early drug addiction, compulsive sexual behavior and deep dives into conspiracy theories — all while under the microscope of fame.

然而，肯尼迪早期为远离毒品而进行的斗争远非他与内心的恶魔和自我毁灭冲动斗争的终点。通过对十几个人的访谈、法庭文件和他自己的陈述，对他生活的审视揭示出他从一个极端到另一个极端循环的独特模式，包括早期的毒瘾、强迫性性行为，以及对阴谋论的深信不疑——所有这些都发生在名声的显微镜下 。

At midlife, Kennedy won public acclaim as a crusading environmental lawyer who sued corporate polluters, cleaned up rivers and lobbied to protect New York’s drinking water. But he was also a serial philanderer who kept a journal chronicling his encounters and assigned numerical scores to women, even as he berated himself for his inability to control his actions.

中年时，肯尼迪作为一名坚定的环保律师赢得了公众赞誉，他起诉污染企业，清理河流，并游说对纽约饮用水进行保护。但他也是一个风流成性的花花公子，他写日记记录艳遇，给女人打分，尽管他痛斥自己无法控制自己的行为。

His infidelities contributed to the breakup of his second marriage, according to interviews with people who knew the couple. A former nanny who worked for his family during this time also has accused Kennedy of making sexual overtures toward her and touching her without consent.

根据对认识肯尼迪夫妇的人的采访，他的不忠导致了第二段婚姻破裂。一位在此期间为他家工作的保姆也指控肯尼迪对她有性暗示，并在未经同意的情况下触碰她。

肯尼迪于2023年4月以“肯尼迪派民主党人”的身份开始竞选总统，但后来他离开了民主党，以独立候选人的身份参选。

As an anti-vaccine advocate, Kennedy has plunged into dark and conspiratorial views of government, the press, scientific institutions and especially the drug industry. He has promoted wild and debunked theories.

作为一名反疫苗倡导者，肯尼迪陷入了对政府、媒体、科研机构，尤其是制药行业的阴暗和阴谋论的观点中。他一直在宣扬一些荒谬的、已被证伪的理论。

Kennedy declined a request for an interview. Friends and close associates say his choices are best understood as a quest to live up to the legacy of his father and namesake, Robert F. Kennedy, the former attorney general, senator and liberal icon who was assassinated while running for president in 1968.

肯尼迪拒绝了采访请求。他的朋友和密友表示，关于他所做的种种选择，最合理的解释是，他希望对得起父亲罗伯特·肯尼迪的声名，这位前司法部长、参议员和自由派偶像在1968年竞选总统时遇刺身亡。

One friend, who like many others interviewed for this article declined to be named, said Kennedy’s self-aggrandizing drive to emulate his father was a “tragic flaw” that gave rise to “the need for adulation, the need for recognition, the need for followers.” The younger Kennedy has long embraced his family mythology and imagined himself as a new hero.

他的一位朋友（与许多接受本文采访的人一样，要求保持匿名）说，肯尼迪自我吹嘘以效仿他父亲的动机是一个“悲剧性的缺陷”，这导致了“对奉承的需要，对认可的需要，对追随者的需要”。小肯尼迪长期以来一直信奉他的家族神话，把自己想像成一个新的英雄。

“Everything that has happened in my life,” Kennedy said in a campaign video, “has led me to where I am right now — the deaths, the tragedies, the addiction, the recovery, finding a deep belief in God.”

“我生命中发生的一切，”肯尼迪在一段竞选视频中说，“把我带到了现在的位置——死亡、悲剧、毒瘾、戒毒，找到了对上帝的深刻信仰。”

But the road Kennedy has traveled led him to an alliance with a man his family and fellow Democrats regard as anathema. Trump brought him into his fold to consolidate his base, and Kennedy entered, telling uneasy allies it was his best chance of effecting real change.

但是，肯尼迪走过的道路，使他与一个家人和民主党同僚恨之入骨人结成了联盟。特朗普为巩固自己的票仓拉他入伙，肯尼迪加入了，他告诉不安的盟友，这是他实现真正变革的最佳机会。

肯尼迪是候任总统特朗普的卫生部长人选，这一提名是在他进行了一次背叛原党派的总统竞选后获得的，在竞选中，他把自己的人生描绘成一个关于救赎的故事。

Other Kennedys have repeatedly denounced him. His sister Kerry Kennedy says her brother has “set fire” to their father’s legacy and called the decision to back Trump “a sad ending to a sad story.”

肯尼迪家族的其他成员多次谴责他。妹妹凯莉·肯尼迪说，他“放火”烧了父亲的政治遗产，并称支持特朗普的决定是“一个悲伤故事的悲惨结局”。

Close friends and supporters see him as a revolutionary, speaking truth to power. They also say he should not be defined by addiction, but by recovery: They note he is disciplined and focused. He has thrown himself into exercise and adheres to a strict diet known as intermittent fasting. More than 40 years after the flight to South Dakota, he still attends daily 12-step meetings, he says.

密友和支持者认为他是一位革命者，敢于对权力者说真话。他们还说，不应该用毒瘾来定义他，而应该用戒毒来定义他：他们指出，他自律、专注。他全身心投入锻炼，并遵循一种被称为间歇性禁食的严格饮食习惯。他说，在飞往南达科他州的航班上发病40多年后，他仍然每天参加强化戒瘾项目。

Del Bigtree, his former communications director, described Kennedy as deeply spiritual, and said he feels “called to make a difference.” Gavin de Becker, Kennedy’s security consultant and close adviser, said Kennedy’s sobriety is a source of his “stamina and commitment and resilience” — “an absolute golden qualification,” he said, for a health secretary.

他的前通讯主任德尔·比格特里形容肯尼迪是一个非常虔诚的人，还说他感觉到自己“被召唤去改变现状”。肯尼迪的安全顾问、与之私交甚笃的加文·德·贝克尔表示，肯尼迪戒毒后的自制力是他“耐力、承诺和韧性的来源”——他称这是担任卫生部长的“绝对的黄金资质”。

Kennedy himself leans into his troubled past. “I got so many skeletons in my closet,” he said while campaigning for president, “that if they could vote, I could be king of the world.”

肯尼迪本人倾向于讲述自己坎坷的过去。“我的柜子里有很多骷髅（意为过往有不可告人的秘密——编注），”他在竞选总统时说，“要是骷髅能投票，我就成世界之王了。”

A Complex Inheritance

复杂的政治遗产

1975年8月在肯尼亚，肯尼迪在一个电视特别节目里训鸟。

Bobby Kennedy was 9 years old when an uncle, President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas. The third of his parents’ 11 children, Bobby wanted to be a scientist or a veterinarian.

他的伯父约翰·肯尼迪总统在达拉斯遇刺身亡时， 博比·肯尼迪（博比是罗伯特这个英文名字的昵称。——译注）只有九岁。他在11个孩子中排行老三，小时候想成为一名科学家或兽医。

Five years later, in June 1968, his father was killed. He was 14. That fall, he entered ninth grade at Millbrook, a boys’ boarding school in New York’s Hudson Valley. The school was isolated and bucolic; Kennedy, fascinated by animals, was attracted to its small zoo.

五年后的1968年6月，他的父亲遇刺。那年秋天，他进入纽约哈德逊河谷的男子寄宿学校米尔布鲁克就读九年级。那是一所与世隔绝的田园风学校，对动物着迷的肯尼迪喜欢里面的小动物园。

In 1970, when he was 16, Kennedy was expelled from Millbrook for drug use, according to his memoir “American Values: Lessons I Learned From My Family.” That summer, he was arrested for marijuana possession in Massachusetts. The following summer he was arrested again, accused of spitting ice cream in a police officer’s face. He denied the accusation but paid a fine.

根据他的回忆录《美国价值观：我从家人那里学到的教训》(American Values: Lessons I Learned From My Family)，1970年，16岁的肯尼迪因吸毒被米尔布鲁克开除。那年夏天，他在马萨诸塞州因持有大麻被捕。第二年夏天，他再次被捕，被控向一名警察的脸上吐冰激凌。他否认了这一指控，但缴纳了罚款。

Kennedy cycled through two more high schools before graduating, and despite his troubles, was able to follow in his father’s footsteps to Harvard.

肯尼迪在毕业前转学去了两所高中，尽管麻烦不断，他还是进入了父亲的母校哈佛大学。

After graduating with honors in American history from Harvard, he went on to law school at the University of Virginia — again, as his father had done. “When he died, I felt kind of an obligation to pick up the torch that he had dropped,” Kennedy said in a video produced for his presidential campaign, “and so I changed my career trajectory to align it more with his.”

以优异成绩从哈佛大学美国史专业毕业后，他又进入弗吉尼亚大学法学院深造——这与他父亲的经历如出一辙。“在他去世后，我觉得自己有义务接过他丢下的火炬，”肯尼迪在为总统竞选活动制作的一段视频中说，“因此我改变了自己的事业轨迹，以便与他的轨迹更一致。”

In 1982, Kennedy, then 28, landed a plum job in the Manhattan district attorney’s office, but had to resign when he failed the bar exam. Then came his arrest and conviction for heroin possession. He was sentenced to two years’ probation and community service.

1982年，时年28岁的肯尼迪在曼哈顿地区检察官办公室找到了一份不错的工作，但由于没有通过律师考试，他不得不辞职。随后，他因持有海洛因被捕并被定罪。他被判处两年缓刑和社区服务。

By the time Kennedy arrived at the Open Space Institute, a land preservation organization, to complete his service work, he was visibly unhealthy, according to one person who knew him then.

据一位当时认识他的人说，来到土地保护组织开放空间研究所完成社区服务工作时，他的健康状况明显不佳。

Being ‘the Kennedy Who Matters’

成为“有份量的肯尼迪”

The institute put Kennedy to work, helping renovate an old farmhouse in Garrison, New York. The house was later rented by the Hudson Riverkeeper, a group dedicated to cleaning up the polluted Hudson River. Kennedy became passionate about its cause and soon signed on.

研究所让肯尼迪开始工作，帮助整修纽约加里森的一所旧农舍。那栋房子后来被哈德逊河守护者组织租下，该组织致力于清理被污染的哈德逊河。肯尼迪对这项事业充满热情，很快就加入了该组织。

Once he was admitted to the bar, in 1985, he got a master’s of law in environmental studies. He kept a low profile at first, but by the early 1990s, he was back in the spotlight, his name a magnet for reporters. He seemed to embrace it.

1985年获得律师执照后，他又获得了环境学的法学硕士学位。起初，他保持着低调，但到20世纪90年代初，他又回到了聚光灯下，他的名字吸引着记者。他似乎乐在其中。

In 1995, New York Magazine crowned him “The Kennedy Who Matters.” He circulated the article widely, according to someone who knew him at the time. In 1997, he was a contestant on “Celebrity Jeopardy!” Rumors began to swirl that he might run for a U.S. Senate seat.

1995年，《纽约杂志》授予他“有份量的肯尼迪”称号。据当时认识他的人说，他广泛传播了那篇文章。1997年，他参加了《名人危险边缘》(Celebrity Jeopardy!)节目，有传言说他可能会竞选联邦参议员。

At his office at Pace University, where he got his master’s and ran the environmental litigation clinic, the wall was covered with photos of him posing with celebrities. He would eventually marry one, actress Cheryl Hines, his third wife.

他在佩斯大学获得硕士学位，并在大学里运营一个环境诉讼诊所，他的办公室墙上挂满他与名人合影的照片。他最终还和一位名人结了婚——演员谢丽尔·海恩斯，他的第三任妻子。

Kennedy became a nationally recognized environmental lawyer. In 1999, he was named a hero of the planet by Time magazine for his work with the Riverkeeper organization.

肯尼迪成为全国知名的环境律师。1999年，他因与河流守护者组织的合作被《时代》杂志评为地球英雄。

Taking On the Powerful

对抗强权

One summer in the early 2000s, Sarah Bridges, a Minnesota psychologist who had gone to college with a sister-in-law of Kennedy, showed up unannounced at his home at the family compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts. Bridges said her son had suffered a brain injury and received an autism diagnosis, after being vaccinated with a pertussis vaccine that is no longer in use in the United States.

2000年代初的一个夏天，曾与肯尼迪的一位姻亲一起上过大学的明尼苏达州心理学家萨拉·布里奇斯突然出现在肯尼迪位于马萨诸塞州海恩尼斯港的家中。布里奇斯说，她的儿子在接种了一种百日咳疫苗后遭受了脑损伤，并被诊断为自闭症，这种疫苗目前在美国已经不再使用。

Kennedy had been working on getting mercury out of waterways; Bridges wanted him to investigate thimerosal, a mercury-based preservative that has been largely removed from childhood vaccines in the United States.

肯尼迪一直致力于将汞从水道中清除；布里奇斯希望他调查硫柳汞，这是一种以汞为基础的防腐剂，在美国，这种防腐剂已基本从儿童疫苗中去除。

Once he dived in, there was no stopping him. Using “my name and my family’s relationships,” he said in a speech at Hillsdale College, he secured meetings with Dr. Anthony Fauci, then the government’s top infectious disease specialist, and Dr. Francis Collins, then the director of the National Institutes of Health.

一旦他投入其中，就再也没有人能拦住他。他在希尔斯代尔学院的一次演讲中说，他利用“我的名字和家人的关系”，与时任政府最高传染病专家安瑟尼·福奇博士和时任美国国立卫生研究院院长弗朗西斯·柯林斯博士会面。

Their answers, he has said, left him convinced that the NIH was little more than “an incubator” for the drug industry. “It was regulatory capture on steroids,” he has said.

他说，他们的回答让他确信，美国国立卫生研究院只不过是制药业的“孵化器”。他说：“这是一种加强版的监管圈套。”

In 2005, Kennedy wrote an article, published in Rolling Stone and Salon, that blamed thimerosal for a rise in autism in children. Both news outlets later withdrew the article after finding that some of its claims were wrong or dubious, and Kennedy was widely criticized by the scientific community. The theory that vaccines cause autism has been widely debunked.

2005年，肯尼迪写了一篇文章，发表在《滚石》和《沙龙》杂志上，指责硫柳汞是儿童自闭症发病率上升的原因。这两家新闻媒体后来发现文章的一些说法是错误或可疑的，撤回了这篇文章，肯尼迪也受到了科学界的广泛批评。疫苗导致自闭症的理论已被广泛推翻。

Yet, Kennedy only saw this as more evidence of the stranglehold the pharmaceutical industry had on the government and on the mainstream media.

然而，这在肯尼迪眼里只是成了制药业控制政府和主流媒体的又一个证据。

He churned out books and founded a nonprofit, Children’s Health Defense, turning it into an anti-vaccine behemoth that raked in millions.

他出版大量书籍，创立了非营利组织“儿童健康保护”，将其变成了一个反疫苗的庞然大物，收入数以百万计。

It was the beginning of a new public persona for Kennedy: the hostile anti-media, anti-establishment warrior. In the eyes of his supporters, Kennedy was taking on the powerful, as his father had done.

这是肯尼迪新的公众形象的开始：一个充满敌意的反媒体、反建制斗士。在他的支持者眼中，肯尼迪是在挑战权贵，就像他的父亲那样。

“I think that he really thinks that things are wrong, that there’s this deep-seated corruption, which is very much the way his father and his uncle viewed the world,” said Tony Lyons, Kennedy’s publisher.

肯尼迪的出版商托尼·莱昂斯说：“我觉得他确实认为这里面有问题，认为存在着根深蒂固的腐败，这与他父亲和伯父看待世界的方式非常相似。”

肯尼迪还是一个花花公子，据说会写日记记录自己的艳遇。

Finding an Audience

找到受众

The coronavirus pandemic gave Kennedy the following that he had long sought. The core of his message — that the federal government was bent on restricting personal liberties, and that pharmaceutical companies were seeking to profit off a crisis — suddenly appealed to a new audience of Americans frustrated by lockdowns and skeptical about a vaccine that was developed and marketed at an extraordinarily fast pace.

新冠大流行为肯尼迪带来了他长期以来一直寻求的追随者。他传达的信息的核心——联邦政府决心限制个人自由，制药公司试图从危机中获利——突然吸引了一批新的美国受众，他们对疫情封锁大为不满，对一种研发和推广速度异常快的疫苗持怀疑态度。

Traffic to the Children’s Health Defense website exploded. Kennedy sold books. He was welcomed at events filled with Trump supporters and appeared with election deniers and Christian nationalists.

“儿童健康保护”网站的访问量激增。肯尼迪的书也畅销一时。他在充斥着特朗普支持者的活动中受到欢迎，其中还有许多否认大选结果的人和基督教民族主义者。

When the Center for Countering Digital Hate labeled him a member of “The Disinformation Dozen,” he was suspended from Instagram — a move that reaffirmed his conviction that Big Tech was conspiring with the Biden administration to suppress free speech.

反数字仇恨中心将他列为“虚假信息十二人”的一员，他被Instagram封杀了——这再次验证了他的信念，即大型科技公司与拜登政府合谋压制言论自由。

Last spring, when he was considering challenging President Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination for president, he told advisers that he heard the echoes of history in the decision: His father, disillusioned with Democrats over the Vietnam War, defied party leaders in 1968 to mount a primary against an incumbent president, Lyndon Johnson. His life appeared to have come full circle, he suggested.

去年春天考虑挑战乔·拜登总统的民主党总统候选人提名时，他告诉顾问，他在这个决定中听到了历史的回响：他的父亲因越南战争问题对民主党人感到失望，在1968年不顾民主党领导人的反对，在初选中对时任总统林登·约翰逊发起挑战。他说，他的生活似乎走了一个轮回。

He began his presidential bid as a “Kennedy Democrat” but later left the party to run as an independent, accusing Democratic leadership of corruptly stifling his primary challenge.

他以“肯尼迪派民主党人”的身份开始总统竞选，但后来离开民主党，以独立人士的身份竞选，并指责腐败的民主党领导层扼杀了他的初选挑战。

By this past summer, with his poll numbers in the single digits and his campaign coffers running dry, Kennedy was faced with a choice: continue his quixotic effort, or bow out of the race and endorse Trump. The former president’s allies, concerned that Kennedy would pull support from their ranks, had long been interested in an alliance, the Times has reported.

