2024年3月14日
In a capital where Republicans and Democrats agree on virtually nothing, it was notable when the House overwhelmingly declared on Wednesday that TikTok poses such a grave risk to national security that it must be forced to sell its U.S. operations to a non-Chinese owner.
在共和党和民主党几乎没有任何共识的首都,周三,众议院以引人瞩目的压倒性多数宣布TikTok对国家安全构成了极为严重的威胁,必须强制它将美国业务出售给一个非中国所有者。
But that glosses over the deeper TikTok security problem, which the legislation does not fully address. In the four years this battle has gone on, it has become clear that the security threat posed by TikTok has far less to do with who owns it than it does with who writes the code and algorithms that make TikTok tick.
但这掩盖了TikTok更深层次的安全问题,该立法并没有完全解决这个问题。在这场持续四年的争斗中,可以清楚地看出,TikTok所构成的安全威胁与TikTok的所有权的关系并不大,而是与由谁来编写让TikTok发挥作用的代码和算法更为相关。
Those algorithms, which guide how TikTok watches its users and feeds them more of what they want, are the magic sauce of an app that 170 million Americans now have on their phones. That’s half the country.
这些算法指导TikTok如何观察用户,并向他们提供更多他们想要的内容,堪称这款应用的法宝。目前1.7亿美国人在手机上安装了这款应用,相当于半个美国。
But TikTok doesn’t own those algorithms; they are developed by engineers who work for its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, which assembles the code in great secrecy in its software labs. But China has issued regulations that appear designed to require government review before any of ByteDance’s algorithms could be licensed to outsiders. Few expect those licenses to be issued — meaning that selling TikTok to an American owner without the underlying code might be like selling a Ferrari without its famed engine.
但TikTok并不拥有这些算法;它们是由为其中国母公司字节跳动工作的工程师开发的,该公司在软件实验室中集成代码,并对其高度保密。但中国出台了一些规定,似乎是为了要求字节跳动在将任何算法授权给外人之前必须送交政府审查。几乎没有人认为政府会颁发相关许可——这意味着,如果把没有底层代码的TikTok卖给美国人,可能就像卖出一辆法拉利,却不附带这个品牌著名的引擎。
The bill would require a new, Western-owned TikTok to be cut off from any “operational relationship” with ByteDance, “including any cooperation with respect to the operation of a content recommendation algorithm.” So the new, American-based company would have to develop its own, made-in-America algorithm. Maybe that would work, or maybe it would flop. But a version of TikTok without its classic algorithm might quickly become useless to users and worthless to investors.
该法案将要求切断这个新的、由西方所有的TikTok切断与字节跳动的任何“运营关系”,“包括在内容推荐算法操作方面的任何合作”。因此,这家总部位于美国的新公司将不得不开发自己的美国本土算法。也许会成功,也许会失败。但是,一个没有经典算法的TikTok版本可能很快就会变得对用户毫无用处,对投资者毫无价值。
And right now, China has no incentive to relent.
而现在,中国没有放手的理由。
The House vote “was a nice symbolic gesture,” James A. Lewis, who leads the cyber research program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said on Wednesday. “But the Chinese get a vote, too.”
众议院的投票“是一个很好的象征性姿态”,战略与国际研究中心网络研究项目负责人詹姆斯·刘易斯周三表示。“但中国人也有一票。”
It is all part of a broader standoff between the world’s two most powerful technology superpowers. The sparring plays out every day, including in President Biden’s refusal to sell China the most advanced computer chips and in China’s objections to a forced sale of one of the most successful consumer apps in history. A spokesman for China’s foreign ministry said on Wednesday that Washington was “resorting to hegemonic moves when one could not succeed in fair competition.”
这是世界上最强大的两个科技超级大国之间更广泛的对峙的一部分。这种纷争每天都在上演,包括拜登总统拒绝向中国出售最先进的电脑芯片,以及中国反对强制出售历史上最成功的消费应用程序之一。中国外交部发言人周三表示,华盛顿“不能在公平竞争中取胜,就采取霸凌行径”。
It is a remarkable problem, one not envisioned when TikTok first released its app in 2016. At that time, Washington was focused on other problems from Beijing. It accused China’s intelligence agencies of cleaning out the Office of Personnel Management, stealing the security clearance files of more than 22 million American government officials and contractors. It was still smarting from the cyber-enabled theft of American chip designs, jet engine technology and the F-35 fighter.
这是一个令人瞩目的问题,是TikTok在2016年首次发布应用程序时人们不曾想到的。当时,华盛顿关注的是来自北京的其他问题。它指责中国情报机构洗劫了美国人事管理局,窃取了2200多万美国政府官员和承包商的安全许可文件。美国的芯片设计、喷气发动机技术和F-35战斗机技术遭到网络窃取,也令华盛顿耿耿于怀。
No one was contemplating the possibility that Chinese engineers could design code that seemed to understand the mind-set of American consumers better than Americans did themselves. By the millions, Americans began to put Chinese-designed software, whose innards no one really understood, on their iPhones and Androids, first for dance videos, then for the memes and now for news.
没有人想到,中国工程师设计的代码似乎比美国人自己更了解美国消费者的心思。数以百万计的美国人开始把这款中国设计的软件放在他们的苹果和安卓设备上,软件的内部构造没有人真正了解,人们先是为了看跳舞的视频,然后是各种米姆,现在又用来获取新闻。
It was the first piece of Chinese-designed consumer software to go wildly viral across the United States. No American firm seemed capable of displacing it. And so it wasn’t long before its ubiquity raised worries about whether the Chinese government could use the data TikTok collected to track the habits and tastes of American citizens. Panicked, state governments across the United States started banning the app from state-owned phones. So did the military.
这是第一款由中国设计,在美国大受欢迎的消费类软件。似乎没有一家美国公司有能力取代它。因此,没过多久,这款风靡一时的软件引发了人们的担忧,中国政府是否有可能利用TikTok收集的数据来追踪美国公民的习惯和品味。惊慌失措的美国各州政府开始禁止在工作手机上安装该应用程序。军队也出台了同样的规定。
But officials know they cannot wrest it from ordinary users — which is why the threat of banning TikTok, especially in an election year, is faintly ridiculous. In a fit of remarkable candor, Gina Raimondo, the commerce secretary, told Bloomberg last year that if any democracy thinks it can outright ban the app, “the politician in me thinks you’re going to literally lose every voter under 35, forever.”
但官员们知道,他们无法从普通用户手中夺走它——这就是为什么威胁禁止TikTok显得有些可笑的原因,尤其是在选举年。商务部长吉娜·雷蒙多去年对彭博新闻社坦言,如果一个民主国家认为它可以彻底禁止这款应用,“如果要我从政治人物的角度来说,我会觉得,这将让你永远失去所有35岁以下的选民。”
The House bill passed on Wednesday holds open the threat of such a ban. But that is probably not its real intent. Rather, it seeks to give the United States leverage to force a sale. And for two years now, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, a secretive body that reviews corporate deals that could jeopardize national security, has quietly been trying to work out an arrangement that would avert a true showdown. So far it has failed — one reason that the bill passed.
周三通过的众议院法案为此类禁令的威胁效果打开了方便之门。但这可能并非其真正意图。相反,它寻求让美国获得强迫出售TikTok的筹码。外国在美投资委员会是一个行事隐秘的机构,负责审查可能危及国家安全的企业交易,两年来,它一直在悄悄地试图制定一项能够避免最后对决的安排。到目前为止,它并未成功,这也是通过该法案的原因之一。
In the course of those negotiations, TikTok has proposed to continue U.S. operations — while still fully owned by ByteDance — and have its algorithm inspected and dissected in the United States. It is part of a broader plan TikTok calls Project Texas.
在谈判过程中,TikTok提出继续在美国运营,仍由字节跳动全资拥有,并且让其算法在美国接受检查和分析。这是 TikTok称为“得克萨斯计划”的更广泛方案的一部分。
Under Project Texas, all U.S.-origin user data from TikTok would be stored on domestic servers operated by Oracle, the cloud computing company. To build confidence in the independence of its algorithm, TikTok has also proposed that Oracle and a third party will review its source code to make sure it has not been manipulated.