今年夏天，肯尼迪的民调支持率只有个位数，他的竞选资金也开始枯竭，他面临着一个选择：要么继续他堂吉诃德式的努力，要么退出竞选，支持特朗普。据《纽约时报》报道，前总统的盟友们担心肯尼迪会导致他们的支持者被分流，因此一直有意结盟。

Conversations between the two camps began in earnest after an assassination attempt on Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, an event whose echoes in Kennedy’s own life seemed to open the door to unity. And Kennedy felt assured that he would get a powerful seat at the table.

特朗普在宾夕法尼亚州巴特勒遇刺未遂后，两个阵营开始认真对话，刺杀的阴影也依然影响着肯尼迪自己的生活，这似乎为他们的结盟打开了大门。肯尼迪确信自己可以得到一个掌握实权的位置。

His power is now poised to grow. Some of Kennedy’s allies believe he will run for president again.

如今他的力量有望得到提升。肯尼迪的一些盟友相信，他会再次竞选总统。

For decades, American zoos have raised tens of millions of dollars from donors and sent the money to China for the right to host and display pandas. Under U.S. law, those funds were required to be spent protecting pandas in the wild.

几十年来，美国动物园筹集数千万美元的捐款，把钱送到中国，以获得大熊猫的托管和展示权。根据美国法律，这些资金必须用于保护野生大熊猫。

But the Chinese government instead spent millions on apartment buildings, roads, computers, museums and other expenses, records show. For years, China refused even to account for millions more.

但记录显示，中国政府将数以百万计的美元用于公寓楼、道路、电脑、博物馆和其他开支。多年来，中国甚至拒绝说明更多数以百万计美元的支出情况。

Regulators with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which oversees the payments, have for two decades raised concerns about this with American zoo administrators and Chinese officials alike. The U.S. government, on three occasions, froze payments to China over incomplete record keeping, documents show.

20年来，负责监督这笔款项的监管机构美国鱼类和野生动物管理局一直在向美国动物园管理人员和中国官员就此提出担忧。文件显示，美国政府曾三次因记录保存不完整而冻结对中国的付款。

Zoos, too, have known that the money was not always going toward conservation. But they worried that if Fish and Wildlife cut off the money altogether, China could demand the return of its bears. Zoos count on pandas for visitors, merchandise sales and media attention.

动物园也知道，这些钱并不总是用于保护动物。但他们担心，如果管理局完全切断这笔钱，中国可能会要求归还熊猫，而动物园依靠熊猫来吸引游客、销售商品和吸引媒体关注。

Ultimately, the regulators allowed the money to keep flowing and agreed not to check the spending in China so thoroughly, according to records and former officials.

根据记录和前官员的说法，最终，监管机构允许资金继续流动，并同意不再对中国的支出进行彻底检查。

“There was always pushing back and forth about how the U.S. shouldn’t ask anything,” said Kenneth Stansell, a former Fish and Wildlife official who traveled to China throughout the 2000s to discuss pandas. He said his Chinese counterparts argued that “it shouldn’t be of any concern to the U.S. government.”

前管理局官员肯尼斯·斯坦塞尔说，“关于美国不应该提出任何要求的问题，人们一直在反复争论。”斯坦塞尔在2000年代曾经前往中国讨论大熊猫问题。他说，他的中国对等官员认为，“美国政府不应该对此有任何担忧。”

None of this has been revealed to the public.

这一切都没有向公众透露过。

Where Did The Money Go?

钱都到哪里去了？

Zoos in the United States pay about $1 million a year to get pairs of pandas from China, an arrangement that regulators allow under a provision of the Endangered Species Act. Animal-rights groups have sued over similar payments for elephants, rhinos and tigers, saying that regulators were distorting the spirit of the law.

为从中国获取成对的大熊猫，美国的动物园每年支付大约100万美元，这是监管机构根据《濒危物种法》的一项规定所允许的安排。动物权利组织曾就大象、犀牛和老虎的类似付款问题提起诉讼，称监管机构扭曲了法律精神。

Pandas have so far escaped such scrutiny.

大熊猫到目前为止还没有受到这样的监管审查。

Panda rentals have been touted as a major conservation success. But a New York Times investigation found that what the program has done best is breed more pandas for zoos. And the conservation money at the heart of the program has been spent in ways that zoos do not reveal when fund-raising.

大熊猫租赁项目被誉为保护大熊猫的重大成功。但《纽约时报》的一项调查发现，该项目的最大作用是为动物园繁殖更多的熊猫。作为该项目核心的保护资金的使用方式，动物园在筹集资金时不会透露。

The Times used two decades of financial reports, internal correspondence, photos and archival records to track more than $86 million from American zoos to a pair of organizations run by the Chinese government. Zoos elsewhere in the world have contributed tens of millions of dollars more. In wildlife conservation, that is a huge sum, far larger than what zoos have spent in overseas donations for any other species.

时报利用20年的财务报告、内部通信、照片和档案记录，追踪了从美国动物园流向中国政府管理的两个组织的8600多万美元。世界上其他地方的动物园也捐出了数千万美元。在野生动物保护领域，这是一笔巨款，远远超过了动物园在海外为其他任何物种所做的捐赠。

Zoos approve which projects get financed and then list them in annual reports to the Fish and Wildlife Service. Those records show that funds were allocated to build apartment buildings far from nature reserves. China also bought computers and satellite television for local government offices and built at least three museums with the money, according to the records.

哪些项目得到资助由动物园批准，然后动物园会在提交给管理局的年度报告中列出这些项目。相关记录显示，资金被分配到远离自然保护区的地方建造公寓楼。记录显示，中国还为地方政府办公室购买了电脑和卫星电视，并用这笔钱建造了至少三座博物馆。

And American money helped transform a panda breeding center in western China into a bustling attraction that, according to an architect’s plans, may soon welcome as many visitors as Disneyland.

美国的资金帮助中国西部的一个熊猫繁殖中心变成了一个熙熙攘攘的景点，根据一位建筑师的计划，它可能很快就会迎来像迪斯尼乐园一样多的游客。

Those payments represent only what was documented. Zoo administrators have at times struggled to persuade their Chinese partners to disclose the spending.

这些只是有记录可查的付款。动物园管理人员有时很难说服他们的中国合作伙伴披露这些支出。

“You had to take their word,” said David Towne, who until 2016 was the director of a foundation representing American zoos with pandas. “China felt it was not our business — that we got the pandas, and we shouldn’t tell them how to spend the money.”

“你必须相信他们的话，”戴维·汤恩说。2016年之前，他一直是一家代表美国动物园饲养大熊猫的基金会的负责人。“中国觉得这不关我们的事——我们得到了熊猫，我们不应该告诉他们如何花钱。”

Early agreements gave zoos the right to verify funding on the ground. But contracts signed recently by the National Zoo in Washington and by the San Diego Zoo make no mention of checking how money is spent.

早期的协议赋予动物园实地核查资金的权利。但是，华盛顿国家动物园和圣地亚哥动物园最近签署的合同没有提到对资金使用情况的检查。

10月，圣地亚哥动物园的纪念品。美国的动物园每年支付约100万美元从中国获取一对熊猫。

American zoo administrators have acknowledged, in letters to regulators, that the numbers do not always add up.

美国动物园管理人员在给监管机构的信中承认，有时候账目是对不上的。

Zoos in Europe, which also rent pandas, reached a similar conclusion. At Edinburgh Zoo, where two pandas lived until last year, an administrator said in 2021 that its money couldn’t be tracked because “the funds from all zoos are pooled,” according to meeting minutes. As a result, the Scottish zoo could not identify any “specific works, projects or outcomes” that it had funded.

同样租借了大熊猫的欧洲动物园也得出了类似的结论。在爱丁堡动物园，有两只大熊猫一直生活到去年，会议纪要显示，2021年，该动物园的一名管理人员表示，动物园的资金无法追踪，因为“所有动物园的资金都集中在一起”。因此，这家苏格兰动物园无法确定其资助的任何“具体工作、项目或成果”。

This has been a problem for decades. When Fish and Wildlife officials asked Memphis Zoo in 2007 to identify which Chinese areas would benefit from $875,000 allocated for panda monitoring, the zoo had no answer. It wrote in an annual report that its Chinese partner had provided “NO ADDITIONAL INFORMATION.”

这个问题已经存在了几十年。2007年，鱼类和野生动物管理局官员要求孟菲斯动物园明确哪些中国地区将从用于熊猫监测的87.5万美元拨款中受益，动物园没有给出答案。该动物园在一份年度报告中写道，其中国合作伙伴“没有提供其他信息”。

In a statement to The Times, the zoo acknowledged problems.

在给时报的一份声明中，该动物园承认存在问题。

“Memphis Zoo was not able to control the funding that was sent to China as, once it was there, it was no longer in the hands of Memphis Zoo officials,” the statement said. “And there was not always information provided regarding the funding once in China.”

“孟菲斯动物园无法控制汇往中国的资金，因为这笔资金一旦到了中国，就不再由孟菲斯动物园官员掌握，”声明说。“而且，资金一旦进入中国，并不总是提供有关信息。”

Melissa Songer, a conservation biologist at the National Zoo, which recently welcomed two new pandas, said that China had put donor money to good use. “They have done so much in terms of setting aside protection and doing all the right things — stopping logging, investing,” she said. “And part of that money is coming from zoos around the world.”

美国国家动物园最近迎来了两只新的大熊猫，动物园的保护生物学家梅丽莎·松厄尔说，中国很好地利用了捐赠资金。“他们在保护上做了很多正确的事——停止伐木，投入资金，”她说。“其中一部分资金来自世界各地的动物园。”

10月，一架载有两只来自中国的大熊猫的航班抵达弗吉尼亚州杜勒斯机场。这两只名叫宝力和青宝的熊猫将被送往美国国家动物园。

The National Zoo did not answer written questions about funding. The San Diego Zoo declined to comment. China’s national forestry bureau and its zoo association, which together oversee panda exchanges, also did not respond to questions.

国家动物园没有回答有关资金的书面问题。圣地亚哥动物园拒绝置评。中国国家林业和草原局以及中国动物园协会也没有回应记者的提问。这两家机构共同监管大熊猫交流。

China has indeed expanded its network of nature reserves, and some American money was allocated for patrol trucks, small ranger stations, equipment and other items needed to protect land, records show. Mr. Stansell, the former regulator, said that, on visits to China, he did see some conservation projects. And Mr. Towne, the former panda foundation director, said that, even in the absence of hard evidence, he saw signs of progress, including more professional staff working in the reserves.

记录显示，中国确实扩大了自然保护区网络，一些美国资金被分配用于巡逻车、小型护林站、设备和其他保护土地所需的物品。前监管人员斯坦塞尔说，在访问中国时，他确实看到了一些保护项目。前熊猫基金会主任汤恩说，即使没有确凿的证据，他还是看到了进步的迹象，包括保护区工作的专业人员越来越多。

But pandas live on only a portion of that land, and their habitat is shrinking. China has built roads and developed tourism in and around nature reserves, piercing the natural habitat and leaving pandas isolated in ever-smaller populations, Chinese and American scientists have concluded.

但大熊猫仅生活在其中的一部分土地上，而且它们的栖息地正在缩小。中美两国科学家得出结论，中国在自然保护区内外修路、发展旅游业，破坏了大熊猫的自然栖息地，导致大熊猫的种群数量越来越少。

Their report estimated that wild pandas have less territory to roam than they did in the 1980s, before the influx of funds from foreign zoos.

他们的报告估计，与20世纪80年代外国动物园资金涌入之前相比，野生大熊猫的活动范围更小了。

“It’s in everybody’s interest to portray these conservation efforts as great successes,” said Kimberly Terrell, who traveled to China while working as director of conservation at Memphis Zoo.

“把这些保护工作描绘成巨大成功符合所有人的利益，”金伯利·特雷尔说，她在孟菲斯动物园担任保护主任期间曾前往中国。

“There was never any real evaluation of the programs,” she added. “In some cases, it was really hard to see the connection between those programs and giant panda conservation.”

“从来没有对这些项目进行过真正的评估，”她还说。“在某些情况下，很难看出这些项目与大熊猫保护之间的联系。”

(Dr. Terrell, now a scientist at Tulane University in Louisiana, settled an unrelated gender discrimination lawsuit against the zoo in 2018.)

（特雷尔现在是路易斯安那州杜兰大学的一名科学家，在2018年与孟菲斯动物园达成了一项与大熊猫保护无关的性别歧视诉讼和解。）

The Fish and Wildlife Service said it takes federal law “very seriously” and requires “sufficiently detailed financial accounting data” from zoos with pandas.

美国鱼类和野生动物管理局表示，该局“非常重视”联邦法律，并要求有大熊猫的动物园提供“足够详细的财务会计数据”。

Dan Ashe, the agency’s former director, called the funding disagreement between China and the United States “a technical matter.” Mr. Ashe said that he had approved new reporting standards to maintain a program that he felt significantly benefited conservation. “We had to come up with a solution,” he said.

前局长丹·阿什称中国和美国之间的资金分歧是“技术问题”。他说他批准过新的报告标准，以维持一个他认为对保护环境有显著好处的项目。“我们必须想出解决方案，”他说。

Mr. Ashe now heads the industry association for American zoos.

阿什现在是美国动物园行业协会的负责人。

A Secret Compromise

秘密妥协

In 2010, Mr. Ashe led a delegation of senior American wildlife officials to China for a high-stakes meeting.

2010年，阿什率领一个由美国野生动物管理高级官员组成的代表团前往中国，参加一场事关重大的会议。

The panda-rental program was on the verge of falling apart, records show. If he could not reach an agreement with his Chinese counterparts, pandas in Atlanta, Memphis, San Diego, and Washington might have to return to China.

记录显示，当时熊猫租赁计划濒临崩溃。如果他不能与中国同行达成协议，亚特兰大、孟菲斯、圣地亚哥和华盛顿的大熊猫可能不得不返回中国。

The program’s finances had been rocky from the start.

该项目的财务状况从一开始就很不稳定。

Early money had gone to what Zoo Atlanta called a “drastic expansion and construction” of a panda breeding center in Chengdu, western China. Millions more went toward infrastructure in and around nature reserves, including roads, buildings, and water hookups — money that regulators questioned. One National Zoo project, a mixed-use building with apartments and office space, was 30 miles from a nature reserve.

早期的资金被用于亚特兰大动物园所称的“大规模扩建和建设”中国西部成都的一个熊猫繁殖中心。还有数以百万计的美元用于自然保护区内部及周边的基础设施建设，包括道路、建筑和供水系统——监管机构对这些资金提出了质疑。国家动物园的一个项目是一栋带公寓和办公空间的多功能建筑，距离自然保护区约50公里。

来自史密森学会档案的一张罕见照片，显示2000年国家动物园的工作人员正在参观成都大熊猫繁育研究基地的建筑工地。在美国动物园的帮助下，该基地成为一个重要旅游景点。

“While we understand the need for establishment of an infrastructure in China, we feel strongly that construction of facilities alone will not accomplish the goal of enhancing the survival of pandas in the wild,” regulators at the Fish and Wildlife Service wrote to the National Zoo.

“虽然我们理解在中国建立基础设施的必要性，但我们强烈认为，仅靠设施建设无法实现提高野生大熊猫存活率的目标，”美国鱼类和野生动物管理局的监管人员在给国家动物园的信中写道。

The zoo industry pushed back. “Conservation activities in the wild cannot occur if the infrastructure does not exist,” the industry group currently headed by Mr. Ashe, now called the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, responded.

动物园行业进行了反击。“如果基础设施不存在，野生动物保护活动就无法进行，”目前由阿什领导、现在名为“动物园和水族馆协会”的行业组织回应。

The Fish and Wildlife Service ultimately approved most of the funds.

管理局最终批准了大部分资金。

Then, in 2003, regulators froze money to China because of a lack of documentation, records show. But they soon gave in to Chinese demands for less detailed reporting.

记录显示，后来在2003年，由于缺乏文件，监管机构冻结了流向中国的资金。但他们很快就屈从了中国提出的减少报告细节的要求。

“The service thought that was a reasonable way to move forward to keep the program going,” Mr. Stansell, the former agency official, said.

“管理局认为这是一种合理的方式，可以继续推进这个项目，”前管理局官员斯坦塞尔说。

Back and forth it went for years, with the Chinese groups sometimes withholding information or spending money on projects with only loose connections to conservation, and American regulators periodically freezing funds.

这种情况反复了好几年，中方有时会隐瞒信息，或者把钱花在与环保没有多少直接联系的项目上，美国监管机构则会时不时冻结资金。

Zoo Atlanta submitted a funding proposal for a 27,000-square-foot building, 48 sets of office furniture and 50 miles of road, along with computers and a copy machine, for “nature reserve infrastructure projects” in the northwestern Chinese province of Gansu, records show. Zoo Atlanta declined to comment, saying it did not have information on old projects.

亚特兰大动物园提交了一份资金提案，为中国西北部甘肃省的“自然保护区基础设施项目”提供约2500平米的建筑，48套办公家具和约80公里的道路，以及电脑和一台复印机。亚特兰大动物园拒绝对此发表评论，称其没有关于旧项目的信息。

So, when Fish and Wildlife officials landed in Beijing in 2010, years of money issues were coming to a head. The Chinese groups had stopped reporting their spending altogether, and the American regulators had frozen $12 million in payments over two years, according to internal National Zoo documents.

因此，当管理局官员们于2010年抵达北京时，多年的资金问题已经到了必须解决的地步。根据国家动物园的内部文件显示，中方已经完全停止上报他们的开支，而美国监管机构在两年内冻结了1200万美元。

The zoo’s employees acknowledged that they couldn’t verify spending and fretted about losing their pandas. “The goal is to find a compromise,” they wrote.

动物园员工承认，他们无法核实支出，并担心失去熊猫。他们写道：“我们的目标是找到一个折中方案。”

“This is a good opportunity to ‘update’ the process,” another document read.

另一份文件写道：“这是一个‘更新’程序的好机会。”

The zoos disclosed none of this publicly. “All of that money goes back into conservation research in China,” Don Moore, a National Zoo administrator, told ABC News that year, even as the zoo’s payments were frozen.