根据该计划,TikTok所有美国用户的数据将存储在云计算公司甲骨文运营的境内服务器上。为了让大家对其算法的独立性放心,TikTok还提议由甲骨文和第三方审查其源代码,以确保它未遭操纵。
TikTok says much of this plan is already being implemented. But government officials insist that it is hard to know how such inspections would actually work — even for the most experienced experts, reviewing minor changes in code, at high speed, is a complicated proposition. Biden administration officials say it is not like inspecting agricultural goods or counting weapons under an arms treaty. Very subtle changes could alter the news that is delivered, whether it was about a presidential election or Chinese action against Taiwan.
TikTok表示,该计划的大部分已经落实。但政府官员坚持认为很难得知这种检查的实际效果,因为即使对最有经验的专家来说,快速审查代码中的微小变化也是一件复杂的事情。拜登政府的官员表示,这不像检查农产品或在武器条约下清点武器。非常细微的变化可能会改变所传递的消息,无论是关于总统选举还是中国对台湾的行动。
TikTok has tried to enshrine that arrangement into a formal agreement to resolve the government’s national security concerns. But that idea met resistance from senior Biden administration officials, starting with Deputy Attorney General Lisa O. Monaco, who felt it was not tight enough to resolve their concerns.
TikTok试图将这一安排纳入一份正式协议,以解决政府对国家安全的担忧。但这一想法遭到了拜登政府高级官员的抵制,首先是司法部副部长丽莎·摩纳哥,她认为这尚不足以化解他们的担忧。
Instead, the Biden administration and lawmakers have pushed for ByteDance to sell TikTok. Senator Mark Warner, the tech-savvy Virginia Democrat who leads the Senate Intelligence Committee and supports the new bill, said that any sale of the app needed to ensure that the “algorithm doesn’t continue to reside in Beijing or it’s replaced by an algorithm that’s totally independent of the algorithm that is in Beijing.” It also needed to protect the security of TikTok’s data, he said.
而拜登政府和立法者则推动字节跳动出售TikTok。参议院情报委员会主席、精通技术的弗吉尼亚州民主党参议员马克·华纳支持这项新法案,他表示,任何出售这款应用程序的交易都需要确保“算法不会继续驻留在北京,或者被完全独立于北京那套算法的算法所取代”。他还说,需要保护TikTok数据的安全。
But in the House, it was hard to figure out what lawmakers were most concerned about: privacy, the potential for disinformation or just the idea that Chinese-developed code was inside Americans’ (largely Chinese-produced) iPhones. All those worries were often jumbled together.
但在众议院,很难搞清楚立法者最为担心的是什么:隐私、虚假信息的可能性,或者仅仅是担心中国开发的代码存在于美国人手中(主要由中国生产的)iPhone里。所有这些担忧往往混杂在一起。
“Foreign adversaries like the Chinese Communist Party pose the greatest national threat of our time,” said Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the Washington Republican who leads the Energy and Commerce Committee, during the Wednesday House debate over the bill. She called TikTok a “valuable propaganda tool for the C.C.P. to exploit.”
“像中国共产党这样的外国对手构成了我们这个时代最大的国家威胁,”在周三的众议院辩论中,能源和商业委员会主席、华盛顿共和党议员凯西·麦克莫里斯·罗杰斯表示。她称TikTok是“中共可以加以利用的宝贵宣传工具”。
TikTok may not have eased that concern in how it lobbied to defeat the House bill. Ms. McMorris Rodgers noted that TikTok had used an alert in its app to push users to contact Congress and urge a “no” vote. Congressional offices were overwhelmed by the calls, some of which staff members believed came from teenagers. To TikTok’s executives, this was democracy in action. To some in Congress, it proved their point.
TikTok通过游说挫败众议院法案的方式,可能反而加剧了担忧。麦克莫里斯·罗杰斯指出,TikTok在应用程序上发出提醒,敦促用户联系国会投“反对”票。国会办公室的电话被打爆,工作人员认为其中一些是青少年打来的。对TikTok的高管来说,这是民主的行动。对一些国会议员来说,这证明了他们的观点。
“This is just a small taste of how the C.C.P. weaponizes applications it controls to manipulate tens of millions of people to further its agenda,” she said.
“这只是中共将其控制的应用程序武器化,操纵成千上万民众来推进其议程的小试牛刀而已,”她说。
2024年8月30日
Ask President Biden — or just about anyone in the national security firmament of the United States — about America’s most potent geopolitical challenge over the next few decades, and you are bound to get a near-unanimous answer: China.
如果问拜登总统——或者美国国家安全领域的任何一个人——未来几十年美国最大的地缘政治挑战是什么,你一定会得到一个几乎一致的答案:中国。
The argument is familiar. The United States has never before faced a competitor who challenges it on so many fronts. Xi Jinping’s China is America’s only real technological competitor, in everything from artificial intelligence to semiconductors, electric cars to biological sciences. The country has more than doubled the size of its nuclear arsenal in the past few years, and a new partnership it has formed with Russia could upend every assumption about how America defends itself.
给出的理由都差不多。美国从来没有遇到过一个在这么多领域挑战它的竞争对手。从人工智能到半导体,从电动汽车到生物科学,习近平领导的中国是美国唯一真正的技术竞争对手。在过去几年里,中国的核武库规模扩大了一倍多,它与俄罗斯建立的一种新伙伴关系可能会颠覆关于美国如何自卫的所有假设。
Then there’s the economy. If, a few years ago, American economists worried about China’s rapid rise, today they worry about its slowdown, and the overhang of industrial production that is flooding the world with excess goods, with potentially disastrous consequences.
然后是经济。如果说几年前,美国经济学家担心的是中国的快速崛起,那么今天,他们担心的是中国经济的放缓,以及产能过剩的问题——过剩的商品正充斥着世界,这有可能带来灾难性后果。
There’s also the very real risk of war over Taiwan. There’s TikTok. The list goes on.
在台湾问题上也存在着爆发战争的真正风险。还有TikTok。这个清单可以一直列下去。
Yet when the issue comes up on the campaign trail at all, it’s framed chiefly as an economic threat. Thornier discussions of China’s role as a broad strategic competitor, with ambitions that are already forcing the United States to change how it prepares its workers, shapes its investments and restructures its defenses, have fallen largely by the wayside.
然而,当这个议题出现在竞选活动中时,它主要被视为一种经济威胁。中国的野心已经迫使美国改变了培训工人、塑造投资和重组国防的方式,关于中国作为一个广泛战略竞争对手的更为棘手的讨论,基本上被放在了一边。
China has fallen victim to what I call Situation Room-Campaign Trail disequilibrium. It works something like this: If there is a topic that is fixating Washington policymakers, it’s usually a good bet no one is talking about it, except in platitudes, on the campaign trail.
中国陷入了我所说的“战情室-竞选活动”失衡。它的原理是这样的:如果有一个议题困扰着华盛顿的政策制定者,那么通常可以肯定的是,除了竞选活动中一些老生常谈的说法,没有人会谈论它。
This week was a prime example. While the campaign roared along, President Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, was in Beijing, meeting with President Xi on a range of urgent issues, including China’s support of Russia’s war in Ukraine.
本周就是一个典型的例子。在竞选活动如火如荼地进行时,拜登总统的国家安全顾问杰克·沙利文到北京与习近平主席就一系列紧急问题举行会谈,包括中国支持俄罗斯在乌克兰的战争。
Chips, human rights and climate
芯片、人权和气候议题
You might think that China would be the exception to the Situation Room rule. It touches everything, from how we shop at Walmart to the warming of the earth. Progressives could be expected to concern themselves both with its human rights record and its status as the world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases.