动物园没有披露这些信息。国家动物园管理者唐·摩尔那一年告诉ABC新闻：“所有这些钱都用于中国的保护研究，”尽管动物园的付款遭到了冻结。

9月，中国西南部都江堰的熊猫保护研究中心。华盛顿国家动物园的一位生物保护学家说，中国把捐赠者的钱用在了刀刃上。

Ultimately, the zoos got the compromise they wanted. Fish and Wildlife regulators agreed to reduce oversight. Going forward, zoos could approve Chinese funding proposals directly, rather than sending them to the agency for review, Mr. Ashe said in an interview.

最终，动物园得到了他们想要的妥协。鱼类和野生动物管理局同意减少监督。阿什在接受采访时说，今后，动物园可以直接批准中国的资助提案，而不是送交该机构审查。

“What it did was put the accountability in the right place,” he said. The zoos are “accountable to demonstrate that they are reporting significant and meritorious conservation projects, not the Chinese.”

他说：“这样做的结果就是把问责放在一个合理的位置上。”动物园，“而不是中国人，有责任表明它们正在报告重要和有价值的保护项目”。

Panda Disneyland

熊猫迪士尼乐园

Even with more lax reporting requirements, problems persisted.

虽然报告的要求更加宽松，但问题依然存在。

Three of the zoos paid for office equipment for local government forestry bureaus.

其中三个动物园为当地政府林草局支付了办公设备费用。

Other money went to captive pandas, rather than to pandas in the wild. Memphis Zoo earmarked hundreds of thousands of dollars for animal enclosures, bamboo and veterinary facilities at Shanghai Zoo.

其他资金则用于圈养大熊猫，而不是野生大熊猫。孟菲斯动物园为上海动物园的动物围栏、竹子和兽医设施拨款了数十万美元。

In 2017, a Chinese government group failed to show how the San Diego Zoo’s money had been spent, records show. In a letter to regulators, the zoo blamed a change in leadership at China’s national forestry bureau.

记录显示，2017年，一个中国政府组织未能说明圣地亚哥动物园的资金使用情况。在致监管机构的一封信中，动物园将责任归咎于中国国家林草局领导层的变动。

Animal-rights groups and scholars say that the heart of the problem is lax enforcement of the Endangered Species Act.

动物权益组织和学者表示，问题的核心在于《濒危物种法》执行不力。

“It’s really alarming that they’re approving these things in the first place,” said Delcianna Winders, an animal-law professor at Vermont Law and Graduate School. “And then there’s no follow-up to track that the money is actually going to what it’s supposed to be going to.”

“他们批准这些项目本身就令人震惊，”佛蒙特州法律与研究生院动物法教授德尔西安娜·温德斯说。“然后也没有后续跟进，以确保这些钱真的用在了该用的地方”。

The Fish and Wildlife Service said that the donations were “an important tool to support conservation of endangered and threatened species.”

鱼类和野生动物管理局表示，捐款是“支持保护濒危和受威胁物种的重要工具”。

American zoos continue to advertise that they are saving a species in the wild. But in western China, where the wild panda ecosystem is more fragmented than ever, panda tourism is booming.

美国动物园继续宣传他们正在拯救一个野生物种。而在中国西部，野生熊猫生态系统比以往任何时候都更加支离破碎，熊猫旅游业却在蓬勃发展。

The Chengdu breeding center, which American zoos helped renovate two decades ago, now has 11 million visitors a year and its own IMAX theater. It is a zoo in its own right, one that controls a third of the world’s pandas. The campus is so large that tourists take shuttle buses from one end to the next.

成都大熊猫繁育研究基地是美国的动物园在二十年前帮助翻新的，现在每年接待1100万游客，并拥有自己的IMAX影院。它本身就是一个动物园，控制着世界上三分之一的大熊猫。园区非常大，游客乘坐小巴士从一端穿梭到另一端。

成都大熊猫繁育研究基地的熊猫塔。该基地本身就是一个动物园，控制着世界上三分之一的大熊猫。

On a visit in August, visitors thronged through the gate at 7 a.m. to catch a glimpse of the pandas before they retreated to air-conditioned enclosures.

在8月的一次参观中，游客们早上7点就簇拥着通过大门，以便在大熊猫返回装有空调的圈舍前一睹它们的芳容。

The center is planning a satellite facility, its second. When complete, the complex expects to host 20 million annual visitors, more than Disneyland, according to an architecture firm’s plan.

该基地正在规划第二座卫星设施。根据一家建筑公司的规划，该综合设施建成后，预计每年将接待2000万游客，超过迪士尼乐园。

The development is part of a larger Chengdu tourism push that includes new resorts and an international panda festival. The Chinese state news agency Xinhua said the goal was to “fully tap the brand value, cultural value and economic value of the giant panda.”

该开发项目是成都旅游业一项大规模开发的一部分，包括新建度假村和举办国际熊猫节。中国官方通讯社新华社称，其目标是“充分挖掘大熊猫的品牌价值、文化价值和经济价值”。

When Donald J. Trump fired the opening shots in a trade war during his first term, Chinese officials often took days to respond and Chinese businesses followed every threat with alarm.

当特朗普在第一个任期打响贸易战的头几枪时，中国官员往往需要数天时间才能做出回应，中国企业对每一次威胁都感到不安。

But this week, after the Biden administration broadened its restrictions on advanced technology that could be sent to China, Beijing announced sweeping retaliation in a single day. The country’s stock market investors mostly shrugged at the Biden administration’s action.

但本周，在拜登政府扩大了对可能出口到中国的先进技术的限制后，北京在一天内就宣布了全面的报复措施。中国股市投资者对拜登政府的举动大多并不在意。

And on Wednesday, General Motors, a onetime cornerstone of American industrial might, said it was taking a $5 billion hit to profit to recognize that it was no longer able to adequately compete with Chinese carmakers.

周三，曾经是美国工业实力基石的通用汽车承认不再能够与中国汽车制造商进行充分竞争，因而将承受50亿美元的利润损失。

The fast-moving developments have underlined how far China has come as an industrial superpower, and its readiness for a potentially bruising battle with the second Trump administration. China now has a manufacturing sector that is larger than those of the United States, Germany, Japan, South Korea and Britain put together. It produces some of the world’s most advanced technology.

这些快速发展的事态凸显出中国作为工业超级大国所取得的巨大成就，以及它已经做好准备，与特朗普第二任政府展开一场潜在的恶战。中国现在的制造业规模超过了美国、德国、日本、韩国和英国的总和，并生产一些世界上最先进的技术设备。

There are a few areas in which China has not caught up with the United States, with the most advanced semiconductors perhaps being the most prominent. But in many other sectors, including all but the fastest semiconductors, its manufacturers are coming close to ending their dependence on American supplies.

在少数领域，中国还没有赶上美国，其中最突出的可能是最先进的半导体。但在许多其他领域，包括除了速度最快的半导体以外的所有领域，中国制造商正接近结束对美国供应的依赖。

That was evident in the announcement on Tuesday by four government-linked trade associations that urged Chinese companies making everything from cars to communications equipment to be wary of buying any more American computer chips.

本周二，四家与政府有关联的行业协会发表声明，敦促制造从汽车到通信设备等各种产品的中国企业谨慎采购美国电脑芯片。

“The Chinese chip industry is stronger now than eight years ago, so we can make such a strong declaration,” said Hu Xijin, an influential nationalistic commentator in China. “Eight years ago, such a declaration was unthinkable,” said Mr. Hu, who has nearly 25 million followers on social media.

“中国芯片产业现在比八年前更强大了，所以我们可以发表如此强烈的声明，”中国颇具影响力的民族主义评论员胡锡进表示。“八年前，这样的声明是不可想象的，”在社交媒体上拥有近2500万粉丝的胡锡进说。

Beijing’s other response to Washington on Tuesday, involving minerals, also highlighted China’s new willingness to publicly and directly confront foreign trading partners. The Ministry of Commerce, in a statement on its website, said it had banned with immediate effect the export of four critical minerals to the United States that were mined or processed mainly in China.

周二，北京对华盛顿的另一项回应涉及矿产，也凸显出中国公开和直接对抗外国贸易伙伴的新意愿。商务部在其网站上发表声明称，已禁止向美国出口四种主要在中国开采或加工的关键矿产，立即生效。

When China imposed a two-month export embargo on rare earth metals to Japan in 2010, by contrast, it did so in complete secrecy. The Commerce Ministry called in representatives of two dozen companies, told them not to export and warned them that they would lose their export licenses if they told the news media.

相比之下，当中国在2010年对日本实施为期两个月的稀土金属出口禁运时，是在完全保密的情况下进行的。商务部召集了二十多家公司的代表，告诉他们不要出口，并警告他们如果向新闻媒体透露消息，就会失去出口许可证。

去年上海车展上的通用雪佛兰展台。

The most recent sign of China’s industrial muscle came in the profit charges by General Motors, which the company has incurred while restructuring its China joint venture with SAIC Motor. When Mr. Trump took office in early 2017, the Chinese ventures of G.M. and Volkswagen were locked in a long-running battle for leadership in China while domestic brands lagged far behind.

中国工业实力的最新迹象是通用汽车公司在重组与上汽集团的中国合资企业时的利润亏损公告。2017年初特朗普上任时，通用汽车和大众汽车的在华合资企业为争夺中国市场的领导地位而展开了一场旷日持久的争夺战，中国国内品牌则远远落在后面。

But G.M. brands that used to rank among the leaders in China sales, like Buick, Chevrolet and Cadillac, no longer even rank among the top 20. BYD, a Chinese electric car manufacturer based in Shenzhen, is now the best-selling brand in China and is rapidly stepping up exports to the rest of the world.

但是，别克、雪佛兰和凯迪拉克等曾经在中国销量名列前茅的通用品牌，甚至连前20名都排不进了。总部位于深圳的中国电动汽车制造商比亚迪目前是中国最畅销的品牌，并正在迅速扩大对世界其他地区的出口。

When G.M. opened an assembly line in Shanghai in 1998, the company showed off the several dozen robots it had imported from outside China. But when Volkswagen — Germany’s signature automaker — opened an electric car assembly plant last year in Hefei, China, it ordered just one robot imported from its home country. VW bought the other 1,074 robots from a factory in Shanghai.

1998年，通用汽车在上海开设了一条装配线，展示了从中国以外进口的几十台机器人。但是，当德国标志性的汽车制造商大众汽车去年在中国合肥开设一家电动汽车装配厂时，它只订购了一台从德国进口的机器人。大众从上海的一家工厂购买了另外1074台机器人。

And while G.M.’s decision to open an assembly line in Shanghai in the late 1990s to build 100,000 Buicks a year was a big bet on the Chinese market, BYD is now building an industrial complex in Hefei with the capacity to make 1.5 million cars a year.

上世纪90年代末，通用汽车决定在上海开设一条装配线，每年生产10万辆别克汽车，这是对中国市场的一次重大押注，现在，比亚迪正在合肥建设一个年产150万辆的工业园区。

China has used tariffs and other fiscal policies to help its homegrown companies gain an advantage: It charges taxes totaling as much as 100 percent on imported cars and sport utility vehicles with large gasoline engines, a category in which G.M. is strong. By contrast, electric cars from Chinese manufacturers face a tax rate of only 13 percent.

中国利用关税和其他财政政策帮助本土企业获得优势：它对进口的大型汽油发动机汽车和运动型多用途车征收高达100%的关税，而这正是通用汽车的优势领域。相比之下，中国制造商生产的电动汽车的税率仅为13%。

So G.M. and its Detroit rivals have long been unable to sell more than a trickle of cars from the United States in China. Now even their sales of gasoline-powered cars from factories inside China have plunged as more than half of Chinese buyers choose battery-electric or plug-in hybrid cars.

因此，通用汽车及其底特律的竞争对手们长期以来只能在中国销售少量的美国汽车。现在，由于超过一半的中国消费者选择电池电动或插电式混合动力汽车，美国公司在中国工厂生产的汽油动力汽车的销量也大幅下降。

The big question now is how the Trump administration will respond to China’s assertive stance. For decades, China has fairly consistently sold about $4 worth of goods to the United States for every $1 worth of goods that it buys. That imbalance partly reflects Beijing’s many tariffs and informal limits on imports, as well as an enormous government effort during nearly two decades to replace imported manufactured goods with domestic production.

现在最大的问题是特朗普政府将如何回应中国的强硬立场。几十年来，中国从美国每购买价值一美元的商品，就向美国出售价值四美元的商品。这种不平衡在一定程度上反映了中国政府对进口商品征收的多种关税和非正式限制，以及政府在近20年里用国产取代进口所做的巨大努力。

Overall Sino-American trade has grown rapidly. So the lopsided ratio has translated into a large American trade deficit.

总的来说，中美贸易增长迅速。因此，一边倒的比例转化为巨大的美国贸易逆差。

China’s overall trade surplus in manufactured goods, mainly but not entirely with the United States, now equals a tenth of the country’s entire economic output. That surplus has created millions of factory jobs in China. But it also means China has more to lose than the United States does in a broad trade war.

中国在制成品方面的总体贸易顺差（主要但不完全是对美贸易）现在相当于中国整个经济产出的十分之一。这种盈余在中国创造了数以百万计的工厂就业机会。但这也意味着，在一场广泛的贸易战中，中国比美国损失更大。

Chinese officials appear to be preparing for a world in which they do not seek confrontation with the United States, but are prepared for the two countries to pursue their own economic paths. Their preferred term for that course: “peaceful coexistence.”

中国官员似乎正在为这样一个世界做准备：在这个世界里，他们不寻求与美国对抗，而是让两国各自走自己的经济道路。他们更喜欢用“和平共处”来形容这一进程。

For Yoon Suk Yeol, the unpopular president of South Korea, things appeared to worsen with each passing day. Thousands of doctors had been on strike for almost a year to resist his health care reforms. The opposition in Parliament repeatedly pushed for investigations into his wife, as well as the impeachment of his cabinet members, accusing them of corruption and abuse of power. And the lawmakers blocked many of Mr. Yoon’s bills and political appointments.

对于韩国不得人心的总统尹锡悦，情况似乎一天比一天糟。数千名医生为抵制他的医疗改革已罢工将近一年。国会里的反对派一再推动对他的妻子进行调查，并弹劾他的内阁成员，指控他们腐败和滥用权力。这些议员还阻止了尹锡悦的多项法案和政治任命。

On Tuesday night, Mr. Yoon took a desperate measure, his boldest political gamble that he said was driven by frustration and crisis. In a surprise, nationally televised address, he declared martial law, the first time in the country in decades. The move banned all political activities, civil gatherings and “fake news” in what he called an attempt to save his country from “pro-North Korean” and “anti-state forces.”

本周二晚，尹锡悦采取了孤注一掷的措施。他表示进行这场最大胆的政治赌博是出于沮丧和危机感。在对全国发表电视讲话时，他突然宣布了戒严令，这是韩国几十年来的第一次。戒严令禁止了一切政治活动、公民集会和“假新闻”，他称此举是为了让国家不被“亲朝鲜反国家势力”者“剿灭掠夺”。

But it ended almost as abruptly as it had started.

但戒严令的解除几乎与宣布来得一样突然。

Thousands of citizens took to the streets, chanting “Impeach Yoon Suk Yeol!” Opposition lawmakers climbed the walls into the National Assembly as citizens pushed​ back police. Parliamentary aides used furniture and fire extinguishers to prevent armed paratroopers from entering the Assembly’s main hall. Inside, lawmakers who included members of Mr. Yoon’s own People Power Party, voted unanimously to strike down his martial law. Six hours after declaring it, Mr. Yoon appeared on television again, this time to retract his decision.

成千上万的韩国公民走上街头，高呼“弹劾尹锡悦”。在民众拦挡警察的同时，反对派议员翻墙进入国会。国会助理们用家具和灭火器阻止了特种部队进入国会大厅。在国会大厅内，全体议员，包括尹锡悦所在的国民力量党的议员都对解除戒严令投了赞成票。宣布戒严令六小时后，尹锡悦再次出现在电视上，这次是撤回他的决定。

士兵们在周二宣布戒严令后试图进入国会大厦正厅。

It was the shortest-lived and most bizarre martial law in ​the history of South Korea, which had had its share of military coups and periods of martial law before it became a vibrant democracy after the military dictatorship that ended in the late 1980s.

这是韩国历史上最短命、最离奇的戒严。韩国已在20世纪80年代末结束了军事独裁统治，成为一个充满活力的民主国家，那之前，韩国曾经历过多次军事政变和戒严时期。

In the end, driven by his own impulsiveness and surrounded by a small group of insiders, who seldom said no to a leader known for angry outbursts, Mr. Yoon shot his own foot,​ according to a former aide and political analysts.​ Now his political future ​is on the chopping block​, thrusting one of the United States’ most important allies in Asia into political upheaval and leaving many South Koreans in a state of shock.

据一名前助手和政治分析人士，尹锡悦身边的内部圈子很小，里面的人很少对这名以爱发脾气著称的领导人说“不”，最终，尹锡悦在他本人的一时冲动驱使下，搬起石头砸了自己的脚。现在，他的政治未来处于危险境地，他把美国在亚洲最重要的盟友之一推入了政治动荡，也让许多韩国人感到震惊。

On Wednesday, the opposition parties, which control the legislature, submitted an impeachment bill after Mr. Yoon did not respond to their demand that he resign because his martial law declaration had been unconstitutional. An editorial in the leading conservative daily Chosun Ilbo, which has often been friendly toward Mr. Yoon, now accused him of “insulting” South Korean democracy. South Koreans have not seen their leader declare martial law since former military dictator Chun Doo-hwan used it to seize power in 1979​ and later massacre pro-democracy students.

拥有立法机构半数以上席位的反对派已于周三提出一项弹劾法案，因为尹锡悦宣布戒严令违宪，而他没有回应他们提出的下台要求。主要的保守派报纸、以前经常对尹锡悦友好的《朝鲜日报》现在在一篇社论中指责他“侮辱”韩国民主。自从前军事独裁者全斗焕在1979年使用戒严令夺取了政权，后来以戒严为由屠杀支持民主的学生以来，韩国人还没有看到过他们的领导人宣布戒严令。

抗议者在首尔的国会大厦附近高呼要求解除戒严，摄于周三。

“The best option Yoon has now is to resign,” said Sung Deuk Hahm, a professor of political science at Kyonggi University, west of Seoul. “As tragic as it may seem, what happened overnight showed the resilience and durability of South Korean democracy.”

“尹锡悦现在最好的选择是辞职，”京畿大学政治学教授咸成得说，该校位于首尔西部。“尽管这也许显得很不幸，但发生在前一夜的事情表明了韩国民主的恢复力和持久性。”

Mr. Yoon did not immediately respond to the opposition’s demand. On Wednesday, all senior aides to Mr. Yoon tendered their resignations to Mr. Yoon, leaving him more isolated than ever. Analysts were skeptical about ​Mr. Yoon’s political future.

尹锡悦没有马上回应反对派的要求。周三，尹锡悦所有的高级助手都已向尹锡悦递交了辞呈，使得他比以往任何时候都更加孤立。分析人士对尹锡悦的政治未来持怀疑态度。

“I don’t think he can finish his five-year term,” said Kang Won-taek, a political scientist at Seoul National University.

“我不认为他能干满他的五年任期，”首尔国立大学政治学家姜元泽（音）说。

On Wednesday, Mr. Yoon’s office said the president’s decision to declare martial law was an inevitable measure in accordance with the constitution to “restore and normalize the state of affairs” from political paralysis.

周三，尹锡悦办公室表示，总统宣布戒严令的决定是不可避免的措施，是依据宪法让国家从政治瘫痪中“恢复到正常状态”。

Mr. Yoon has grown increasingly despondent in recent months, particularly over escalating scandals surrounding him and his wife and the relentless political pressure from the opposition, said Mr. Hahm, who has known Mr. Yoon since before his election.​

在尹锡悦当总统前就认识他的咸成得说，尹锡悦近几个月来对事态的发展越来越绝望，尤其是围绕着他和妻子的丑闻不断升级，以及反对派不断施加的政治压力。

“Things have become too much for him,” ​Mr. Hahm said. “He became mentally unstable under political pressure.”

“事情对他来说已变得难以承受，”咸成得说。“他的精神状态已在政治压力下变得不稳定。”

韩国主要的反对党民主党党员们用障碍物挡住了首尔国会大厦的入口，摄于周三。

Mr. Yoon was surrounded by a handful of aides, including former military generals, who were not used to second-guessing their boss’s decision, said a former presidential aide to Mr. Yoon who agreed to discuss the president’s leadership style on the condition they not be identified. That small circle raised questions about how thoroughly Mr. Yoon prepared for martial law.

据一名曾在尹锡悦手下担任总统助理的人说，尹锡悦身边有几名助手，包括前军事将领，他们很少会质疑上司的决定。这名前助理同意在不具名的条件下讨论总统的领导作风。那个圈子很小，让人怀疑尹锡悦对宣布戒严令是否作出充分的准备。

The former presidential aide said that as soon as he heard the declaration of martial law, he called contacts in Mr. Yoon’s office and other branches of the government. But none of them had advance knowledge of what was coming, he said.

该前总统助理称，他一听到戒严令，就给尹锡悦办公室和政府其他部门的熟人打了电话。但他们事先都对此事一无所知，他说。

Even top leaders of Mr. Yoon’s party said they learned of the declaration through the news media. Kim Byung-joo, an opposition lawmaker and former general, told MBC Radio on Wednesday that when he called army generals near the border with North Korea, none of them knew what was happening. Paratroopers mobilized to occupy the National Assembly showed none of the decisiveness and brutality their predecessors used in the 1980 crackdown on pro-democracy activists, when as many as hundreds were killed in the southern city of Gwangju during Mr. Chun’s period of martial law. On Wednesday, the soldiers peacefully retreated after the Assembly voted to repeal Mr. Yoon’s action.

甚至连尹锡悦所在政党的高层领导也表示，他们是从新闻中得知戒严消息的。反对派议员、退役将军金炳柱周三对韩国文化广播公司说，他给在韩朝边境附近的陆军将领们打电话时，他们都不知道发生了什么。同样是受命占领国会，特种部队没有表现出1980年军队在镇压民主活动人士时的果断和残暴，当时南部城市光州有几百人在全斗焕实施戒严令期间被枪杀。周三，国会投票解除了尹锡悦的戒严令后，特种部队和平地撤出了国会。

1980年5月，学生示威者要求结束戒严，并要求时任总理的申铉碻和曾任韩国中央情报局局长的全斗焕中将辞职。

Some opposition lawmakers and social media commentators speculated that Mr. Yoon might be preparing for martial law when he appointed Kim Yong-hyun, his chief bodyguard and former army general, as his defense minister in September. ​But members of his government called the idea a conspiracy theory, and not many people took it seriously.

一些反对派议员和社交媒体评论员猜测，尹锡悦今年9月任命金龙显为国防部长官时可能已在为戒严做准备，金龙显是陆军退役将领，曾任总统保安室长。但尹锡悦政府成员将这个说法称为阴谋论，称没有多少人把它当真。

Before he was catapulted into the presidential race in 2022, Mr. Yoon was a political neophyte. He was a star prosecutor who wielded the law to help imprison two former presidents, and was used to a strictly top-down culture.

在2022年成为总统大选的黑马之前，尹锡悦是一名政治新手。他曾是一名明星检察官，利用法律帮助将两名前总统送进了监狱，他习惯于严格的自上而下文化。

He won the election by a razor-thin margin, thanks largely to the public’s discontent with his predecessor, Moon Jae-in. But, from the start, he laid out big ambitions, seemingly staking his claim for a legacy as a change maker in a gridlocked political system.

他以微弱优势在总统大选中获胜，那在很大程度上要归功于公众对前任文在寅的不满。但他从一开始就有雄心勃勃的打算，似乎想给自己留下一笔政治遗产，成为打破政治体系僵局的变革者。

Mr. Yoon put South Korea back on a path toward embracing more nuclear power, mended ties with Japan and expanded military cooperation with the United States and Japan as he took a harder line against North Korea.

尹锡悦让韩国重新走上使用更多核电的道路，修复了与日本的关系，扩大了与美国和日本的军事合作，同时对朝鲜采取了更强硬的立场。

But little of his domestic agenda has worked out. His opponents won even greater control in the National Assembly in parliamentary elections this year. His government was accused of using prosecutors and criminal investigations to intimidate opposition leaders and crack down on news media he accused of spreading “fake news​.” ​His approval rating plummeted to around 20 percent, as he repeatedly vetoed the opposition’s demands for independent investigations into allegations against his wife, Kim Keon Hee. The opposition also imposed large changes on his budget proposals for next year.

但他的国内议程几乎毫无进展。他的对手们在今年的议会选举中赢得了更大的控制权。他的政府被指控使用起诉和刑事调查来恐吓反对派领导人，打击被他指责为传播“假新闻”的新闻媒体。由于他多次否决反对派提出的对其妻金建希的指控进行独立调查的要求，他的支持率已跌到20%左右。反对派还对他明年的预算提案做了大量修改。

反对派领导人聚集在首尔国会大厦台阶上举行抗议活动，要求逮捕尹锡悦，并要求他辞职。

Mr. Yoon was often called a “tribal leader” by political analysts for his penchant for appointing loyal friends among former prosecutors and fellow high school alumni to key military and government posts.​

尹锡悦经常被政治分析人士称为“部落领袖”，因为他喜欢任命他当检察官时的忠实朋友和高中同学担任军事和政府要职。

One of ​them was Han Dong-hoon, Mr. Yoon’s loyal lieutenant when he was prosecutor general. As president, Mr. Yoon appointed Mr. Han as justice minister and later helped make him the head of his governing party. But they fell out over differences in how to handle allegations against the first lady.

其中包括韩东勋，他曾是尹锡悦担任检察长时的忠实副手。尹锡悦就任总统后任命韩东勋为法务部长官，后来还帮助他当选了执政党党魁。但他们因如何处理针对第一夫人的指控发生了分歧。

They ​grew to dislike each other so much ​that Mr. Yoon considered Mr. Han a betrayer, ​according to former aides and local media.

据前助手和当地媒体，他们变得如此讨厌对方，以至于尹锡悦认为韩东勋背叛了他。

“He must have felt that he was surrounded by enemies and that he must make a bold decision,” said Ahn Byong-jin, a political scientist at Kyung Hee University in Seoul. “But it’s mind-boggling that he didn’t know how it would be received by the National Assembly and the people.”

“他一定是觉得自己被敌人包围着，必须做出大胆的决定，”首尔庆熙大学的政治学家安秉镇（音）说。“但令人不解的是，他竟然不知道国会和人民会怎样看待这个决定。”

Mr. Hahm, the professor, said Mr. Yoon was an impulsive man surrounded by “sycophantic aides​.” When he met the president after his party’s crushing defeat in parliamentary elections in April, he was surprised that Mr. Yoon had become more “obstinate and talkative,” Mr. Hahm said.

咸成得说，尹锡悦是个易冲动的人，身边都是些“阿谀奉承的助手”。尹锡悦所在的政党在今年4月的议会选举中惨败后，咸成得曾与总统见过面，他对尹锡悦已变得更加“固执和健谈”感到惊讶，咸成得说道。

今年7月，曾任国民力量党临时党魁的韩东勋在首尔西北的高阳市举行的全国代表大会上当选为该党新任党魁后，发表感言。

Mr. Yoon appeared to live with conflicting emotions, Mr. Hahm said. On one hand, he brimmed with optimism that things would work out almost miraculously, as they had in his previous career. On the other, he feared that he would end up a failed president with no positive legacy to speak of — a result he seemingly ensured when he moved to use the military against his opponents Tuesday night.

咸成得说，尹锡悦似乎生活在矛盾的情绪之中。一方面，他充满乐观，认为事情会几乎奇迹般地顺利发展，就像他在以前的职业生涯中经历的那样。另一方面，他担心自己会最终成为一名失败的总统，没有留下值得一提的正面政治遗产，他周二晚动用军队对付对手的行动似乎确保了这个结果。

“I think those two emotions have combined to lead him to his decision,” he said.

“我觉得这两种情绪结合在一起导致他做出了那个决定，”咸成得说。

John Leung was an unlikely spy. In the small Oklahoma town where he lived, people knew him as a former restaurant owner and a father. In Houston, where he often traveled, they knew him as a political organizer in the city’s vibrant Chinese community.

梁成运是个让人意想不到的间谍。在他生活的俄克拉荷马州小镇，认识他的人知道他曾是一家餐馆的老板、一位父亲。在他经常去的休斯顿，人们知道他是该市充满活力的华人社区政治组织者。

And in China, they knew him as a benevolent patriot, a man who arranged musical performances and embraced official causes like unifying the mainland with Taiwan.

在中国，人们知道他是行善的爱国人士，他筹办音乐演出，支持大陆与台湾统一等官方目标。

In fact, Mr. Leung was an informant for the F.B.I., gathering intelligence on China, according to two senior United States officials. That work landed him in Chinese custody in 2021, after he traveled to the mainland at the age of 75. He was later sentenced to life in prison, a first in decades for an American accused of espionage.

但据两名美国高级官员说，梁成运实际上曾是联邦调查局的线人，负责收集有关中国的情报。这项工作导致他在2021年前往中国大陆时被当局拘留，当时他75岁。他后来被判处无期徒刑，这是几十年来中国第一次对被指控从事间谍活动的美国人处以这样的刑罚。

Mr. Leung was freed last Wednesday in a rare prisoner swap between Washington and Beijing. Six months shy of his 80th birthday, he was put on a plane to the United States with two other Americans who had been detained in China, along with three Uyghurs, members of an ethnic group that faces repression by the Chinese government.

梁成运上周三已在华盛顿与北京的一次罕见的囚犯交换中获释。离80岁生日还有六个月的他，与另外两名被中国监禁的美国人以及三名维吾尔人一起被送上了飞往美国的飞机。（维吾尔人是受中国政府镇压的少数民族。）

In return, Washington released Xu Yanjun, a convicted Chinese spy who had been serving a 20-year sentence and Ji Chaoqun, 31, who had reported to Mr. Xu and was serving an eight-year sentence. A clemency order for a third Chinese national, Jin Shanlin, who had been in prison for possessing child pornography, was signed on the same day as an order for Mr. Xu. China said Washington also handed over a fugitive.

作为交换，美国政府释放了因间谍罪被判处20年有期徒刑的徐延军，以及正在服八年有期徒刑、现年31岁的纪超群（音），前者是后者的上司。在签署提前释放徐延军文件的同一天，美国还释放了第三名中国公民，因儿童色情犯罪入狱的靳善霖（音）。中国表示，美国还向中国移交了一名逃犯。

在上周的一次罕见的囚犯交换中，中国释放了三名美国公民：马克·斯威丹、李凯和梁成运，图为他们乘坐飞机抵达圣安东尼奥。

Mr. Leung had cultivated an image as a philanthropist, which brought him access to Chinese power circles. In Houston, he directed groups that promoted Beijing’s political interests. He attended Chinese state banquets. And he rubbed shoulders with senior Chinese officials, including its foreign minister, its ambassador and three consuls general to the United States.

梁成运给自己建立了一个慈善家形象，这使他能够接触中国的权力圈。他曾在休斯顿担任促进中国政府政治利益团体的领导，出席过中国政府举办的国宴。他还曾与中国高级官员有过接触，包括中国的外交部长、驻美大使，以及三名驻美总领事。

But that carefully curated image was a ruse.

但精心营造的形象是一种伪装。

To piece together the story of Mr. Leung’s unusual trajectory from small-town restaurateur to prisoner in a high-stakes geopolitical dispute with China, The Times interviewed dozens of people who knew him, including relatives in the United States and Hong Kong, business associates in Houston and acquaintances in New York’s Chinatown. Reporters also drew on corporate records, archival materials and other documents.

为了解梁成运从小镇餐馆老板到中美地缘政治争端囚徒的不寻常经历，《纽约时报》采访了数十名认识他的人，包括他在美国和香港的亲戚、他在休斯顿的商业伙伴，以及他在纽约唐人街的熟人。记者还查阅了公司记录、档案材料和其他文件。

Much remains unclear about Mr. Leung’s relationship with the F.B.I. China’s Ministry of State Security said that he was spying while in China, but U.S. officials said that Mr. Leung had not worked for the F.B.I. for years and that the bureau had discouraged him from making the trip.

梁成运与美国联邦调查局的关系仍有许多不清楚之处。中国国家安全部称梁成运在中国从事间谍活动，但美国官员表示，梁成运已有多年不为美国联邦调查局工作，该局曾劝他不要去中国。

Some of the pro-China groups Mr. Leung was involved with have been linked to organizations that have come under U.S. government scrutiny. One was affiliated with the National Association for China’s Peaceful Unification, which the Trump administration designated in 2020 as a foreign mission, accusing it of seeking “to spread Beijing’s malign influence in the United States.”

梁成运曾参与的一些亲中国团体与已受到美国政府审查的组织有关，包括一个隶属于中国和平统一促进会的组织。特朗普政府曾在2020年将中国和平统一促进会列管为“外国使团”，指责其试图“在美国传播中国政府的恶意影响”。

“Chinese intelligence operatives are known to use these organizations as cover for their clandestine operations,” said Dennis Wilder, a former U.S. intelligence analyst on China and a senior fellow at Georgetown University.

“众所周知，中国情报人员利用这些组织为其秘密行动作掩护，”曾在美国政府担任中国情报分析师的伟德宁(Dennis Wilder)说，他现在是乔治城大学的高级研究员。

Mr. Leung’s work with such groups could have made him a useful informant, said Nigel Inkster, the former director of operations and intelligence for Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service. He described Mr. Leung as a likely “access agent,” with “no access to secrets himself but access to people who might have them.”

梁成运与这些组织的工作联系会让他成为一名有用的线人，英国秘密情报局的前行动和情报主管奈杰尔·英克斯特说。他称梁成运可能是“门路特工”，虽然“他自己没有机会接触机密，但他有接触可能掌握机密的人的门路”。

Christopher Wray, the F.B.I. director, has called Beijing the “biggest long-term threat to our economic and national security.”

联邦调查局局长克里斯托弗·雷已把中国政府描述为“我们的经济和国家安全所面临的最大的长远威胁”。

China’s spy agency has publicized what it portrays as Mr. Leung’s treachery, saying that he “collected a significant amount of intelligence related to China.” The ministry said he lured Chinese officials into U.S. hotel rooms for “pornographic traps,” an allegation that former and current bureau officials said was false, explaining that the F.B.I. does not use such tactics.

中国的国家安全部已将梁成运的案件公开，该部在描述其背叛行为时写道，他“搜集大量涉华情报”，并称梁成运曾“设置色情圈套”，把中国官员引诱到美国的酒店房间进行策反。美国联邦调查局的前任和现任官员说，这是虚假指控，因为联邦调查局不会使用那种手段。

The Chinese spy agency also released a video of Mr. Leung made while he was in custody, in which he expressed regret for what he had done. (Prisoners in China have in the past been coerced into making such televised confessions for propaganda purposes.)

中国国安部还公布了当局在梁成运被拘留期间给他拍摄的一段视频，梁成运在视频中对自己的所作所为表示了懊悔。（中国过去曾强迫囚犯在电视上认罪，以达到宣传目的。）

Mr. Leung, who upon arriving in the United States was sent to an Army medical center outside San Antonio, could not be reached for comment. He was met there by a son, according to Nury Turkel, a lawyer who was there to welcome his mother, one of the Uyghurs released by Beijing. Calls and messages left for family members were not returned.

梁成运抵达美国后被送往圣安东尼奥郊外的一家陆军医疗中心，记者无法联系到他置评。据一名当时在机场迎接母亲的律师努里·特克尔说，梁成运的一个儿子在机场迎接了他。特克尔的母亲是中国政府释放的维吾尔人之一。梁成运的家人没有回复记者打去的电话和给他们的留言。

David Tang, a director with Mr. Leung of several pro-China groups in the Houston area, said he was happy to hear the news that Mr. Leung was back in the United States. He said he did not believe that he was a spy and that his release pointed to his innocence. “The mistake finally was corrected.”