你可能认为中国会是战情室规则的例外。中国的问题涉及方方面面,从我们在沃尔玛的购物方式到地球变暖。进步人士估计同时会关注这个国家的人权记录,以及作为世界最大温室气体排放国的身份。
Some conservatives arguing for bigger defense budgets pay close attention to the growth of China’s navy, and its 2021 tests of hypersonic missiles that took the Pentagon by surprise. They make a case for letting Europe worry about the war in Ukraine, so the United States can focus on China.
一些主张增加国防预算的保守派人士密切关注中国海军的发展,还有2021年令五角大楼大吃一惊的那次高超音速导弹试验。他们主张把乌克兰战争留给欧洲去操心,这样美国就可以集中精力对付中国。
But China has yet to emerge as the subject of sustained — and substantive — debate in the presidential campaign.
但在总统竞选中,中国并不是一个贯穿始终并得到充分讨论的话题。
It’s easy to dismiss this by saying that foreign policy rarely gets a serious airing in presidential elections, unless Americans are actively deployed in a conflict abroad. But it’s emerged as a key theme in multiple elections.
大家很容易对这个议题不以为然,觉得总统选举很少会认真讨论外交政策,除非美国人正在积极地参与海外冲突。然而,在以往的多次选举中,外交政策已经成为了一个重大主题。
In 2016, Trump turned “America First” into his rallying cry, echoing a term used by an isolationist, stay-out-of-war political pressure group in the 1940 election. (When my colleague Maggie Haberman and I first asked Trump about the phrase in an interview in early 2016, he said he hadn’t heard of it; days later, he was using it.)
2016年,特朗普将“美国优先”变成了他的战斗口号,呼应了1940年的总统选举期间,一个信奉孤立主义、主张不参战的政治压力团体所使用的一个术语。(我和同事玛吉·哈伯曼在2016年初的一次采访中第一次问起特朗普这个说法时,他表示自己没听说过;几天后他就开始用上了。)
The Kennedy-Nixon debates in 1960 were dominated by the questions of nuclear strategy and how to curb the influence of the Soviet Union. And Barack Obama’s election in 2008 was propelled by the human and strategic disaster of the Iraq War.
1960年,肯尼迪与尼克松的辩论主要围绕核战略以及如何遏制苏联的影响等问题来展开。2008年奥巴马的当选是由伊拉克战争的人道和战略灾难所推动的。
Falling back on easy talking points
退回到简单的谈话要点
1960年,肯尼迪与尼克松的辩论主要围绕核战略以及如何遏制苏联的影响等问题来展开
Vice President Kamala Harris mentioned China just once when she accepted the Democratic presidential nomination last week, saying she wanted to ensure “that America, not China, wins the competition for the 21st century and that we strengthen, not abdicate, our global leadership.” She then moved on to Russia.
上周,副总统贺锦丽在接受民主党总统候选人提名的演讲中,只提到了中国一次,她说,她想确保“赢得21世纪竞争的是美国,而不是中国,我们要加强而非放弃我们的全球领导地位”。然后,她就把话题转向了俄罗斯。
For his part, Trump no longer talks at his rallies about the great trade deals he thinks he is going to strike with Xi, as he often did while in office. Instead, he blames Beijing for the coronavirus pandemic and then promises to impose steep tariffs on Chinese goods.
至于特朗普,他在竞选造势集会上不再谈论他认为自己将与习近平达成的重大贸易协议,在任时,他经常把这件事挂在嘴边。相反,他将新冠大流行归咎于北京,并承诺对中国商品征收高额关税。
Harris has criticized those ideas as a “national sales tax” that would cost middle-class consumers billions and fuel inflation. But the Biden administration has not only kept Trump-era tariffs in place, it has also proposed new ones, including a 100 percent tax on Chinese-made electric vehicles. So far, the Harris campaign hasn’t said what kind of tariffs she would support.
贺锦丽批评这些想法是一种“国家销售税”,将使中产阶级消费者付出数十亿美元的代价,并加剧通货膨胀。但拜登政府不仅保留了特朗普时代的关税,还提出了新的关税,包括对中国制造的电动汽车征收100%的税。到目前为止,贺锦丽的竞选团队尚未就她的关税立场表态。
The argument about tariffs is a critical economic one. But the strategic questions of dealing with China go far beyond what you can order — or how much you pay — when you shop online.
关于关税的争论是一个关键的经济问题。但是,与中国打交道的战略问题远非你在网上购物时可以订购什么——或者付多少钱——那么简单。
Nukes, satellites and dominance
核武器、卫星和主导地位
Almost as soon as the next president is sworn in, questions about countering China’s military buildup — in space and cyberspace, on the seas and in the nuclear missile silos that have suddenly appeared in the Chinese desert — will sweep through those Situation Room meetings.
新总统甫一宣誓就职,关于如何应对中国的军备——在太空和网络空间、在海洋,以及中国的沙漠中突然出现的核导弹发射井——几乎第一时间就会席卷战情室的会议。
First and foremost will be the implications of the new relationship between Beijing and Moscow. Just before he exited the presidential race, Biden acknowledged for the first time, in response to my question at a news conference, that the administration had adopted a strategy of trying to interrupt the partnership of its two biggest adversaries, much as Nixon and Kissinger attempted 50 years ago. Harris has been around for internal debates about that strategy, but we know little about her thinking on the subject.
首当其冲的是北京和莫斯科之间建立新关系所带来的影响。就在拜登退出总统竞选之前,他在一次新闻发布会上回答我的提问时首次承认,政府采取了一种策略,试图打断两个最大对手的伙伴关系,就像尼克松和基辛格50年前尝试做的那样。贺锦丽一直有参与该战略的内部讨论,但我们对她在这一问题上的想法知之甚少。
Quietly, Mr. Biden also changed the guidance on nuclear strategy, to focus more on a Chinese arsenal that the Pentagon thinks is headed to 1,500 weapons. That sounds like an invitation for rekindling Cold War-era debates.
拜登还悄悄地改变了美国的核战略指导方针,将更多的注意力放在中国的核武库上,五角大楼认为中国的核武数量将达到1500件。这听起来像是在试图重新点燃冷战时期的辩论。
The one subject no candidate wants to touch, of course, is TikTok. Trump threatened to ban it in the last year of his presidency; he has now flipped his position. Harris hasn’t said yet whether she thinks the Chinese-owned app, which her campaign is using furiously to attract younger voters, is a blessing or a national security threat.
当然,所有候选人都不愿触碰的话题是TikTok。特朗普在他总统任期的最后一年威胁要禁止该应用;现在他已经改变立场。而这款由中国拥有的应用程序究竟是好东西还是国家安全威胁,贺锦丽也没有表态。与此同时,她的竞选团队正在积极利用TikTok吸引年轻选民。
But Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo had it about right when she was asked last year whether the Biden administration was ready to ban it in an effort to keep Chinese influences off American phones.
但去年,当商务部长吉娜·雷蒙多被问及拜登政府是否准备禁止TikTok,以阻止中国的影响力进入美国人的手机时,她的看法无疑是正确的。
“The politician in me,” she said drolly, “thinks you’re going to literally lose every voter under 35, forever.”
“要我从政治人物的角度来说,”她打趣道,“我会觉得,这将让你永远失去所有35岁以下的选民。”
2024年8月30日
Given the sudden possibility of electing a female president, there’s been a lot of talk about masculinity of late. It’s true that Democrats have been showcasing genial, outspoken guys who support women’s rights and accomplishments. But beyond the typical male-feminist talking points, there is another, subtler aspect of the new masculinity, which has yet to be acknowledged: husbandliness.
鉴于突然有可能选出一位女总统,最近有很多关于男性气质的讨论。诚然,民主党人一直在展示支持女性权利和成就的和蔼可亲、直言不讳的男性形象。但除了有关男性女权主义者的那些典型话题,新男性气质还有另一个更微妙的层面尚未得到认可:人夫气质。
For four days last week, men at the Democratic National Convention openly showed emotion and admired their wives — even at their own expense. Doug Emhoff made gentle fun of his early romantic foibles while courting his future wife, Vice President Kamala Harris (the phone call!). Former President Barack Obama acknowledged the difficulty of having to give a speech after his wife, Michelle.