戴维·唐（音）曾和梁成运一起曾担任休斯顿地区几个亲中团体的董事，他说，他很高兴得知梁成运已回到美国。他说，他不相信梁成运是间谍，中国将他释放表明他是无辜的。“错误终于被纠正了。”

An Arrest, and Charges Dropped

被捕，然后指控被撤销

Mr. Leung was born in 1945 in Hong Kong’s New Territories, a largely mountainous, lush expanse of villages and farmland. He moved to New York in the 1970s, where he worked a low-level mailroom job at the United Nations while starting travel agencies in Chinatown with his brothers.

梁成运1945年在香港新界出生，新界多为山地，主要是郁郁葱葱的村庄和农田。20世纪70年代，他移民纽约后曾在联合国做过一些低级别的邮件收发工作，同时与兄弟们在唐人街办旅行社。

The travel business boomed. One agency, Leung Brothers Travel, had offices in New York and Toronto. It was the exclusive booking agent for Singapore Airlines, which often made it a necessary stop for people hoping to travel to Asia, said Tom Yiu, a longtime travel agent in Toronto.

旅行社的生意红火。其中一家名为“梁氏兄弟”的旅行社在纽约和多伦多设有办事处。长期在多伦多当旅行社代理人的汤姆·姚（音）说，这家旅行社曾是新加坡航空公司的独家订票代理，许多想去亚洲旅行的人那时都需要经过新加坡。

New York’s Chinatown was roiled by crime, with Chinese gangs waging bloody turf wars, and Mr. Leung ran a side business selling guns, according to two longtime acquaintances. In 1980, his partner at a second travel agency was shot dead by two masked men while Mr. Leung crouched in the bathroom, according to acquaintances and to Chinese-language news reports from the time.

那时，纽约的唐人街犯罪猖獗，华人帮派之间经常为争夺地盘发生血腥冲突，据两名与他相识多年的朋友说，梁成运还干过贩卖枪支的副业。据熟人以及当时的中文新闻报道，1980年，梁成运的第二家旅行社的合伙人被两名蒙面男子开枪打死，梁成运当时正在上厕所，躲过了一劫。

A few years later, he moved with his wife at the time, Kin Lan Ng, to Durant, a small college town in southeastern Oklahoma. The couple opened a Chinese restaurant in a strip mall, bought a modest home and raised three sons, according to property and ancestry records, and an interview with one son, Kit Leung.

几年后，他和当时的妻子吴金兰（音）一起搬到了俄克拉荷马州东南部的大学小城杜兰特。据房产和家谱记录、以及对其中一个儿子基特·梁（音）的采访，夫妻俩在一个购物中心开了一家中餐馆，买了一栋不太大的房子，并养育了三个儿子。

In 1984, Mr. Leung was arrested in Durant in the attempted purchase of a .22-caliber pistol and a silencer from an undercover federal agent. He was charged with possession of an unregistered firearm, court records show.

1984年，梁成运在杜兰特被捕，当时他企图从一名卧底联邦特工那里购买一只.22口径的手枪和一个消音器。法庭记录显示，对他的指控是持有未登记的枪支。

Rick Musticchi, a former agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives who sold Mr. Leung the gun and silencer, told The Times that he had approached Mr. Leung after getting a tip from an informant that he was involved in illegal activity and preparing to travel to China.

曾为烟酒火器和爆炸物管理局特工的里克·穆斯蒂奇是把枪和消音器卖给梁成运的人。穆斯蒂奇对时报说，在从一名线人那里获得密报，得知梁成运参与了非法活动并准备前往中国后，他开始接近梁成运。

Mark F. Green, Mr. Leung’s lawyer on the case, said that prosecutors dropped charges after Mr. Musticchi did not show up to a hearing.

梁成运那个案子的律师马克·F·格林说，检察官撤销了指控，因为穆斯蒂奇没有出席法庭听证。

China’s spy agency said that U.S. intelligence operatives first contacted Mr. Leung soon after, in 1986, and formalized the relationship in 1989. The Times could not verify those allegations.

中国的国安部称，美国情报人员首次与梁成运接触是在那个案子结束不久后的1986年，他们在1989年与梁成运建立了正式关系。时报无法核实这些说法。

For a small-town restaurant owner, Mr. Leung soon developed unusually high-level connections inside China, which was opening to the West. He set up a group that promoted business and cultural ties between Oklahoma City and the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, according to corporate records.

虽然只是一个小镇餐馆的老板，当时中国正向西方开放，梁成运很快就在中国建立起了不同寻常的高层关系。据公司记录，梁成运成立了一个团体，以促进俄克拉荷马城与中国南方城市广州之间的商业和文化联系。

Mr. Leung also organized musical exchanges between Southeastern Oklahoma State University, The Juilliard School in New York and cities in China. He arranged for the Chinese classical pianist Li Yundi to perform in Oklahoma in 1999.

梁成运还为东南俄克拉荷马州立大学和纽约的茱莉亚音乐学院组织了与中国城市的音乐交流活动。他曾在1999年安排中国钢琴演奏家李云迪在俄克拉荷马州举行古典音乐会。

The performances he set up in China were sometimes disorganized, said Aaron Wunsch, a Juilliard pianist who joined several of them. Mr. Wunsch said he once arrived to find the piano wrapped in plastic and missing legs. But, he added: “He would talk in a genuine way about China and how he loved China and the U.S.”

参加过几场演出的茱莉亚学院钢琴师亚伦·温施说，他在中国举办的演出有时很混乱。温施说，有一次他到达现场时发现钢琴被塑料包裹着，琴腿也不见了。但是，温施还说：“他会以一种真诚的方式谈论中国，以及他如何热爱中国和美国。”

Mr. Leung’s efforts earned him accolades inside China. In 2004, he was featured as one of 55 “outstanding overseas Chinese representatives” in People’s Daily, the Communist Party’s mouthpiece.

梁成运的努力为他在中国赢得了赞誉。2004年，中国共产党的喉舌《人民日报》将他列为“55位杰出华人代表”之一。

At a 2008 state banquet in Beijing celebrating the founding of China, he posed for a photo with Yang Jiechi, then the foreign minister, said Mr. Tang, who had also attended the event.

2008年，在北京举行的庆祝新中国成立的国宴上，他与时任外交部长杨洁篪合影留念，同样参加了那次活动的戴维·唐说。

Li Liangzhou, a now-retired director of Guangzhou’s foreign affairs office, helped Mr. Leung organize many of the exchange trips. “He didn’t ask us about inside government information,” Mr. Li said in a phone interview in March. “We didn’t expect him to be a spy at all.”

现已退休的广州市外办主任李良洲（音）曾帮助梁成运组织多次交流之旅。“他没有问过我们政府内部的信息，”李良洲在3月份接受电话采访时说。“我们根本没想到他是间谍。”

Expanding Into Houston

进军休斯顿

In the mid-2000s, Mr. Leung began setting up pro-China groups in Houston, which was home to a large Chinese community and a Chinese consulate.

在2005年前后，梁成运开始在休斯顿建立亲华团体，那里有庞大的华人社区和中国领事馆。

There, Mr. Leung drafted an alternative past. Mr. Tang, the other organizer of the pro-China groups, said he met Mr. Leung at a party in Houston, and they bonded by speaking Cantonese. Mr. Leung, who sometimes donated money to their groups, said he had come from wealth. He said he owned ranches in Oklahoma, sometimes showing up with farm eggs. He did not mention having owned a restaurant, despite the fact that his new friend was also a restaurateur, according to Mr. Tang.

在那里，梁成运书写了自己的另一种过去。亲华团体的另一位组织者戴维·唐说，他在休斯顿的一个派对上遇到了梁成运，两人因为说粤语而结识。梁成运有时会向他们的团体捐款，他说自己出身富裕家庭，在俄克拉何马州拥有牧场，有时会带着农场的鸡蛋出现。据戴维·唐说，尽管唐自己也是餐馆老板，但梁成运没有提到自己开过餐馆。

The two joined forces in the Texas Council for the Promotion of China’s Peaceful Reunification, a group with links to the Washington, D.C.-based group the Trump administration later designated as a foreign mission.

两人在得克萨斯州促进中国和平统一委员会合作，该组织与那个后来被特朗普政府指定为外国使团的华盛顿组织有联系。

Mr. Tang rejected the Trump administration’s characterization and said the group was set up to support American policy on China. He said he and Mr. Leung attended a 2018 protest against a stopover in Houston by Tsai Ing-wen, Taiwan’s president at the time.

戴维·唐否认了特朗普政府的定性，并表示该组织的成立是为了支持美国的对华政策。他说，他和梁成运参加了2018年抗议时任台湾总统蔡英文在休斯顿停留的活动。

Mr. Leung also became a director of the Chinese Civic Center in Houston, according to its tax filings. It serves the Chinese community and houses a separate service center that has come under scrutiny for suspected ties to Beijing. In 2023, the Justice Department accused two men of operating an “illegal overseas police station” out of a similar outpost in New York.

根据休斯顿华人公民中心的税务申报，梁成运还担任该中心的董事。中心为华人社区提供服务，并设有一个单独的服务中心，后者因涉嫌与北京有联系而受到审查。2023年，司法部指控两名男子在纽约的类似站点经营一个“非法海外警务站”。

2018年，时任台湾总统蔡英文在休斯敦参观美国国家航空航天局的太空中心。梁成运参加了针对蔡英文在休斯顿停留的抗议活动。

Xie Bin, a cybersecurity specialist in Houston, said he met Mr. Leung during this period at a mid-autumn festival event attended by Chinese diplomats. “He was the one who greeted everyone,” Mr. Xie said.

休斯顿的网络安全专家谢斌（音）说，就是在这段时间，他在一次有中国外交官参加的中秋节活动上认识了梁成运。“他和每个人都打招呼，”谢斌说。

But Mr. Leung never found a home in Houston, said Mr. Tang, staying instead at a Ramada close to Chinatown.

但戴维·唐说，梁成运一直没有在休斯顿安家，而是住在离唐人街不远的华美达酒店。

The Chinese government’s efforts in Houston were becoming a focus for the F.B.I. Beginning in 2018, the bureau spent over a year investigating suspected intellectual property theft at Texas Medical Center by researchers with ties to China.

从2018年开始，中国政府在休斯顿的行动成为联邦调查局关注的焦点。该局花了一年多的时间，调查与中国有联系的研究人员涉嫌在得克萨斯医疗中心窃取知识产权的行为。

Relations deteriorated, and the Trump administration closed the Chinese consulate in Houston in July 2020, saying it was a hub of spying. Beijing responded by shuttering the U.S. consulate in Chengdu.

两国关系恶化后，特朗普政府于2020年7月关闭了中国驻休斯顿领事馆，称其为间谍活动中心。作为回应，北京关闭了美国驻成都领事馆。

From a Life Sentence to a Surprise Release

从无期徒刑到意外释放

In 2023, a Chinese court said Mr. Leung had been arrested two years earlier by state security agents from Suzhou, a city in Jiangsu Province. He had traveled to Jiangsu regularly for years, making inroads there with officials.

2023年，中国一家法院称，梁成运于两年前被江苏省苏州市的国家安全人员逮捕。多年来，他定期前往江苏，与当地官员打交道。

In China, where the top leader, Xi Jinping, has empowered security agencies to hunt down spies, Mr. Leung’s arrest and life sentence were hailed as a win.

在中国，最高领导人习近平授权安全机构追捕间谍，梁成运的被捕和无期徒刑被视为胜利。

In the United States, Mr. Leung’s case got little news coverage.

在美国，梁成运案几乎没有被新闻报道。

Kit Leung said in January at his home in Texas that Mr. Leung took him and a brother to Hong Kong to witness its handover to Chinese control in 1997 but that he and his father later became estranged. He said he learned about his imprisonment through news reports. Mr. Leung’s ex-wife, Ms. Ng, a New York resident, said she hadn’t spoken to him in years.

基特·梁在得克萨斯州的家中说，1997年，梁成运曾带他和一个兄弟去香港，见证香港回归中国，但后来他和父亲关系疏远了。他说他是通过新闻报道得知父亲被监禁的消息。梁成运的前妻、现居纽约的吴金兰说，她已经好几年没和梁成运联系了。

Another son moved into Mr. Leung’s house in Durant, neighbors said, and told them that his father had died. Reached there in January, that son, Carl Leung, declined to comment.

邻居们说，梁成运的另一个儿子搬进了梁成运在杜兰特的房子，并告诉他们，自己的父亲已经去世。今年1月，记者联系到他的儿子卡尔·梁，他拒绝置评。

But under intense secrecy, the Biden administration was working out the contours of a swap with Beijing. During a global summit in Peru last month, President Biden discussed a potential trade with Mr. Xi.

但拜登政府在高度保密的情况下与中国政府制定了交换计划的框架。上个月在秘鲁举行的全球峰会上，拜登总统与习近平讨论了潜在的交换。

拜登总统和中国国家主席习近平上个月在秘鲁利马举行的双边会晤中。

When Mr. Leung and the two other American prisoners were released, they were met by Nicholas Burns, the U.S. ambassador to China, at the Beijing airport. He handed them their U.S. passports. President Biden and Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken separately called all three men when they landed in Alaska for refueling.

梁成运和另外两名美国囚犯获释后，美国驻华大使伯恩斯在北京机场与他们见面，把美国护照交给他们。拜登总统和国务卿布林肯在飞机降落在阿拉斯加加油时，各自给这三人打了电话。

For Mr. Leung, it was the end of his time in Chinese custody — as well as the end of a ruse.

对梁成运来说，这意味着他结束了在中国的监禁——同时也结束了以假面示人的生活。

China said on Tuesday that it would begin banning the export of several rare minerals to the United States, in an escalation of the tech war between the world’s two biggest powers. The move comes a day after the Biden administration tightened Chinese access to advanced American technology.

中国周二表示将开始禁止向美国出口某些稀有矿产，这是世界上两个最大国家之间技术战的升级。此前一天，拜登政府加强了对中国获取美国先进技术的限制。

The ban signals Beijing’s willingness to engage in supply chain warfare by blocking the export of important components used to make valuable products, like weaponry and semiconductors.

这项禁令表明，中国政府愿意通过阻止用于制造武器和半导体等重要产品的重要零部件的出口来打供应链战争。

Sales of gallium, germanium, antimony and so-called superhard materials to the United States would be halted immediately on the grounds that they have dual military and civilian uses, China’s Ministry of Commerce said, citing the minerals’ use for military purposes. The export of graphite would also be subject to stricter review.

中国商务部表示，将立即停止向美国销售镓、锗、锑和所谓的超硬材料，理由是它们属于军民两用物项。石墨的出口也将受到更严格的审查。

China is central to many global supply chains, but it generally refrained from clamping down on its own exports during the first Trump administration, preferring instead to take more limited actions like buying soybeans from Brazil instead of the United States. But senior Chinese officials are worried that President-elect Donald J. Trump plans more stringent policies during his coming term in office.

中国是许多全球供应链的核心，但在特朗普的第一个任期，中国通常不会对本国的出口进行打压，而是倾向于采取更有限的行动，比如从巴西而不是美国购买大豆。但中国的高级官员担心，美国的候任总统特朗普有意在即将到来的任期内实施更严格的政策。

Mr. Trump has promised to put hefty tariffs on goods from China and further sever the trading relationship between the countries. The move on Tuesday — one of the most aggressive steps China has taken to counter increasingly restrictive policies from the U.S. government — could foreshadow more economic conflict as Mr. Trump enters the White House.

特朗普已经放话，要对来自中国的商品征收高额关税，并进一步切断两国间的贸易关系。周二的举动是中国为反制美国政府日益严厉的限制政策而采取的最激进举措之一，可能预示着随着特朗普入主白宫，会出现更多的经济冲突。

China produces nearly all the world’s supply of critical minerals needed to make advanced technologies such as semiconductors. Beijing has been tightening its grip on the materials to retaliate for clampdowns on American technology exports to China over the past two years.

全球制造半导体等先进技术产品所需的关键矿产几乎全部来自中国。北京一直在加强对这些原材料的控制，以报复过去两年美国对华技术出口的限制。

China created a legal framework last year for controlling exports of gallium and germanium, which are used in semiconductors, and on Sept. 15 China added antimony, which is used in military explosives. In October, China began requiring its exporters of rare earth metals, used in everything from advanced semiconductors to smart bombs, to disclose, step by step, how the minerals would be used in Western supply chains.

去年，中国建立了一个法律框架来控制半导体中使用的镓和锗的出口，9月15日，中国将可用于军用炸药的锑纳入控制范围。10月，中国开始要求稀土金属的出口商逐步披露这些矿物在西方供应链中的使用情况，稀土金属用于从先进半导体到智能炸弹的各种产品。

China’s exports of gallium and germanium briefly halted a year ago until officials in Beijing devised a system for approving such transactions. Shipments to the United States have never fully recovered, forcing the United States to rely more on the purchase of semi-processed materials from other countries like Japan that buy directly from China.

一年前，中国的镓和锗出口曾一度停止，直到有关部门制定了一套批准此类交易的制度。对美国的出口一直没有完全恢复，迫使美国更多地依赖从日本等其他国家购买半加工材料，这些国家可以直接从中国购买。

The move by China on Tuesday echoed an unannounced embargo on exports of rare earth metals to Japan that Beijing imposed for two months in 2010 during a territorial dispute between the countries. That embargo produced considerable distress among manufacturers in Japan worried about dwindling supplies, because China provides as much as 99 percent of the world’s supply of some rare earth metals.

周二中国的举动让人想起2010年在中日领土争端期间，北京突然对日本实施的为期两个月的稀土金属出口禁令。这一禁令在日本制造商中引发了相当大的不安，因为某些稀土金属的全球供应有99%来自中国。

The United States could be somewhat less vulnerable to China’s measures now than Japan was then. Many chemical factories in the United States have closed in recent decades, so the country already buys semi-processed materials from countries other than China.

与当时的日本相比，美国现在受中国措施的影响可能要小一些。近几十年来，美国的许多化工厂已经关闭，因此它已经在从中国以外的国家购买半成品材料。

The Chinese ban on superhard mineral exports could provoke particular unhappiness in America’s national security community. That ban appeared to be aimed at Chinese exports of tungsten, which is vital for making armor-piercing bullets and shells, said Oliver Friesen, the chief executive of Guardian Metal Resources, a London company that is planning to mine tungsten in Nevada.