在上周为期四天的民主党全国代表大会上,男人们公开表达了对妻子的情感和钦佩,甚至不惜牺牲自己。道格·艾默霍夫轻松地取笑了自己早年在追求未来妻子、副总统贺锦丽时的浪漫糗事(那通电话!)。前总统贝拉克·奥巴马承认,在妻子米歇尔之后发表演讲很不容易。
Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, Ms. Harris’s running mate, spoke not just about “reproductive rights,” but about his personal pain in dealing with infertility and the joy of finally having his children — choking up when recounting naming his daughter, Hope. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg talked not just about marriage equality, but about air-frying mac and cheese for his 3-year-old twins, and trying to get them to wash their hands.
贺锦丽的竞选搭档、明尼苏达州州长蒂姆·沃尔兹不仅谈到了“生育权”,还谈到了他个人在面对不孕不育时的痛苦和终于有了孩子的喜悦——在讲述给女儿取名“Hope”(希望)时,他哽咽了。交通部长皮特·巴蒂吉格不仅谈到了婚姻平等,还谈到了他用空气炸锅给三岁的双胞胎做奶酪通心粉,以及想方设法让他们去洗手的故事。
The men of the D.N.C. were shining a light on something almost never discussed in politics: the private, household role of the husband as a person intimately involved in the domestic, physical, sometimes even gynecological details of a marriage.
这场大会上的男人们正在揭示政治中几乎从未讨论过的问题:作为深入参与一场婚姻的人——包括家居的、身体的甚至是妇科上的方方面面细节,一个丈夫在私人的、家庭的层面所扮演的角色。
前总统贝拉克·奥巴马在民主党全国大会第二晚开玩笑说,他“感觉已经准备好了——即使我是唯一一个愚蠢到在米歇尔·奥巴马之后发言的人”。
Josh Zurawski and Derick Cook took the stage with their wives to discuss the nearly fatal medical crises they had endured as a result of abortion bans. As Anya Cook described her husband’s attempts to save her life during her miscarriage, Mr. Cook silently held their infant daughter in his arms.
乔希·祖拉夫斯基和德里克·库克与他们的妻子一起上台,讨论他们因堕胎禁令而经历的几乎致命的医疗危机。当安雅·库克描述她的丈夫在她流产时为挽救她的生命所做的努力时,库克默默地将他们襁褓中的女儿抱在怀里。
This is new. We’ve heard men endorse female candidates or talk about “kitchen table” issues. But we’ve never heard men wade this deeply into the intimate details of coupledom.
这是新鲜事。我们听过男性支持女性候选人或谈论厨房桌边的那些家长里短。但我们从未听过男人如此深入地谈论夫妻间的私密细节。
Often in politics it’s the women playing the supporting roles — praising their husbands’ brilliance, holding the babies in the background, talking about parenthood or childbirth, meal prep, or courtship days. Domestic attachments tend to be defining identities for women, mere social adornments for men.
在政治中,通常是女性扮演配角——赞美丈夫的才华,抱着孩子站在他身后,谈论育儿或分娩、备餐或当初相恋的日子。家庭依恋往往是女性的决定性身份,而对男性来说只是社会性装饰品。
But at the Democratic convention, a quality best described as husbandliness became a virtue to highlight — and something important happens when men publicly embrace husbandliness: Women can be seen as something other than “wifely.”
但在民主党全国大会上,一种最能体现丈夫风范的品质成了值得强调的美德——当男人公开接受“人夫气质”时,重要的事情发生了:女人可以被视为“妻子”以外的东西。
民主党全国大会发言人乔希·祖拉夫斯基描述了他对失去妻子阿曼达的恐惧,当时她在医院里与死神搏斗,等待合法终止无法存活的妊娠。
When men — straight or gay — embrace their roles in the private, domestic world, it frees women to embrace their roles in the public world, their status as authorities. By being husbandly, men at the D.N.C. lifted the yoke of wifeliness from Ms. Harris’s shoulders, helping her project the image of a strong leader at the head of the Democratic ticket.
当男人——无论是异性恋还是同性恋——接受了他们在私人的、家庭的世界里扮演的角色,这就解放了女人,让她们可以接受她们在公共世界里扮演的角色,接受她们作为权威的地位。民主党全国委员会的男人们以丈夫的姿态解除了贺锦丽肩上的妻子枷锁,帮助她树立民主党候选人强有力的领袖形象。
The debut of the new husbandliness came just one day after the death of the television pioneer Phil Donahue, a founding father of enlightened, tender masculinity and, arguably, the originator of pop-culture husbandliness.
在这种新“人夫气质”的首次亮相前一天,电视先驱菲尔·多纳休刚刚去世。多纳休是开明、温柔男性气质的开创者,可以说是流行文化中“人夫气质”的鼻祖。
Mr. Donahue was among the first publicly feminist male celebrities: a man who seemed strong and confident while demonstrating empathy, respect and genuine interest in women. When he married the actress and second-wave feminist Marlo Thomas, in 1980, they embodied a new kind of egalitarian couple.
多纳休是第一批公开倡导女权主义的男性名人之一:他看起来坚强而自信,同时表现出对女性的同情、尊重和真正的兴趣。1980年,他与女演员、第二波女权主义者马洛·托马斯结婚,他们代表着一种新型的平等主义夫妻关系。
For a long stretch in the 1970s and ’80s, Mr. Donahue’s program was the most watched daytime talk show on television, reaching nine million mostly female viewers an episode. He chose many of the show’s topics to appeal specifically to this audience, covering issues such as lesbian motherhood, vasectomies and childbirth.
在20世纪70年代和80年代的很长一段时间里,多纳休的节目是收视率最高的日间脱口秀,每集观众达到900万,其中大部分是女性。他选择的许多节目主题都特别吸引这些观众,包括女同性恋母亲、输精管结扎术和分娩等等。
与约翰尼·卡森拿自己的离婚开玩笑、爱挖苦人的大卫·莱特曼或热衷于风流事的杰里·斯普林格等其他电视节目主持人不同,菲尔·多纳休(上方,摄于1979年)在许多女性观众心目中扮演了代理丈夫的角色。
It was easy to imagine Mr. Donahue at home with his wife, sharing chores, talking about feelings. No subsequent male talk show host ever managed to embody this kind of husbandliness again. Mr. Donahue was also known for listening to women, becoming the first daytime host to share his microphone with his largely female studio audience, allowing them to ask questions on air. “He’s every wife’s replacement for the husband who doesn’t talk to her,” the humorist Erma Bombeck is said to have quipped.
很容易想象多纳休和妻子在家里分担家务,谈论感情的情景。此后,再也没有一位男性脱口秀主持人能够成功地体现出这种气质。多纳休还以倾听女性的声音而闻名,他是第一个与以女性为主的观众群分享麦克风的日间节目主持人,他允许她们在直播中提问。“在每一个丈夫不和她们说话的妻子心目中,他充当了替代品,”据说幽默作家埃尔玛·邦贝克曾经这样打趣。
The key word there was “husband.”
这里的重点是“丈夫”。
Was the blueprint for a so-called new masculinity there the whole time?
所谓的新男子气概的蓝图,难道一直就在我们手上?
2024年8月30日
The two veterans of Hong Kong’s long boisterous news media scene didn’t shy away from publishing pro-democracy voices on their Stand News site, even as China cranked up its national security clampdown to silence critics in the city.
尽管中国加大了国家安全方面的打击力度以压制香港的批评人士,但在一向沸沸扬扬的香港新闻媒体圈,两位资深人士依然没有回避在他们的“立场新闻”网站上发表支持民主的声音。
Then the police came knocking and, more than two and a half years later, a judge Thursday convicted the two journalists — the former editor in chief of Stand News, Chung Pui-kuen, and his successor, Patrick Lam — of conspiring to publish seditious materials on the now-defunct liberal news outlet. Both face potential prison sentences.
于是警察上门了,两年半后,一名法官于周四裁定这两名记者——前立场新闻总编辑钟沛权和他的继任者林绍桐——在这家现已停刊的自由派新闻媒体上串谋发布煽动性文章罪名成立。两人都可能面临牢狱之灾。
The landmark ruling highlighted how far press freedom has shrunk in the city, where local news outlets already self censor to survive and some foreign news organizations have left or moved out staff amid increasing scrutiny from the authorities.
这一具有里程碑意义的裁决凸显出香港的新闻自由已经严重萎缩。当地新闻机构为了生存已经开始自我审查,一些外国新闻机构在当局日益严格的审查下已经撤离或迁走了员工。
During the trial, prosecutors characterized news articles and opinion pieces published by the two as biased against the government and a threat to national security. The articles were similar to those Stand News had been publishing for years. But after the authorities crushed protests that rocked the city in 2019, China imposed a national security law, and tolerance for dissent in the city’s freewheeling media began to evaporate.
在审判期间,检察官将两人发表的新闻文章和评论文章定性为对政府持有偏见和对国家安全构成威胁。这些文章与“立场新闻”多年来发表的文章类似。但在当局镇压了2019年震撼香港的抗议活动后,中国实施了一项国家安全法,对香港自由媒体持异见者的容忍开始消失。
The two editors have maintained their innocence. Mr. Chung said in his court testimony that they were operating within journalistic principles, to deliver stories with news value and of public interest.
两位主编坚称自己是无辜的。钟沛权在法庭证词中说,他们是在新闻原则的范围内行事,提供具有新闻价值、符合公众利益的报道。
“We didn’t have a hidden agenda, or any other goals that you couldn’t see,” he said in his testimony at the trial last year. “We saw very important events with a lot of public interest; we only wanted to document them.”
“我们没有一个隐藏议程,我们没有其他你见不到的目的、议程在背后。我们只是纯粹见到好重要、有公众利益的事件,我们想记录,”他在去年的庭审证词中说。
Former colleagues of Mr. Chung described him as a fearless leader and a fair-minded journalist who encouraged employees to seek out pro-Beijing politicians for interviews or opinion articles, even though those requests were regularly declined.
钟沛权的前同事形容他是一位无畏的领导者,也是一位公正的记者,他鼓励员工寻找亲北京的政界人士进行采访或发表观点文章,尽管这些要求经常被拒绝。
“He was steadfast to his ideals,” said Lam Yin-pong, a former editor at the site who now runs a one-man online news agency. “He has the most backbone. His sacrifice is very extreme.”
“他对自己的理想坚定不移,”曾在该网站担任编辑的林彦邦说,他现在独自一人经营着一家在线通讯社。“他最有骨气。他的牺牲精神是极致的。”
The trial is the latest example of the authorities’ campaign against dissent in Hong Kong that has seen scores of activists, opposition politicians and ordinary citizens who posted comments online sent to jail. The campaign has led to an exodus of local and expatriate residents and driven out some foreign companies as the city’s economy struggles to bounce back from the pandemic.
此次审判是当局打击香港异见人士的最新例证。在这场运动中,数十名活动人士、反对派政界人士和在网上发表评论的普通市民被判入狱。这场运动导致当地和外籍居民大批外流,令一些外国公司迁出,与此同时,香港经济正苦于难以从疫情时期的低迷中走出来。
“The verdict could impose an additional chilling effect on the local media industry that has been exercising self censorship heavily since 2020,” said Eric Lai, a Hong Kong law expert at Georgetown Center for Asian Law.
乔治敦亚洲法律中心的香港法律专家黎恩灏表示:“这一判决可能会对自2020年以来一直在严格进行自我审查的本地媒体行业产生更多的寒蝉效应。”
In his ruling, the judge in the case, Kwok Wai-kin, wrote that it was necessary to balance freedom of speech “with the prevention of the potential damage wrought by incendiary publications.” Judge Kwok is one of the judges handpicked by Hong Kong’s chief executive to hear national security cases.
该案法官郭伟健在裁决中写道,有必要在言论自由与“防止煽动性出版物造成的潜在损害”之间取得平衡。郭伟健是香港特首亲自挑选的审理国家安全案件的法官之一。
《苹果日报》创始人黎智英自2020年以来一直在狱中服刑。
Hong Kong’s press freedom ranking fell to 135th out of 180 countries and territories, according to an index compiled by the advocacy group Reporters Without Borders. A representative of the organization was denied entry to Hong Kong on a fact-finding mission in April.
根据倡导组织无国界记者组织编制的一项指数,在180个国家和地区中,香港的新闻自由排名降至第135位。今年4月,该组织的一名代表在进行实况调查时被拒绝进入香港。
The media mogul Jimmy Lai, founder of the defunct pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, is on trial on charges of conspiracy and collusion with foreign forces under the national security law.
媒体大亨黎智英是已停刊的民主派报纸《苹果日报》的创办人,根据国家安全法,他被控串谋和勾结外国势力,正在接受审判。
The United States-funded news service Radio Free Asia said in March it had closed its office in Hong Kong after the government enacted a new national security law that targets so-called foreign interference. The Hong Kong Journalists Association was targeted for criticism after it elected a new board this year, with Chinese state media accusing it of having a political agenda.
美国资助的新闻服务机构自由亚洲电台3月称,在政府颁布针对所谓外国干涉的新国家安全法后,该电台已关闭在香港的办事处。香港记者协会今年选举新一届董事会后成为批评的目标,中国官方媒体指责该协会有政治目的。
The two editors, who both spent almost a year in prison after their arrests, had their bail extended pending sentencing expected in late September. Mr. Lam did not attend Thursday’s hearing because of health issues, his lawyer said.
两名编辑被捕后都在监狱里度过了近一年的时间,他们的保释期被延长,等待9月底的宣判。林绍桐的律师说,林绍桐因健康问题没有出席周四的听证会。
The imposition of Hong Kong’s new security law has led to some uncertainty over how existing political cases will be handled. The Stand News journalists were charged in 2021 under a British colonial-era sedition law, which carries a maximum sentence of up to two years in prison.
香港新安全法的实施给如何处理现有的政治案件带来了一些不确定性。立场新闻的记者于2021年根据英国殖民时期的煽动叛乱法被起诉,根据该法,最高可判处两年监禁。
But Hong Kong’s new national security law introduced this year increased the maximum sentence for sedition to seven years — and 10, if an “external force” was involved. It replaced the sedition law.
但香港今年出台的新国家安全法将煽动叛乱罪的最高刑期提高到七年,如果涉及“外部势力”,最高刑期为10年。该法取代了原来的煽动叛乱法。
Legal experts said that in at least one other case related to national security, the courts have applied the harsher new punishments retroactively. It isn’t clear if that will happen when the court sentences the two editors.
法律专家表示,至少在另外一起与国家安全有关的案件中,法院进行了追溯,实施更严厉的新处罚。目前尚不清楚法院对这两名编辑的判决是否会发生这种情况。
Stand News was founded in 2014, and its founding principles included safeguarding democracy, freedom and human rights. It came to greater prominence for its livestreaming of monthslong anti-government protests in 2019, its small but seemingly ubiquitous team nimbly covering the movement and the response by the authorities.
立场新闻成立于2014年,其创始原则包括维护民主、自由和人权。它因直播2019年长达数月的反政府抗议活动而更加出名,其规模虽小但看似无处不在的团队灵活地报道了这场运动以及当局的反应。
Mr. Chung and Mr. Lam were arrested in late December 2021. Hundreds of police officers descended on the newsroom and collected boxes of evidence. Stand News replaced its home page with a notice announcing that it would shut down.