中国对超硬矿物出口的禁令可能会引起美国国家安全界的特别不满。伦敦一家计划在内华达州开采钨矿的公司Guardian Metal Resources的首席执行官奥利弗·弗里森表示，这一禁令似乎是针对中国的钨矿出口，钨对于制造穿甲子弹和炮弹至关重要。

It will take close to three years to establish a new tungsten mine in Nevada, he said, adding: “We’re moving things along quite quickly.”

他说，在内华达州新开一座钨矿需要近三年的时间，并称，“我们的进展相当迅速。”

When the Biden administration broadened tariffs in September that Mr. Trump imposed in his first term, it added a 25 percent tariff on imports of tungsten from China — part of an effort to persuade tungsten users in the United States to find more dependable suppliers elsewhere.

今年9月，拜登政府扩大了特朗普在第一任期内征收的关税，对从中国进口的钨征收25%的关税，这是为了说服美国的钨用户在其他地方寻找更可靠供应商。

Even before China instituted the ban Tuesday, it had begun limiting its overall antimony exports tightly enough that global prices for the material have doubled in the past three months.

甚至在周二颁布禁令之前，中国就已经开始严格限制锑的整体出口，以至于全球锑价格在过去三个月里翻了一番。

According to the United States Geological Survey, China has been supplying 54 percent of the germanium used by the United States, a material used in infrared technology and fiber optics.

根据美国地质调查局的数据，美国使用的锗有54%来自中国。锗是一种用于红外技术和光纤的材料。

The United States has not mined its own gallium, used in semiconductors, since 1987. Japan supplies 26 percent of American imports of gallium, China 21 percent and Germany 19 percent, along with several smaller suppliers.

自1987年以来，美国就再也没有开采过可用于半导体的镓。在美国进口的镓中，日本占26%，中国占21%，德国占19%，还有几个较小的供应国。

Halting exports of critical minerals can backfire. After China temporarily halted exports to Japan in 2010, the Japanese government helped Lynas, a company in Australia, to develop a large rare earth metals mine there as an alternative supplier.

停止关键矿物出口的效果可能会适得其反。2010年中国暂停对日本的出口后，日本政府帮助澳大利亚的Lynas公司在当地开发了一个大型稀土金属矿，作为替代供应。

On Monday, the Biden administration expanded its curbs on technology to China by prohibiting the sale of certain types of chips and machinery and adding more than 100 Chinese companies to a restricted-trade list. American officials characterized the limits as a routine action to update the existing curbs and close loopholes that some businesses had used to circumvent prohibitions.

周一，拜登政府扩大了对华技术出口的限制，禁止出售某些类型的芯片和制造这些芯片的设备，并将100多家中国公司列入了贸易限制名单。美国官员称这些限制是例行行动，目的是更新现有的限制措施，堵塞一些企业用来规避禁令的漏洞。

It was the third significant action in the past three years in the Biden administration’s bid to prevent China from catching up to the United States in cutting-edge technologies. The Biden administration has steadily expanded other restrictions on doing business with China, like curbing U.S. investment in certain Chinese industries, and blocking Chinese electric vehicles out of concern their operating systems could share data with Beijing.

拜登政府稳步扩大了与中国做生意的其他限制，比如限制美国对中国某些行业的投资，以及阻止中国电动车进入美国市场，因担心其操作系统可能与北京共享数据。

Mr. Trump has promised his own aggressive measures that would further cut down on trade between the countries. For example, he campaigned on a promise to add tariffs of 60 percent or more on Chinese products and remove so-called permanent normal trade relations with China, which would also result in higher tariffs on Chinese goods.

特朗普承诺将采取积极措施，进一步减少两国间的贸易。例如，他在竞选时承诺对中国产品征收60%或更多的关税，并取消与中国的所谓永久正常贸易关系，这也将导致对中国商品征收更高的关税。

China criticized the technology curbs by the United States, calling them “illegal.”

中国将美国实施技术限制批评为“非法”。

“Such practices seriously undermine the international economic and trade order, disrupt the stability of global production and the supply chain, and harms the interests of all countries,” said Lin Jian, a spokesman for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

“这种做法严重破坏国际经贸秩序，扰乱全球产供链稳定，损害所有国家利益，”中国外交部发言人林剑说。

In response to U.S. technology curbs, Chinese industry groups representing business sectors, including semiconductors and auto manufacturing, also released statements on Tuesday calling for Chinese companies to purchase more chips domestically or from countries other than the United States.

针对美国的技术限制，中国代表半导体和汽车制造等行业的行业团体于周二发表声明，呼吁中国企业更多地从国内或美国以外的国家采购芯片。

“American chip products are no longer safe and reliable, and related Chinese industries will have to be cautious in purchasing American chips,” the China Semiconductor Industry Association said.

中国半导体行业协会表示：“美国芯片产品不再安全、不再可靠，中国相关行业将不得不谨慎采购美国芯片。”

These associations include some of the world’s largest consumers of semiconductors, so the warning could have financial implications for U.S. chip makers.

这些行业协会代表着一些全球最大的半导体消费企业，因此这一警告可能对美国芯片制造商产生财务影响。

U.S. companies like Micron and Intel were previously targeted by national security investigations in China that threatened to cut them off from a major market. Chinese government officials have also been discouraged from using foreign-made devices, threatening Apple’s market share.

美光和英特尔等美国公司此前曾是中国国家安全调查的目标，这些调查可能会切断它们与一个主要市场的联系。中国政府还不鼓励官员使用外国制造的电子产品，这对苹果公司的市场份额构成了威胁。

In a statement, John Neuffer, the president of the Washington-based Semiconductor Industry Association, said that the group was evaluating the impact of the proposals and that “any claims that American chips are ‘no longer safe or reliable’ are simply inaccurate.”

总部设在华盛顿的半导体行业协会主席约翰·诺伊弗在一份声明中表示，该组织正在评估这些提议的影响，并指出，“任何关于美国芯片‘不再安全、不再可靠’的说法都是不准确的。”

The association had “long urged that export controls should be narrow and targeted to meet specific national security objectives,” he said. “We encourage both governments to avoid further escalation.”

他表示，该协会“长期以来一直主张出口管制应缩小范围且有针对性，以满足特定的国家安全目标”。他还表示：“我们鼓励两国政府避免事态进一步升级。”

Yoon Suk Yeol won South Korea’s highest office in 2022 by a threadbare margin, the closest since his country abandoned military rule in the 1980s and began holding free presidential elections.

2022年，尹锡悦以微弱的优势赢得了韩国总统大选，自韩国在20世纪80年代放弃军事统治、开始举行自由选举以来，这是两名候选人之间差距最小的一次。

Just over two years later, Mr. Yoon’s brief declaration of martial law on Tuesday shocked South Koreans who had hoped that tumultuous era of military intervention was behind them. Thousands of protesters gathered in Seoul to call for his arrest. Their country, regarded as a model of cultural soft power and an Asian democratic stalwart, had suddenly taken a sharp turn in another direction.

两年多之后的本周二，尹锡悦短暂宣布戒严令，令原本希望那个动荡的军事干预时代已经过去的韩国人感到震惊。数以千计的抗议者聚集在首尔，要求逮捕尹锡悦。他们的国家曾被视为文化软实力的典范和亚洲民主的中坚力量，如今却突然转向另一个方向。

But the events that led to Mr. Yoon’s stunning declaration on Tuesday — and his decision six hours later to lift the decree after Parliament voted to block it — were set in motion well before his razor-thin victory. They were a dramatic illustration of South Korea’s bitterly polarized politics and the deep societal discontent beneath the surface of its rising global might.

但是，尹锡悦周二发表这一惊人声明——以及六小时之后，国会投票否决该戒严令的情况下，他决定取消戒严令——的肇因，始于他以微弱优势获胜之前。它们戏剧性地展现了韩国政治的严重两极化，以及在它日益强大的全球实力表象下深刻的社会不满情绪。

It all came to a head when Mr. Yoon, once a hard-charging prosecutor who investigated former presidents, found himself on the receiving end of a political onslaught by a galvanized opposition.

尹锡悦曾是负责调查前总统的强硬检察官，当他发现自己正受到愤怒的反对派的政治攻击时，一切都变得岌岌可危。

Victory, but no mandate

获胜，但没有授权

Mr. Yoon, a conservative leader, has never been popular in South Korea. He won election by a margin of only 0.8 percentage points. The vote, analysts said, was more a referendum on his liberal predecessor’s failures than an endorsement of Mr. Yoon.

作为保守派领导人，尹锡悦在韩国从来都不受欢迎。他仅以0.8个百分点的优势赢得了选举。分析人士说，那次投票与其说是对尹锡悦的支持，不如说是表明属于自由派的前任总统是多么失败的全民公决。

The bitterness of the campaign was reflected in a statement by Mr. Yoon’s main opponent, Lee Jae-myung, who would go on to lead the opposition to the Yoon government in Parliament.

竞选的激烈程度从尹锡悦的主要对手李在明的声明中可见一斑，李在明后来在议会中领导反对尹锡悦政府的反对派。

“I sincerely ask the president-elect to lead the country over the divide and conflict and open an era of unity and harmony,” he said.

“我真诚地请求候任总统领导这个国家超越分裂和冲突，开启一个团结与和谐的时代，”他写道。

尹锡悦总统于2022年5月宣誓就职。

Mr. Yoon, 63, was an unlikely figure to guide the nation to reconciliation. As prosecutor general, he helped convict and imprison a former leader of his own party, Park Geun-hye​, after her impeachment as president. Specializing in corruption cases, he had also pursued another former president and the head of Samsung.

63岁的尹锡悦不太可能是引导国家走向和解的人物。作为总检察长，在朴槿惠任总统期间被弹劾后，他曾参与了对这位自己政党前领导人的定罪，将她关入监狱。专门调查腐败案件的他还曾起诉另一位前总统和三星集团总裁。

As Mr. Yoon investigated Ms. Park, the administration he worked for continued a long pattern in South Korea in which new leaders launch inquiries into their predecessors, contributing to the rancorous nature of the country’s politics.

在尹锡悦调查朴槿惠的过程中，他任职的政府延续了韩国长期以来的一种模式：新领导人会对前任展开调查，这加剧了韩国政治中的敌对本质。

Running for office, Mr. Yoon vehemently criticized his former boss, the progressive president Moon Jae-in, for meeting with North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, but failing to stop his nuclear ambitions. He called for ratcheting up military drills and for strict enforcement of sanctions on the North, envisioning a South Korea that wielded its influence as a major U.S. ally in Asia.

在竞选时，尹锡悦强烈批评他的前任上司、进步派总统文在寅与朝鲜领导人金正恩会面，却未能阻止朝鲜的核野心。他呼吁加强军事演习，并严格执行对朝鲜的制裁，把韩国设想为美国在亚洲的主要盟友，从而发挥其影响力。

“Peace is meaningless unless it is backed by power,” Mr. Yoon said during the campaign. “War can be avoided only when we acquire an ability to launch pre-emptive strikes and show our willingness to use them.”

“除非有实力做后盾，否则和平毫无意义，”尹锡悦在竞选期间说。“只有当我们有能力发动先发制人的打击，并表现出使用它们的意愿时，战争才能避免。”

The approach won him favor in Washington, where the Biden administration was glad to have South Korea align itself more closely with American positions as a bulwark against China. But it did little for him at home, where he was locked in perpetual war with the opposition even as his domestic challenges mounted.

这种方式为他赢得了华盛顿的支持，拜登政府很高兴韩国能够更紧密地与美国站在一起，成为对抗中国的堡垒。但这对尹锡悦在国内的处境没有什么帮助，他在国内面临的挑战越来越多，还陷入了与反对派无休止的斗争中。

A cauldron of discontent

不满情绪的熔炉

Despite South Korea’s growing influence around the world — in business, film, television and music — vertiginous inequality has fueled widespread discontent at home. Skyrocketing home prices have forced people to live in ever-smaller spaces at ever-greater cost. Recent college graduates have struggled to find suitable work, sometimes accusing older generations of locking them out.

尽管韩国在商业、电影、电视和音乐领域的全球影响力日益增强，但极度的不平等在国内引发了广泛的不满。飞涨的房价迫使人们以越来越高的成本住在越来越小的空间里。刚毕业的大学生很难找到合适的工作，有时会指责老一代人把他们拒之门外。

Many young people, facing uncertain economic prospects, are reluctant to marry or have children, and the country has both a rapidly aging population and the world’s lowest birthrate. Increasingly, voters have blamed their political opponents, as well as immigrants and feminists.

面对不确定的经济前景，许多年轻人不愿结婚或生孩子，而且该国人口迅速老龄化，是世界上出生率最低的国家。选民们越来越多地指责政治对手，以及移民和女权主义者。

俯瞰首尔，2022年。

Critics of Mr. Yoon, whose campaign promised to abolish South Korea’s ministry of gender equality, accused him of playing on some of those divides, saying he stoked biases, especially among young men.

尹锡悦在竞选活动中承诺废除韩国主管性别平等的部门，批评者指责他利用了其中的一些分歧，说他煽动偏见，尤其是在年轻男性当中。

From the start, however, Mr. Yoon faced two obstacles.

然而，从一开始，尹锡悦就面临着两个障碍。

The opposition Democratic Party held on to its majority in the National Assembly and then expanded it in parliamentary elections in April, making him the first South Korean leader in decades to never have a majority in Parliament. And then there were his own dismal approval ratings.

反对党共同民主党在国民议会中保持了多数席位，并在4月的国会选举中扩大了多数优势，使他成为数十年来首位在议会中从未获得过多数席位的韩国领导人。此外，他本人的支持率也很低。

Mr. Yoon’s toxic relationship with opposition lawmakers — and their vehement efforts to oppose him at every turn — paralyzed his pro-business agenda for two years, hindering his efforts to cut corporate taxes, overhaul the national pension system and address housing prices.

尹锡悦与反对党议员之间的恶性关系——以及他们在各方面都极力反对他——使他的亲商议程瘫痪了两年，阻碍了他削减公司税、改革国家养老金制度和解决房价问题的努力。

An election fueled by vitriol

因谩骂而火上浇油的选举

Mr. Yoon’s party had seen the 2024 elections as an opportunity to win back the chamber.

尹锡悦的政党曾将2024年的选举视为赢回国会的机会。

Instead the crises and scandals built. A Halloween celebration became a deadly catastrophe, and North Korea ramped up its threats. Doctors went on strike, describing a medical system of harsh working conditions and low wages. Allegations of corruption involving Mr. Yoon’s wife and a $2,200 Dior pouch roiled his party, with one senior member comparing her to Marie Antoinette.

然而，危机和丑闻越来越多。一场万圣节庆祝活动变成了致命灾难，朝鲜加大了威胁力度。许多医生举行罢工，称医疗系统工作条件恶劣、工资过低。涉及尹锡悦妻子和一个价值2200美元的迪奥手袋的腐败指控在他的政党中掀起了轩然大波，一名高级成员将她比作玛丽·安托瓦内特。

Protests organized on social media by rival political activists became common, with a rough division of churchgoers and other older citizens on the right, and mostly younger people on the left.

敌对政治活动人士在社交媒体上组织的抗议活动变得很常见，左右两派形成激烈对峙，右派大致是去教堂的人和其他年长公民，左派则主要是年轻人。

The election devolved into vicious recriminations, with left-wing protesters calling Mr. Yoon a “national traitor” over what they called his anti-feminist policies and attacks on news outlets he accused of spreading “fake news.” They also criticized him for the Halloween crowd crush and his efforts to improve ties with Japan, the onetime colonial ruler of Korea.

选举演变成了恶毒的相互指责，左翼抗议者说尹锡悦的政策是反女权主义的，称他为“民族叛徒”；他们还攻击他指责新闻机构传播“假新闻”。他们批评他在万圣节人群踩踏事件中的表现，以及他改善韩日关系的努力。日本曾是韩国的殖民统治者。

Opposition leaders warned that Mr. Yoon was taking South Korea onto the path of “dictatorship.” In turn, members of Mr. Yoon’s party called the opposition “criminals,” and voters on the right rallied against what they called “pro-North Korean communists.”

反对派领导人警告说，尹锡悦正在把韩国带上“独裁统治”的道路。尹锡悦所在政党的成员称反对派是“罪犯”，右翼选民则联合起来反对他们所称的“亲朝鲜共产主义者”。

(Mr. Yoon echoed that language on Tuesday in his declaration of martial law, saying he was issuing it “to protect a free South Korea from the North Korean communist forces, eliminate shameless pro-North Korean and anti-state forces.”)

（周二，尹锡悦在宣布戒严时重复了上述措辞，称他宣布戒严是“捍卫自由大韩民国免受朝鲜共产主义势力的威胁，剿灭掠夺我国人民自由和幸福的无耻亲朝鲜反国家势力”。)

周二，反对党领袖在国会外发言。

The election in April ultimately granted the opposition one of the biggest parliamentary majorities in South Korea in decades.

4月份的选举最终使反对党获得了韩国几十年来最大的议会多数。

Many South Koreans called it “Judgment Day.” But the outcome also solidified the deadlock in the government, restricting either party’s ability to agree on the national budget or address the public’s complaints. The acrimony only deepened as the opposition moved to impeach several members of Mr. Yoon’s government.

许多韩国人称那一天为“审判日”。但选举结果也进一步强化了政府内部的僵局，限制了双方就国家预算达成一致或解决公众不满的能力。随着反对派开始弹劾尹锡悦政府的几名成员，双方的敌意进一步加深。

In the aftermath of the April vote, the prime minister and many of the president’s top aides resigned. Mr. Yoon’s chief of staff relayed a message from the president, who was quoted as saying he would “overhaul the way the government is run.”

在4月的投票之后，总理和总统的许多高级助手辞职。尹锡悦的幕僚长转达了总统的口信，并援引总统的话称，总统将“彻底改革政府的运作方式”。

But by Tuesday night, Mr. Yoon had turned startlingly defiant. He declared that “the National Assembly, which should have been the foundation of free democracy, has become a monster that destroys it.”