钟沛权和林绍桐于2021年12月底被捕。当时数以百计警察来到新闻编辑室,收集了成箱的证据。立场新闻将其主页换成了一则宣布将关闭的通知。
2021年,数百名警察来到新闻编辑室,从立场新闻的办公室收集了成箱的证据。
During the trial, prosecutors cited 17 articles they said were at the center of a conspiracy between the two editors and the company that owned Stand News to publish seditious materials. Those included an opinion article written by Nathan Law and an interview with Ted Hui, both former lawmakers who now live in self-exile abroad and are wanted by the Hong Kong police.
在审判期间,检察官列举了17篇文章,称这些文章是两名编辑与拥有立场新闻的公司串谋发布煽动性材料的核心内容。这些文章包括罗冠聪撰写的评论文章和对许智峰的采访,这两名前立法者目前都流亡海外,被香港警方通缉。
The trial of the Stand News editors has been plagued by delays: Originally slated to last 20 days, it stretched to more than 50. The verdict was first scheduled to be handed down last October, but it was postponed three times.
对立场新闻编辑的审判一直在拖延:最初计划持续20天,后来延长到50多天。该判决最初定于去年10月做出,但被推迟了三次。
Mr. Chung spent 36 days on the witness stand, with prosecutor Laura Ng, the prosecutor, suggesting to him that Stand News was a platform for hardened critics of Hong Kong and Beijing. Mr. Chung responded that he sought to include voices across the political spectrum because he believed that open discussion was healthy for society.
钟沛权在证人席上待了36天,主控官伍淑娟表示,立场新闻是对香港和北京持强硬批评态度者的平台。钟沛权回应说,他寻求吸纳各种政治派别的声音,因为他认为公开讨论对社会有益。
“To me, freedom of speech is close to a kind of faith,” he said.
“言论自由对我来说是接近一种信仰,”他说。
In one exchange, Mr. Chung was asked if his belief in free speech would include giving a platform to dangerous voices, such as Osama bin Laden in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the U.S.
在一次交锋中,钟沛权被问到,他对言论自由的信仰是否包括为危险的声音提供一个平台,例如在9月11日美国遭受恐怖袭击后为奥萨马·本·拉登提供平台。
The toll of the trial became evident on Mr. Chung when at one point he broke down in tears as he recounted the day his wife, Chan Pui-man, was arrested over her role as an associate publisher of Apple Daily. Mr. Chung had stepped down as the top editor of Stand News in the months before the site closed to focus on handling her affairs while she was in prison.
审判对钟沛权带来的折磨是很明显的,他在回忆妻子陈沛敏因《苹果日报》副发行人的身份被捕的情景时一度泪流满面。钟沛权在立场新闻关闭前几个月辞去了该网站首席编辑的职务,专注于处理她在狱中的事务。
Prosecutors accused him of continuing to give instructions to Mr. Lam afterward, citing group chat messages in which he pointed out typos or story ideas that the newspaper hadn’t yet covered. Mr. Chung said that he was merely offering suggestions, and that work habits were hard to shake.
检方指控他事后继续向林绍桐下达指示,并引用了他在群聊信息中指出的错别字,以及该报尚未报道的选题,钟沛权说他只是在提供建议,而且工作习惯很难改变。
Former co-workers of Mr. Chung recalled in interviews that he was often the first one into the office and last to leave. Sometimes he would jump in and write article drafts himself, make graphics and write captions for photographs, they said. When Stand News struggled financially, he took a reduced salary, they said.
钟沛权的前同事在采访中回忆说,他经常是第一个到办公室,最后一个离开的人。他们说,有时他会亲自撰写文章草稿,制作图片,给照片写说明文字。他们说,当立场新闻陷入财务困境时,他接受了减薪。
Lam Yin-pong, the former colleague, recalled Stand News running a story that was critical of the Democratic Party.
他的前同事林彦邦回忆说,《立场新闻》曾发表过一篇批评香港民主党的文章。
“We didn’t try to serve anyone in particular, or to say what is right,” he said. “To call this a conspiracy is a joke.”
“我们没有特别为任何人服务,也没有说什么是正确的,”他说。“说这是阴谋就是个笑话。”
2024年8月30日
One Saturday evening in late July, more than 100 people attended an elaborate party in the lush garden of a mansion in Silicon Valley. The host was David Wei, a former chief executive of Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce giant, and now a venture capital investor. Guests, most dressed in white, were offered Panama hats as the bright California sun set and models walked a catwalk between large round tables covered with white cloths.
7月下旬的一个周六傍晚,在硅谷一座豪宅郁郁葱葱的花园里,100多人参加了一场盛大派对。做东的是中国电商巨头阿里巴巴的前首席执行官卫哲,他现在是一名风险投资人。大多数客人身穿白衣,派对给他们准备了巴拿马帽,在加州明媚的夕阳下,模特们在铺着白布的大圆桌之间走着猫步。
Many of the guests were current or former investors or entrepreneurs in China’s tech industry. Their conversations, like those at a number of similar gatherings in Silicon Valley this summer, bounced among three topics: how little confidence they have in China; how many opportunities artificial intelligence presents in the United States; and how they can get into the game on this side of the Pacific.
许多来宾都是中国科技行业的现任或前任投资者或企业家。与今夏在硅谷举行的许多类似聚会一样,他们的谈话围绕着三个主题:他们对中国缺乏信心;人工智能在美国带来了多少机会;以及他们如何才能参与到太平洋这边的赛道。
Chinese tech professionals are moving to Silicon Valley for opportunities they don’t believe are available in China anymore. They’re part of a wave of Chinese companies “going global,” as a growing number of businesses look outside their home country for growth.
中国的科技专业人士正前往硅谷寻找他们认为在中国再也找不到的机会。随着越来越多的企业将目光投向国外寻求增长,中国企业正在掀起“出海”浪潮,他们也是其中一部分。
With China’s economy in a lasting slump, investors and entrepreneurs are seeking the next China. They feel unwelcome by their government, which in recent years has sent an ominous message by clamping down on private companies. The heightened tensions between China and the United States make it tough to operate as a Chinese-based business with international ambitions. There are opportunities in Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Africa. But only one other market can compare to China in size and potential. That’s the United States.
随着中国经济持续低迷,投资者和企业家正在寻找下一个中国。近年来,政府打压民营企业,发出了不祥的信号,让他们觉得自己不受政府欢迎。中美之间紧张局势的加剧,使得有国际野心的中国企业在经营上遭遇了很多困难。东南亚、中东和非洲都有机会。但只有一个市场的规模和潜力可以与中国相比。那就是美国。
上个月在北京举行的小米新智能手机发布会。
Most eager to make the jump are the venture capitalists. They used to be able to raise money from funds managed by America’s university endowments, retirement pensions and wealthy individuals, and then invest that money in Chinese start-ups. They helped give rise to China’s tech industry, backing Alibaba, Baidu (internet search), Xiaomi (smartphones) and Didi (ride hailing). When these companies did public stock offerings, the venture capital investors reaped bountiful returns.
最急于采取行动的是风险投资家。过去,他们能够从美国大学捐赠基金、退休养老金和富有的个人管理的基金中筹集资金,然后将这些资金投资于中国的初创企业。他们推动了中国科技产业的崛起,支持了阿里巴巴、百度(互联网搜索)、小米(智能手机)和滴滴(叫车服务)。当这些公司上市时,风险资本投资者获得了丰厚的回报。
This is also the group now in the most awkward position. Neither Beijing nor Washington wants these people to invest in cutting edge technologies such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing and semiconductors. Both governments have made it difficult for the companies they back to list stock for sale in New York, their main way to cash in.
他们也是目前处境最尴尬的群体。北京和华盛顿都不希望这些人投资人工智能、量子计算和半导体等尖端技术。两国政府都令他们支持的公司难以在纽约上市出售股票,而这正是他们的主要变现途径。
“We used to enjoy the best of both worlds,” said a venture capitalist who has worked in both countries for decades. “Now we’re losing on both ends.”
“我们曾经享受两个世界的好处,”一位在两国工作了几十年的风险投资家说。“现在我们落得两头空。”
All of the 14 Chinese venture capitalists and entrepreneurs I talked to are working in Silicon Valley or making plans to do so. Most of them requested anonymity because they don’t want to attract attention from Beijing or Washington.
我采访的14位中国风险投资家和企业家都在硅谷工作,或者正打算搬到那里。他们中的大多数人要求匿名,因为他们不想引起北京或华盛顿的注意。
The first thing one of them said to me when we met in Palo Alto was that her career in China was finished and that she was depressed. She had not made a single deal in nearly three years. She plans to focus on Silicon Valley but will need to spend time in China to wind up projects.
当我们在帕洛阿尔托见面时,其中一人对我说的第一件事就是,她在中国的职业生涯结束了,她很沮丧。近三年来,她一笔生意也没做成。她计划把重点放在硅谷,但还需要在中国待一段时间,给一些项目收尾。
Another investor, who had not visited the United States much in the past decade, told me that she would split her time between the two countries while looking for U.S. start-ups to back.
另一位在过去10年里很少来美国的投资者告诉我,她将在两国之间来回跑,同时寻找机会,支持美国的初创企业。
2018年,阿里巴巴联合创始人马云在上海。
A third person, who relocated to Silicon Valley this year, was the most determined to settle down. He said he was selling his investments or dissolving his companies in China. He no longer feels safe there, he said, because the government jailed entrepreneurs or imposed sometimes huge fines on private enterprises.
第三位投资者是今年搬到硅谷的,他最有决心安顿下来。他说,他正在出售自己在中国的投资,或者解散他在中国的公司。他说,他在那里不再感到安全,因为政府把企业家关进监狱,有时还对民营企业处以巨额罚款。
He said most of his peers were reluctant to leave China completely and start over in a foreign country with a foreign language and a foreign culture. It has been tough for him, he added.
他说,大多数跟他情况差不多的人都不愿意完全离开中国,到语言和文化完全陌生的外国重新开始。他还说,这对他来说很困难。
Tom Zhang, a well-connected human resources expert who has worked at several big tech companies in Silicon Valley, said he had met with many investors from China since last year.
人脉广泛的人力资源专家汤姆·张(音)曾在硅谷的几家大型科技公司工作,他表示,自去年以来,他会见了许多来自中国的投资者。
“They have completely lost their direction, buzzing around like flies, not knowing what to invest in next,” he told me.
“他们完全失去了方向,像苍蝇一样飞来飞去,不知道下一步该投资什么,”他告诉我。
There’s no doubt that these people belong to the privileged class. To meet with them, I visited quite a few fancy mansions. One home sat atop the Los Gatos hills; my Uber driver whistled in awe when he turned onto the long driveway. Then he chuckled when he stopped his modest S.U.V. in front of a red Ferrari, a Tesla Cybertruck and a few Audis and BMWs. And there was Mr. Wei’s party, which one partygoer described to me as Gatsbyesque.
毫无疑问,这些人属于特权阶层。为了与他们见面,我参观了不少豪宅。一所房子坐落在洛斯加托斯的山顶上;我的优步司机在驶入长长的私人车道时吹了一声口哨表示惊叹。然后,在把自己那辆不起眼的SUV停在一辆红色法拉利、一辆特斯拉Cybertruck以及几辆奥迪和宝马前面时,他轻声笑了起来。还有卫哲的派对,一位参加派对的人对我说,那是盖茨比式的。
Nonetheless, the frustrations of this moneyed set reflect a significant shift in the tech world: the bust of a financial pipeline known as U.S. dollar-denominated venture capital funds, and the demise of the market economy-driven model that propelled China’s tech growth. Behind the shift is the vision that China’s leader, Xi Jinping, has for the country’s tech industry, one that is led by the government and aims for national self-reliance.
尽管如此,这群富人的挫败感反映了科技世界的一个重大转变:以美元计价的风险投资基金的融资管道破裂,以及推动中国科技增长的市场经济驱动模式的消亡。这一转变的背后是中国领导人习近平对中国科技产业的愿景:由政府主导,实现民族自强。
The ramifications of this approach for China’s drive for innovation and its tech rivalry with the United States probably won’t be clear for years.
这种做法对中国推动创新及其与美国技术竞争的影响可能在未来几年才会显现出来。
But for now, on the human level, it’s a waste of talent for China. A generation of investors who spent two decades cultivating start-ups and shaping tech development have nowhere to apply their expertise.
但就目前而言,从个人层面看,这是对中国人才的浪费。整整一代投资者花了20年时间培育初创企业,塑造科技发展,却无处施展才华。
The problem for China’s displaced investors is that the United States isn’t exactly a welcoming land.
这些变得无用武之地的中国投资者面临的问题是,美国并不是一个欢迎他们的国家。
Since 2018, the U.S. government has heightened its scrutiny of Chinese technology. A year ago, President Biden signed an executive order banning new American investment in key industries that could help Beijing’s military capabilities.
自2018年以来,美国政府加强了对中国技术的审查。一年前,拜登总统签署了一项行政命令,禁止美国在可能有助于提升北京军事能力的关键行业进行新的投资。
This has left many in Silicon Valley afraid of China. Some brand-name venture firms will not consider putting money into a start-up that has taken funds from investors with China ties, a Chinese venture capitalist who had started two funds in the Valley told me. And that leaves founders reluctant to take money from transplanted Chinese investors for fear of scaring off later investors. His assessment was confirmed by other people I interviewed.
这让硅谷的许多人对中国感到害怕。一位在硅谷创立了两家基金的中国风险投资家告诉我,如果一家初创企业接受过与中国有联系的投资者的资金,那么一些知名风险投资公司就不会再考虑这家企业。这使得创始人不愿接受来自中国投资者的资金,因为他们担心吓跑后来的投资者。我采访的其他人也证实了他的判断。
Only start-ups that are desperate for funding will take money from relocated Chinese investors. The few venture firms with China connections have rebranded themselves and take pains to explain that all the partners are U.S. citizens and that their funding mainly came from outside China.
只有迫切需要融资的初创企业才会接受中国投资者的资金。少数几家与中国有联系的风投公司已经改头换面,并煞费苦心地解释说,所有合伙人都是美国公民,他们的资金主要来自中国以外。
One veteran investor told me that a founder had refused to talk to him even after he explained that he had been a naturalized citizen for decades. People are acting with extra caution, the investor said.
一位资深投资者告诉我,一位创始人拒绝与他交谈,即使他解释说,他已经入籍美国几十年了。这位投资者说,人们的行为格外谨慎。
But that’s not stopping other venture capitalists from looking at Silicon Valley as the promised land. They still have some slim hope, said the investor who has started two funds here. They probably won’t be able to land the next Alibaba, but they might find some opportunities to invest in small start-ups that might succeed, he added.
但这并不能阻止一些风险投资家将硅谷视为乐土。那位在硅谷创立了两个基金的投资者说,他们仍然抱有一些渺茫的希望。他还说,他们可能无法找到下一个阿里巴巴,但他们可能会找到一些机会,投资可能成功的小型初创企业。
That might be better than nothing.
总归是聊胜于无。
2024年8月30日
The White House national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, met on Thursday with China’s leader, Xi Jinping, and held rare talks with a top Chinese military official in a sign that the two countries are communicating at senior levels despite tensions over the South China Sea and Taiwan.
美国总统国家安全事务助理杰克·沙利文周四与中国国家主席习近平会面,并与中国军方高级官员举行了罕见的会晤,这表明两国仍在进行高层沟通,尽管南中国海和台湾问题已造成双方关系的紧张。
Mr. Sullivan’s meeting with Gen. Zhang Youxia, vice chairman of China’s Central Military Commission, was the first in years between a senior American official and a vice chair of the commission, which oversees China’s armed forces and is chaired by Mr. Xi. In 2018, Jim Mattis, who was the U.S. defense secretary at the time, met with Gen. Xu Qiliang, who held the vice chair position.