但到在周二晚上，尹锡悦的态度变得惊人地强硬。他说：“本应成为自由民主主义基础的国会变成了摧毁自由民主主义的怪物。”

Not long after, as protesters rushed to the gates of the National Assembly, lawmakers voted to lift the president’s measure. Mr. Lee, the opposition leader, who survived a stabbing attack in January and later staged a hunger strike against the Yoon government, said Mr. Yoon had “betrayed the people.”

不久后，抗议者冲到国会门口，议员们投票取消了总统的戒严令。反对党领袖李在明说，尹锡悦“背叛了人民”，李在明于1月在一次刺杀事件中幸免于难，后来又以绝食抗议尹锡悦政府。”

Hours later, Mr. Yoon said he would comply with the legislature’s order. But even then, with his political future now thrown into profound uncertainty, he added a plea.

几个小时后，尹锡悦说他将遵守立法机关的命令。但即便如此，在他的政治前途陷入极度不确定的情况下，他还是提出了一个请求。

“I call on the National Assembly,” he said, “to immediately stop the outrageous behavior that is paralyzing the functioning of the country with impeachments, legislative manipulation and budget manipulation.”

“我呼吁国会，”他说，“立即停止通过弹劾、操纵立法和操纵预算等手段使国家运转陷入瘫痪的骇人行为。”

国会的警官。

President Yoon Suk Yeol of South Korea declared martial law on Tuesday night, accusing the opposition of “trying to overthrow the free democracy.” But about five hours later, he said he would lift the declaration, bowing to pressure after the National Assembly unanimously passed a resolution demanding that it end.

韩国总统尹锡悦周二晚间宣布戒严，指责反对派“试图推翻自由民主”。但在大约五小时后，屈服于国会一致通过决议要求解除戒严的压力，尹锡悦称他将解除戒严。

“I will lift martial law as soon as we have a quorum in the cabinet. It’s early in the morning, so we don’t have a quorum yet,” Mr. Yoon said in an address. He called on the legislature to “immediately stop the outrageous behavior that is paralyzing the functioning of the country with impeachments, legislative manipulation and budget manipulation.”

“内阁成员达到法定人数后，我将立即解除戒严令。现在还是凌晨，我们还没有达到法定人数。”尹锡悦在讲话中说。他呼吁国会“立即停止通过弹劾、操纵立法和操纵预算等手段使国家运转陷入瘫痪的骇人行为”。

It was the first martial law declaration in more than four decades in South Korea, which saw the end of a military dictatorship in the late 1980s. Mr. Yoon, who was elected president in 2022, has been in a near-constant political standoff with the opposition, which controls Parliament, and his government has faced plunging public approval ratings.

这是韩国40多年来首次宣布戒严，韩国于1980年代末结束了军事独裁统治。尹锡悦于2022年当选总统，他与控制国会的反对派几乎一直处于政治对峙状态，他的政府面临着民众支持率暴跌的问题。

In his speech declaring martial law late Tuesday, Mr. Yoon said he was making the move to “defend the free Republic of Korea from the threats of North Korean communist forces and to eradicate the shameless pro-North Korean anti-state forces that are plundering the freedom and happiness of our people and to protect the free constitutional order. Through this emergency martial law, I will rebuild and defend the free Republic of Korea, which is falling into ruin.”

尹锡悦在周二晚间宣布戒严的讲话中表示，他采取这一举措是为了“捍卫自由大韩民国免受朝鲜共产主义势力的威胁，剿灭掠夺我国人民自由和幸福的无耻亲朝鲜反国家势力，维护自由宪政秩序。通过实施紧急戒严，将重建并捍卫自由大韩民国，以防国家走入亡国之路”。

What does the martial law declaration mean?

戒严令意味着什么？

The country’s constitution states that the president may proclaim martial law when “required to cope with a military necessity or to maintain the public safety and order by mobilization of the military forces in time of war, armed conflict or similar national emergency.”

韩国宪法规定，总统在“战争、武装冲突或类似的国家紧急状态期间动员军队，以应对军事需要或维护公共安全和秩序”时，可以宣布戒严。

Army Gen. Park An-Su, who was appointed martial law commander by Mr. Yoon, banned “all political activities,” including political party activities and citizens’ rallies. “All news media and publications are under the control of martial law command,” General Park said.

陆军大将朴安秀被尹锡悦任命为戒严司令官，他禁止“一切政治活动”，包括政党活动和公民集会。朴安秀说：“所有新闻媒体和出版物都要接受戒严司令部的控制。”

His edict also banned labor activities and spreading “fake news.” Those who violate the decree can be arrested without a court warrant, it said. According to South Korean news agency Yonhap, the martial law command says all media and publishers are to be under its control, and orders all medical staff including trainee doctors, many of whom have been on strike, to return to work in 48 hours. Those who violate the martial law can be arrested without a warrant.

他还宣布禁止劳工活动和传播“假新闻”。戒严令称，违反戒严令的人可在未经法院授权的情况下被逮捕。据韩联社报道，戒严司令部表示，所有媒体和出版商都将受到控制，并命令所有医务人员（包括许多一直在罢工的实习医生）在48小时内返回工作岗位。违反戒严令的人可在没有逮捕令的情况下被逮捕。

Who is Yoon Suk Yeol?

尹锡悦是谁？

Mr. Yoon, a former prosecutor, won an extremely close presidential election in 2022, bringing the country’s conservatives back to power with calls for a more confrontational stance against North Korea and a stronger alliance with the United States. He replaced President Moon Jae-in, a progressive leader who served a single five-year term, and by law could not run again.

尹锡悦曾任检察官，2022年，他在总统选举中以微弱优势获胜，从而使韩国保守派重新掌权。他呼吁对朝鲜采取更加强硬的立场，并与美国建立更牢固的联盟。他的前任总统文在寅是一位进步派领导人，完成了一届五年任期，根据法律规定，总统不能连任。

When he was sworn in to office in May of that year, Mr. Yoon vowed to stand for values including freedom and liberal democracy.

同年5月宣誓就职时，尹锡悦誓言要捍卫自由和自由民主在内的价值观。

Soon after he was elected, however, Mr. Yoon began turning to lawsuits, state regulators and criminal investigations to clamp down on speech that he called disinformation, efforts that were largely aimed at news organizations. Police and prosecutors repeatedly raided the homes and newsrooms of journalists whom his office has accused of spreading “fake news.”

然而，尹锡悦当选后不久就开始诉诸法律手段、国家监管和刑事调查来打击他所称的虚假信息言论，这些努力主要针对新闻机构。警方和检察官多次突击搜查记者的住宅和新闻编辑部，总统办公室指控他们传播“假新闻”。

In April, Mr. Yoon’s People Power Party suffered a stinging defeat in parliamentary elections, giving the opposition a huge majority. He became the first South Korean president in decades to contend with an opposition-controlled Parliament for his entire time in office.

今年4月，尹锡悦领导的国民力量党在国会选举中惨败，反对党获得了绝对多数席位。他成为数十年来首位在任期间一直与反对党控制的国会抗衡的韩国总统。

How did South Korea’s political parties react?

韩国各个政党有何反应？

Han Dong-hoon, the leader of Mr. Yoon’s own People Power Party, said the declaration of martial law is “wrong” and that he will “block it,” South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported.

据韩联社报道，尹锡悦所属的国民力量党党魁韩东勋表示，宣布戒严是“错误的”，他将“阻止它” 。

Lee Jae-myung, the South Korean opposition leader, recorded a video in a car on his way to the National Assembly, asking citizens to congregate there. “There is no reason to declare martial law. We cannot let the military rule this country,” he said. “President Yoon Suk Yeol has betrayed the people. President Yoon’s illegal declaration of emergency martial law is null and void. From this moment on, Mr. Yoon is no longer the president of South Korea.”

在前往国会的路上，韩国反对党领袖李在明在车里录制了一段视频，呼吁民众到国会聚集。“没有理由宣布戒严。我们不能让军队统治这个国家，”他说。“尹锡悦总统背叛了人民。尹锡悦非法宣布紧急戒严是无效的。从这一刻起，尹锡悦已不再是韩国总统。”

Lee Jae-jung, a South Korean lawmaker who is a member of the Democratic Party, wrote on Facebook that she was making her way to the National Assembly. “We will stop this at all costs,” she said.

韩国共同民主党议员李在汀在Facebook上写道，她正在前往国会。“我们将不惜一切代价阻止它发生，”她说。

Broadcasts by state news media showed soldiers and police officers pushing against citizens trying to enter the National Assembly building as protesters shouted, “End martial law! End martial law!”

国家新闻媒体的报道显示，士兵和警察推搡试图进入国会大楼的民众，抗议者高呼“解除戒严！解除戒严！”。

How could martial law be lifted?

戒严该如何解除？

Under South Korean law, martial law can be lifted with a majority vote in the parliament, where the opposition Democratic Party holds a majority. When “the National Assembly requests the lifting of martial law, the President shall, without delay, do so and announce it,” the law states.

根据韩国法律，只要国会多数票通过，即可解除戒严，而反对党共同民主党在国会中占多数席位。法律规定，当“国会要求解除戒严时，总统应立即照做，并向民众宣布”。

Live footage from the National Assembly showed that some lawmakers seemed to be holding an emergency meeting held by Woo Won-shik, the speaker of the National Assembly.

国会现场直播画面显示，部分议员似乎正在参加由国会议长禹元植主持的紧急会议。

Mr. Woo later said President Yoon’s declaration of martial law had become “null and void” after the assembly adopted a resolution demanding its lifting.

禹元植随后表示，议会通过决议要求解除戒严，总统尹锡悦的戒严令“无效”。

Cristina Nambendi receives training on farming techniques from an American-funded program in Angola. But when asked if she had ever heard of President Biden or knew much about the United States, she looked stumped.

克里斯蒂娜·南本迪在安哥拉接受美国资助项目的农业技术培训。但被问及她是否听说过拜登总统或对美国了解多少时，她显得很困惑。

When asked about China, however, her eyes lit up.

然而，被问及中国时，她的眼睛亮了起来。

“What I hear and what I see is that they are building tall buildings and houses, and they are selling stuff,” said Ms. Nambendi, 47, who has been farming corn and beans for more than two decades in this southern African nation.

“我听到和看到的是，他们正在建造大厦和住宅，他们在卖东西，”47岁的南本迪说。她在这个非洲南部国家种植玉米和豆类已有20多年。

Mr. Biden visits Angola on Monday in his only trip to Africa as president and what is scheduled to be his last foreign trip in office. He will be there to promote the Lobito Corridor, an 800-mile railway project funded in part by the United States that is meant to be his signature initiative on the continent and an answer to China’s outsize influence across many African nations.

拜登于周一访问安哥拉，这是他作为总统唯一一次访问非洲，也是他任期内最后一次出访。他将在当地推广“洛比托走廊”，这是一个约1300公里的铁路项目，部分资金由美国提供，将是他在非洲大陆的标志性倡议，也是对中国在许多非洲国家巨大影响力的回应。

United States officials say the corridor will encourage private investment in Angola and provide the West with better access to minerals necessary for electric vehicles and other clean energy technologies. Yet China has already spent decades funding projects in the country and around the continent, leaving some to wonder whether America can compete with its rival.

美国官员说，这条走廊将鼓励在安哥拉的私人投资，并为西方国家提供获得电动汽车和其他清洁能源技术所需矿产的更好途径。然而，中国已经花了几十年的时间，在该国和整个非洲大陆资助项目，这让一些人怀疑美国是否能与其对手竞争。

安哥拉本格拉的农场工人，这是连接安哥拉与刚果民主共和国和赞比亚的洛比托走廊的一部分。

Beijing has built ostentatious shopping malls and roads with Chinese logos and signs. Angolans say the Chinese have made life easier and created jobs. Rather than funding such development projects, the United States has sought to create conditions that will attract private investment, though there’s no telling how long that will take or when Angolans might see the benefits. Some are skeptical those benefits will come at all.

中国在这里修建了许多华丽的购物中心和带有中国标识与标志的道路。安哥拉人说，中国人让他们的生活更加便利，创造了就业机会。美国没有为这些发展项目提供资金，而是寻求创造条件，吸引私人投资，但不知道这需要多长时间，也不知道安哥拉人什么时候能看到好处。一些人对这些好处能否实现持怀疑态度。

“What is real is real,” said Edu Xiong, the spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Luanda, the capital. “To speak loudly is easy, but to make it real is another thing. Some people are talking about this corridor. ‘We will hire a lot of people.’ But we have not seen that.”

“真的就是真的，”首都罗安达的中国驻安哥拉大使馆发言人埃杜·熊（音）说。“高谈阔论是很容易的，但让它成为现实是另一回事。有人谈起这条走廊。‘我们会雇用很多人。’但我们还没有看到。”

Angola is the second largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa. When it emerged from a devastating civil war in 2002, the government knocked on the doors of wealthy nations to ask for help rebuilding. America said no. China said yes. Angolans remember that.

安哥拉是撒哈拉以南非洲第二大石油生产国。2002年，正在从惨痛的内战恢复的安哥拉去敲富国的门，请求他们帮助重建家园。美国拒绝了。中国同意了。安哥拉人记得这件事。

Thus far, America’s only significant economic investment in the country has been in its oil and gas industries. Those who are critical of the corridor say oil and gas remain America’s true interest.

到目前为止，美国在安哥拉唯一的重大经济投资是在石油和天然气工业领域。对该走廊持批评态度的人说，石油和天然气仍然是美国的真正利益所在。

The election of Donald J. Trump has deepened uncertainty about how the United States will engage here, and there is no shortage of skepticism about what America is really after.

特朗普的当选加深了美国将如何参与当地事务的不确定性，人们对美国的真正目的也不乏怀疑。

“Sometimes they say, ‘We do care about agriculture as well,’” Beto Pinheiro, a 48-year-old farmer in the coastal city of Benguela, said of American officials. “But at the end of the day, it’s only petrol and minerals.”

“有时他们会说，‘我们也关心农业，’”在沿海城市本格拉，48岁的农民贝托·皮涅罗谈到美国官员时说。“但归根结底，他们只关心汽油和矿。”

Despite the skepticism among Angolans, the country’s president, João Lourenço, has bullishly pivoted toward the United States in recent years, in some cases spurning traditional allies like China and Russia to do so.

尽管安哥拉人持怀疑态度，但该国总统若昂·洛伦索近年来还是坚定地转向了美国，在某些情况下，甚至不惜抛弃中国和俄罗斯等传统盟友。

安哥拉本格拉省洛比托港的景色。

Since Mr. Lourenço took office in 2017, he has met with Mr. Biden twice. Rather than selecting a Chinese company to oversee the Lobito railway, his government chose a consortium of European companies, even though it was China that rebuilt the century-old rail line after the Angolan civil war. Mr. Lourenço has also turned to the United States to help modernize his country’s aging military, which has historically been aligned with Russia.

自2017年洛伦索上任以来，他与拜登两次会晤。他的政府没有选择一家中国公司来负责洛比托铁路，而是选了一个由欧洲公司组成的财团，尽管是中国在安哥拉内战后重建了这条有百年历史的铁路线。洛伦索还求助美国帮助该国老化的军队实现现代化，尽管其军方历来与俄罗斯结盟。

Many Angolans still harbor resentment toward the United States for not supporting its fight against Portuguese colonizers. The United States also supported the opponents of Angola’s largest anticolonial movement, which had embraced communism, during the civil war that came after independence in 1975.

许多安哥拉人仍然对美国心怀怨恨，因为美国没有支持该国反抗葡萄牙殖民者的斗争。1975年安哥拉独立后的内战期间，美国支持的力量反对该国最大的反殖民运动，该运动采纳了共产主义主张。

Mr. Lourenço, in an interview, said Angola should be more like Japan or Vietnam, countries that were once at war with the United States but had moved on and now welcomed American investment.

洛伦索在接受采访时表示，安哥拉应该更像日本或越南，这两个国家曾经与美国交战，但已经放下过去，现在欢迎美国的投资。

“Angola also could be one more of those countries that have turned the page,” he said. “We joined the market economy, and today there is no country in the world that has joined the market economy without having good relations with the U.S.”

 “安哥拉也可以成为翻过这一页的国家之一，”他说。“我们加入了市场经济，今天，世界上没有一个国家在加入市场经济后不与美国保持良好关系。”

Critics have argued that the Lobito Corridor is another example of foreign powers stripping African nations of their resources. The line runs from Angola’s border with the Democratic Republic of Congo to the port city of Lobito, on the Atlantic Ocean. From there, minerals can be more easily shipped to the United States, Europe and other countries.

批评者认为洛比托走廊是外国势力剥夺非洲国家资源的又一例证。这条铁路线从安哥拉与刚果民主共和国的边境一直延伸到大西洋上港口城市洛比托。从那里，矿产可以更容易地运往美国、欧洲和其他国家。

China is far ahead of the United States in its access to critical minerals in Africa. But the corridor could reduce that advantage, which may appeal to Mr. Trump, said J. Peter Pham, an Africa policy expert who worked in the first Trump administration.

在获得非洲关键矿产方面，中国远远领先于美国。但曾在特朗普第一届政府任职的非洲政策专家J·彼得·范说，该走廊可能会削弱这一优势，因此可能引起特朗普的兴趣。

“It’s in no one’s interest that any one country lock up the supply chain,” Mr. Pham said. “If you want to make America great again and rebuild the industrial base, you’re not going to do that without critical minerals.”

“任何一个国家封锁供应链都不符合任何人的利益，”范说。“如果你想恢复美国伟大荣光，重建工业基础，没有关键的矿产，你将无法做到这一点。”

克里斯蒂娜·南本迪在家中。她是美国支持安哥拉女性农民项目的参与者。

Mr. Biden has pitched the corridor as a catalyst that will help Angola diversify its economy. It will entice manufacturers to build factories along the railway because they can use it to ship goods, U.S. officials say. And it won’t bury the country in debt. (Since 2002, Angola has accumulated more than $42 billion in Chinese debt, more than any other African nation.)

拜登称这条走廊是帮助安哥拉实现经济多样化的催化剂。美国官员说，这将吸引制造商在铁路沿线建厂，因为他们可以利用铁路运输货物。而且它不会让安哥拉陷入债务之中。（自2002年以来，安哥拉累积了超过420亿美元的中国债务，比其他任何非洲国家都多。）

U.S. officials say the corridor could allow small, subsistence farmers to ship their harvests overseas, rather than selling them at roadside markets as most currently do. The United States has also introduced programs that teach agricultural best practices, like the one helping Ms. Nambendi in Cubal, a village that the Lobito railway cuts through.

美国官员们表示，这条走廊可以让自给自足的小农户将收成运往海外，而不是像目前大多数人那样在路边市场出售。美国还引进了一些传授最佳农业实践的项目，在洛比托铁路途经的库巴尔村帮助了南本迪的项目就是其中之一。

Women in the program said they had learned how to produce their own fertilizer and properly space seeds when planting. They were also taught to read and write so they could run a business.

参加这个项目的女人们说，她们学会了如何自己生产肥料，并在播种时适当地将种子隔开。她们还学会了读写，这样就可以经营自己的生意。

Ms. Nambendi, a mother of seven, said she earned so much in her first harvest since joining the program that she was able to buy a goat, invest in her modest house constructed from mud blocks and build an outdoor, wood-burning oven to support her other business, baking bread.

南本迪是七个孩子的母亲，她说，自从加入这个项目以来，她第一次收获农作物就赚了很多钱，让她能够买一只山羊，投资建造她用泥砖盖起来的简陋房子，并建造了一个户外木柴烤箱，支持她的另一项生意——烤面包。

These are small inroads that American officials hope will add up.

这些都是美国官员希望累积起来的小进展。

It’s important that Angolans understand these U.S.-backed initiatives are supporting them, said William Butterfield, the representative to Angola of the United States Agency for International Development, which funds the program.

为该项目提供资金的美国国际开发署驻安哥拉代表威廉·巴特菲尔德说，重要的是安哥拉人要明白，美国支持的这些举措是在支持他们。

南本迪家的孩子们。自从加入这个项目以来，她靠着第一次农作物收获赚了很多钱，得以买下一只山羊。

“It helps us create the good will that’s necessary to do a lot of our other business,” such as trade and defense, he said.

他说：“这有助于我们营造善意的氛围，这是我们开展其他许多业务所必需的，”比如贸易和国防。

Some Angolans are starting to take note.

一些安哥拉人开始注意到这一点。

Antonio Andrade, the deputy administrator for Cubal, stood on the farm where the women received their training, envisioning a future in which America’s efforts led to neat rows of crops resembling large commercial farms, factories that produce fruit juice and corn flour and slaughterhouses for cattle.

库巴尔的副行政官安东尼奥·安德拉德站在女人们接受培训的农场上，展望着这样的未来：在美国的努力下，一排排整齐的庄稼如同大型商业农场，还有生产果汁和玉米粉的工厂，以及牛的屠宰场。

“America has a name to protect,” he said. “They don’t just go for quick profit.”

“美国要保守自己的名声，”他说。“他们不只是为了快速获利。”

Along Via Expressa, a busy highway that cuts through Luanda, billboards with Chinese characters advertise Beijing’s presence. “Tough world, tough equipment,” read an ad for LiuGong heavy machinery. China City, a massive, open-air mall, occupies several blocks along the highway.

在途经罗安达的繁忙高速公路Via Expressa上，随处可见写着汉字的广告牌，宣传着北京方面的存在。柳工中国重型机械的一则广告写道：“艰难的世界，坚固的设备。”中国城是一个大型露天购物中心，占据了高速公路沿线的几个街区。

But with economic challenges at home, China has decreased its investment in Africa in recent years. Many African nations are also less willing to take on more Chinese debt. Private Chinese entrepreneurs are turning to industries like green energy, mining and manufacturing. Some also say they, too, could reap the benefits of the Lobito Corridor.

但由于国内经济面临挑战，中国近年来减少了对非洲的投资。许多非洲国家也不太愿意承担更多中国债务。中国民营企业家正转向绿色能源、矿业和制造业等行业。一些人表示，他们也可以从洛比托走廊中获益。

“This Lobito project is a very good project for Angola’s development,” said Zheng Gang, a Chinese entrepreneur who has been doing business in Angola for 18 years. “Angola’s economy grows, which means that we will have more opportunities.”

“洛比托项目对安哥拉的发展来说是一个非常好的项目，”在安哥拉经商18年的中国企业家郑刚（音）说。“安哥拉的经济在增长，这意味着我们将有更多的机会。”

副行政官安东尼奥·安德拉德在库巴尔火车站，库巴尔是洛比托走廊的一部分。

The boulders hiding in the alcove of Tong Yang-Tze’s apartment testify to this Taiwanese calligrapher’s daunting perfectionism.

在董阳孜的公寓，藏在角落的纸堆证明了这位台湾书法家对完美令人生畏的追求。

They are paper — remnants of discarded artworks, crumpled together like used tissues and soaked into inky wads of pulp. Hundreds of old drafts of writing, including many of her efforts to draw Chinese poetry at monumental scale, have been recycled into these rocks over the years, most recently as she worked on her commission for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which will debut on Nov. 21. Curators call it the most important showing of calligraphy in the United States by a woman in recent memory and say it will bridge the art form from its ancient history to the 21st century.

它们是废弃的艺术作品，像用过的纸巾一样皱成一团，墨汁将它们浸透，成了一团团带着黑斑的纸浆。多年来，成千上万的草稿——包括以巨幅尺寸书写中国诗歌的尝试——变成了这些故纸堆。最近的一次尝试是她受大都会艺术博物馆委托所创作的作品，将于11月21日亮相。策展人表示，这是近年来美国最有分量的女性书法家作品展，并表示，它将把这一艺术形式从古代带入21世纪。

Earlier this fall, Tong, who is 81, unfurled scrolls on the floor of her Taipei apartment, pushing furniture to the walls before dipping a comically large brush into a mixing bowl filled with velvety black ink. She was preparing designs for the two paintings that will hang from the Met’s iconic entryway, the Great Hall. The texts consisted of sayings from poets born thousands of years ago, delivering messages about values like pragmatism and morality. But in the hands of a master calligrapher like Tong, the Chinese characters are also imbued with nuance — no two characters are ever the same — and moxie, in her supersized work. “Here in Taiwan, the immense freedom has allowed me to focus singlemindedly on developing my art,” she said.

今年秋天早些时候，81岁的董阳孜在她台北公寓的地板上展开一卷卷纸，家具已经推到了墙边，她将一支大得可笑的毛笔浸入装着柔滑墨汁的碗里。她正在为将悬挂在大都会艺术博物馆标志性入口大厅的两幅作品打稿。这些诗句都出自千百年前的诗人之手，传达了关于实用主义和道德等价值观的信息。但在董阳孜这样的书法大师手中，汉字也充满了微妙的不同——没有两个字是一样的——在她的巨幅作品中也是如此。“在台湾，无限的自由让我可以一心一意去钻研我的艺术，”她说。

董阳孜在台北的工作室展示她为大型书法作品绘制的草图，摄于9月。她在网上找到了超大号的毛笔。

And then, she dances. Heaving the giant brush across the 280-square-foot picture plane with shocking speed, Tong drew the Chinese characters that she has studied her entire lifetime. She was building on the lineage of old masters like Yan Zhenqing, an eighth-century calligrapher, military general and governor of the Tang Dynasty, attempting to revive a dying practice by making it contemporary, political and distinctly Taiwanese.

然后，她开始舞动起来。在26平方米的纸张上，她以惊人的速度挥动着巨大的毛笔，写下她一生都在研究的汉字。她师法八世纪的书法家、唐朝武将和地方官颜真卿这样的大师，试图借助现代性、政治性和鲜明的台湾特色的融入，来复兴这一行将消亡的艺术。

“I owe my artistic career to Taiwan,” Tong said, speaking through a translator.

“我把我的艺术生涯归功于台湾，”董阳孜通过翻译说道。

Considered one of her country’s most important artists, Tong was born in 1942 in Shanghai, on the mainland. She and her brother and parents moved to Taiwan (then called Formosa) in 1952, several years after Mao Zedong established the People’s Republic of China, forcing Chiang Kai-shek and his anti-Communist followers in government to leave for Taiwan. Three of Tong’s sisters stayed behind with an aunt, which led to decades of separation because of Taiwan’s volatile relationship with China. With an American friend’s help, they were able to arrange for her siblings to travel to Hong Kong to reunite briefly with the rest of the family after President Richard Nixon’s visit to China in 1972.

董阳孜是台湾最重要的书法家之一，1942年出生在中国大陆的上海。1952年，她随父母和弟弟移居台湾（当时称福尔摩沙），几年前，毛泽东建立了中华人民共和国，迫使蒋介石及其反共追随者前往台湾。董阳孜的三位姐妹与一位姑姑留在大陆，两岸的动荡关系导致了她们长达数十年的分离。1972年尼克松总统访问中国后，在一位美国朋友的帮助下，他们得以安排一家人在香港短暂团聚。

Tong pursued calligraphy to pass the time, gravitating toward the bold linework of Yan instead of the examples of softer styles usually recommended to young girls of her time. Her father required her to practice writing 100 large characters and 200 small characters every day, starting in fourth grade.

董阳孜小时候以练书法消磨时间，她的习字更接近遒劲有力的颜体，而不是那个时代的年轻女孩通常被推荐学习的柔美字体。她的父亲要求她从小学四年级起每天练习写100个大字和200个小字。

It was the kind of artistic education that Tong said had largely vanished from mainland Chinese schools because of politics, with calligraphy practices left to the rarefied pursuit of artists and scholars (though in recent years, China has put a new emphasis on calligraphy in an attempt to reassert “traditional” Chinese culture). Taiwan continued to use the traditional characters, rather than the simplified characters the mainland uses, and taught calligraphy in its public schools for many decades, but the practice of calligraphy has been fading.

董阳孜说，出于政治原因，这种艺术教育在中国大陆的学校曾经基本消失，练习书法仅限于艺术家和学者的高雅追求（虽然在近年，中国重新重视书法，试图恢复传统文化的地位）。台湾一直使用的是繁体字，而不是大陆使用的简体字，而且数十年来，公立学校一直教授书法——虽然也已逐渐式微。

And globally, the number of people familiar with calligraphy is vanishing. Tong observed that most young Chinese speakers use electronic devices to automatically generate characters through transcription or by using English phonetics to prompt the characters.

在全球范围内，熟悉书法的人越来越少。董阳孜注意到，大多数说中文的年轻人都是在电子设备上透过注音符号或英文字母写字。

“I think nowadays people have gotten lazier,” said the artist, who spends the majority of her waking hours at work.

“我认为现代人变懒了，”这位艺术家说道，除了睡觉，她的大部分时间都花在了工作上。

Calligraphy is an instinctive practice for Tong. She develops her “word paintings” from small reference drawings that anticipate where every drop of ink will land on the scrolls. But she often compares herself to a jazz musician whose music is constantly changing. No two brushstrokes are alike, infusing her practice with a sense of spontaneity.

对于董阳孜来说，书法是一种本能之道。她发展出的“字画”从小幅的速写参照入手，明确了每一滴墨水将落在卷轴上的位置。但她经常把自己比作爵士乐人，音乐不断变化。没有两笔是相同的，这为她的作品注入了一种即兴成分。

“Everything happens in your mind,” the artist explained. “You just express it.”

“所有的一切都发生在你的脑海中，”这位艺术家解释道。“你只是将它表达出来。”

Given the size of her artworks — one of the biggest is a hand scroll measuring 6 feet by 170 feet — and the limited space in her apartment studio, everything must happen in rotation. The artist shifts around different portions of her scrolls as she works, unable to see the result until weeks later, when she rents a local warehouse to unroll several artworks at once. Sometimes, when she doesn’t like what she sees, she discards the calligraphy, adding to her collection of 17 boxes of the paper boulders, and starting again.

考虑到她的作品篇幅——其中最大的一件达到180×5200厘米——以及她公寓工作室的空间有限，一切都必须依次进行。创作的时候，卷轴的不同部分依次打开，几周过后才会看到最后的结果。有时候，她不喜欢最后的成品，就会将其作废，放进17个纸箱中，然后从头开始创作。

“She wrote more than 40 drafts for the Great Hall commission,” said Lesley Ma, the Met’s associate curator of Asian Art in the department of Modern and Contemporary Art, who selected Tong for the project. “And she is always anxious because maybe she wrote something in September, but is not able to see it until October. She looks for what is right and what is wrong.”

“她为大都会大厅的委约写了40多稿，”大都会艺术博物馆的现当代艺术部亚洲艺术副策展人马唯中说。“她总是很焦虑，可能是因为她9月份写的东西要到10月份才能看到最后的成品。她在寻找什么是对的，什么是错的。”

That level of uncertainty — bringing the possibility of failure — is what worried Tong’s father when his daughter announced her intention to become a calligrapher and to study Western art by traveling to the United States in the late 1960s. At the time, calligraphy was made mostly for gifts and favors, not as salable artworks. But Tong continued on her path, arriving at the Brooklyn Museum Art School in 1967 and graduating with an M.F.A. in painting from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 1970. In the United States, she was inspired to start painting at a monumental scale after she saw works by artists like Matisse, whose “Dance (1) ” she admired for its energy and purity. She also felt a sense of competition looking at the gestural paintings of Abstract Expressionists like Willem de Kooning and Franz Kline, in which she saw the linework of calligraphy.

这种不确定性——存在失败的可能性——正是董阳孜的父亲在她宣布打算成为一名书法家、并于上世纪60年代末前往美国学习西方艺术时所担忧的。当时，书法主要用于赠礼和人情，而不是可以销售的艺术品。然而，董阳孜坚持走这条路，1967年来到布鲁克林博物馆艺术学校，并于1970年在马萨诸塞大学阿默斯特分校获得绘画硕士学位。在美国，她受到启发，开始创作大尺幅的绘画作品，尤其是在看到马蒂斯的作品《舞蹈（1）》后，作品传达出的能量和纯粹让她仰慕。她在观看威廉·德库宁和弗朗茨·克莱因等抽象表现主义者的动势绘画时，也感受到了一种竞争感，因为她在其中看到了书法的线条。

“I will show you,” she remembers thinking.

“我会让你们涨涨见识，”她记得当时自己这么想。

董阳孜在台北市立美术馆回顾展上的作品目录。这是她2011年的书法作品《鸢飞戾天，鱼跃于渊》。

Tong returned to Taiwan and subsidized her artistic practice with commissions, designing the visual signage at train stations and bookshops, for dance troupes and jazz musicians, and even adding Chinese characters to a Chanel anniversary ad campaign. Her work hangs in Taipei’s Songshan Airport and the city’s National Concert Hall, a sprawling arts complex.

董阳孜回到台湾，通过接受委约来支持自己的艺术创作，她设计火车站和书店的视觉标识，为舞蹈团体和爵士乐手创作，甚至为香奈儿的周年庆广告加入汉字。她的作品悬挂在台北的松山机场和国家音乐厅——一座庞大的艺术综合体。

In 2013, Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs invited her to create the country’s passport stamp, an honor that she humorously downplayed as easy work.

2013年，台湾外交部邀请她设计台湾的护照印章，面对这一殊荣，她幽默地说，这是一项很容易的工作。

“The characters were very regular,” she shrugged. “Not many people in Taiwan know that my calligraphy is on the passport stamp. I didn’t even discuss it with my brother. It is only when I go through customs that the immigration officers see my name and know it was me.”

“这些字非常规整，”她耸耸肩。“在台湾，没有多少人知道护照印章上是我的书法。我甚至都没和我的兄弟说过。只有当过海关时，移民官员看到我的名字才知道是我。”

董阳孜在翻看颜真卿灯中国著名书法家的作品，她经常在他们的作品中寻找灵感。

Thanks to those commissions, Tong became world famous without a presence in the art market.

由于这些委托，董阳孜虽然没有在艺术市场上出现，但却闻名世界。

Tong is hoping to recapture that boldness with the commission at the Met Museum. She has been thinking about her American audience, which probably has little exposure to calligraphy, and of her Chinese audience — which accounts for nearly four percent of the museum’s international visitors. (Before the pandemic, almost 10 percent of those visitors were Chinese.)

董阳孜希望在大都会博物馆委托作品中重新找回这种肆意。她一直在考虑她的美国受众，他们可能很少接触书法，还有她的中国受众，他们占博物馆国际游客的近4%。（疫情爆发前，近10%的游客是中国人。）

From nine different texts, the artist ultimately chose two for the Great Hall. One was inspired by the Book of Songs written nearly 3,000 years ago: “Stones from other mountains can refine our jade.” According to Ma, the phrase was traditionally interpreted to mean that talents from another country can be useful to one’s own. Modern interpretations have shifted to reflect on how accepting differences can help us improve.

她从九幅不同的字中最终选择了两幅作为大厅展品。其中一幅来自近3000年前的《诗经》：“他山之石，可以攻玉。”据马唯中说，这句话传统上被解释为来自另一个国家的人才可以对自己有用。现代的解释已经转向反思接受差异如何能帮助我们进步。

The other adage was written by the poet-scholar Su Shi in 1100 about his creative process: “Go where it is right, stop when one must” — a saying that reminds the reader to have self-awareness and practice moral restraint.

另一句格言是诗人学者苏轼在1100年所写，是关于创作过程的：“行于其所当行，止于其不得不止”——这句话提醒观者要有自知之明，要有道德约束。

董阳孜的大型书法作品的参考草稿。下方为正在创作中的作品。

For Tong, who has memorized hundreds of sayings, the phrases hold personal meaning. But she said she selected these texts to help people find their places in the world, expressing a desire to reach tourists from mainland China.

对于熟记数百句这样的话语的董阳孜来说，它们具有个人意义。但她说，她选择这些文字是为了帮助人们找到自己在世界上的位置，并表达了吸引中国大陆游客的愿望。

“I chose these words for the people who will read the works,” the artist said, adding that these visitors “will think about what the meaning is because they haven’t seen these words in a long time.” And now that they have started to read, she added, “they can reflect upon how to be a man, how to be a citizen, how to be free.”

“我选择这些文字是给那些会阅读这些作品的人，”艺术家说，她还说，这些观者“会思考文字的含义，因为他们很长时间没有看到这些文字了。”她还说，既然他们已经开始阅读，“他们就可以反思如何做一个人，如何做一个公民，如何获得自由。”