沙利文与张又侠上将举行了美国高级官员与中共中央军事委员会副主席多年来的首次会晤。中国军队由以习近平为主席的中央军委指挥。上次这种会晤是在2018年,发生在时任美国国防部长的吉姆·马蒂斯与时任中央军委副主席的许其亮上将之间。
It was the latest effort by the two powers to keep communication channels open even as disputes grow over national security, trade and geopolitics. On the military front, the United States has argued that more open communication is necessary to prevent accidents between the two countries’ warplanes and navy ships as they regularly patrol contested areas like the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea.
这是两国在国家安全、贸易和地缘政治问题上的争端加剧之际保持沟通渠道畅通的最新努力。美国认为有必要在军事方面进行更公开的沟通,以防止两国的战机和海军舰艇在台湾海峡和南中国海等存在争议的水域进行定期巡逻时发生不测事件。
“A meeting with Zhang Youxia is very significant, and an indication that China is prepared to meaningfully re-engage with the Department of Defense,” said Drew Thompson, a visiting senior research fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. “Beijing views the military-to-military relationship as an important political indicator of the overall relationship, which differs somewhat from the U.S. perspective, which sees it as a more pragmatic channel to reduce risk.”
“与张又侠举行会晤意义非常重大,这表明中国准备好了重新开始与美国国防部进行有意义的接触,”新加坡国立大学李光耀公共政策学院的高级访问学者唐安竹(Drew Thompson)说。“中国政府将双边军事关系视为整体关系的一个重要政治指标,这与美国的看法有些不同,美国将其视为一个更务实的降低风险渠道。”
Mr. Sullivan’s meeting with General Zhang, which was held at the headquarters of China’s People’s Liberation Army, came on the final day of his three-day visit to Beijing to bolster the Biden administration’s bid to manage competition with China.
沙利文和张又侠的会晤是在中国人民解放军总部举行的,这是沙利文为期三天北京之行的最后一天,此行的目的是促进拜登政府管理与中国竞争的努力。
沙利文周四还会晤了中共中央军事委员会副主席张又侠上将。
China and the United States have been locked in a rivalry for global influence and have seen tensions rise over a raft of issues, including China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea, its tacit support for Russia’s war in Ukraine, and the flood of Chinese electric vehicles and solar panels onto global markets.
中国和美国一直在全球争夺影响力,双方在一系列问题上存在紧张关系,包括中国对南中国海的领土主张、对俄罗斯在乌克兰战争的暗中支持,以及中国电动汽车和太阳能电池板大量流入全球市场等。
“We believe that competition with China does not have to lead to conflict and confrontation — the key is responsible management through diplomacy,” Mr. Sullivan said at a news conference after meeting with Mr. Xi.
“我们认为与中国的竞争不一定会导致冲突和对抗,关键是通过外交进行负责任的管理,”沙利文在与习近平见面后举行的记者会上表示。
Even as the visit was a chance for both nations to reassure the world that they were working to lower the risk of conflict between them, it was clear that they were still fundamentally divided on strategic issues. China has rejected Washington’s framing of the bilateral relationship as being defined by competition, a stance Mr. Xi highlighted at the top of an official summary of the meeting.
尽管这次访问对两国来说是一次机会,让它们能表明两国正在努力降低发生冲突的风险,打消世界的有关疑虑,但也不难看出他们在许多战略问题上仍存在根本分歧。中国拒绝接受美国政府将双边关系描述为竞争的说法,并在官方发表的会晤纪要的一开始就用习近平的话强调了这一立场。
“First of all, we must answer the general question of whether China and the United States are rivals or partners,” Mr. Xi told Mr. Sullivan. China’s intentions were “above board,” he said, and his country was committed to “peaceful development.” He said he hoped that the United States would work with China to “find a correct way for the two major countries to get along.”
“首先要回答好中美到底是对手还是伙伴这个管总的问题,”习近平对沙利文说。习近平表示,中国的“战略意图光明磊落”,中国致力于“和平发展”,并说他希望美国与中国共同努力,找到“正确相处之道”。
Mr. Sullivan told reporters that the Biden administration’s priorities in its final months included greater communication between their militaries and more cooperation to tackle the fentanyl crisis in the United States.
沙利文对记者说,拜登政府在其任期最后几个月的优先事项包括加强两国军队间的沟通,以及在应对美国芬太尼危机上的更多合作。
He also elaborated on discussions about a potential meeting between President Biden and Mr. Xi, noting that both leaders would likely attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Peru and the Group of 20 Leader’s Summit in Brazil, to be held in mid-November.
他还对关于拜登与习近平可能再次会晤的讨论做了详细说明,指出两名领导人都可能出席11月中旬在秘鲁举行的亚太经合组织峰会,以及在巴西举行的20国集团领导人峰会。
“It would only be natural for them to have the chance to sit down with one another,” Mr. Sullivan said.
“他们有机会坐下来谈谈会是很自然的事情,”沙利文说。
He also spoke briefly about Vice President Kamala Harris, who is now the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate, and her perspective on China.
沙利文还简要地提到现任副总统、民主党总统候选人贺锦丽,以及她对中国的看法。
“She shares President Biden’s view that responsibly managing this competition, so it doesn’t veer into conflict or confrontation, is essential,” Mr. Sullivan told reporters, noting that Ms. Harris has met Mr. Xi and also China’s second-highest official, Premier Li Qiang.
“她与拜登总统有共同的看法,即负责任地管理这一竞争关系,不让它变成冲突或对抗,这是至关重要的,”沙利文对记者说,并指出,贺锦丽曾与习近平和中国二号官员李强总理见过面。
Earlier in the day, General Zhang told Mr. Sullivan that the world expected the two countries to “maintain stability in the military and security fields,” according to a statement released by China’s defense ministry. He also reiterated China’s opposition to American support for Taiwan, the island democracy that Beijing claims.
据中国国防部发布的一份声明,当天早些时候,张又侠对沙利文表示,世界期待两国“保持军事安全领域稳定”。他还重申了中国反对美国支持台湾的立场,中国宣称对民主自治的台湾拥有主权。
“China demands that the United States stop military collusion between the United States and Taiwan, stop arming Taiwan, and stop spreading false narratives involving Taiwan,” the general said, according to the official statement.
“中国要求美国停止美台军事勾连,停止武装台湾,停止散布涉台虚假叙事,”张又侠在中国国防部的声明中表示。
Mr. Sullivan later said that having a chance to speak in person with General Zhang had made a difference.
沙利文后来表示,有机会与张又侠面对面交谈已产生了积极的影响。
“The meeting with Vice Chairman Zhang was very important — there is no substitute for actually being able to sit across the table not just with the vice chairman but with his whole team, to be able to hear from them their perspective on critical issues,” he said.
“与军委副主席张又侠见面非常重要,能实际上在桌子两边坐下来,面对的不仅是军委副主席,还有他的整个团队,听听他们对关键问题的看法,这是无可替代的,”沙利文说。
On Wednesday, Mr. Sullivan and China’s most senior diplomatic official, Wang Yi, said their countries’ top military commanders in the region would hold a video call at some point.
沙利文和中国级别最高的外交官员王毅周三表示,两国的战区领导将在某个时候进行视频通话。
Mr. Thompson said such a call could help reinvigorate lower-level dialogue that used to take place more frequently in the past. Those meetings, he said, allowed military personnel to discuss aerial and maritime maneuvers in greater detail to prevent accidents.
唐安竹表示,这种通话会有助于重启过去曾更频繁进行的低级别对话。他说,那些低级别对话让军事人员能更详细地讨论空中和海上的活动,以防止发生意外事件。
Washington is also concerned about encounters between China and U.S. allies that could draw American forces into a confrontation. That includes the most recent standoff between the Philippines and China near a disputed atoll, Sabina Shoal, where Chinese coast guard vessels have rammed Philippine ships and targeted them with water cannons.
美国政府还担心中国与美国盟友的意外冲突可能会使美国军队卷入与中国的对抗。这包括菲律宾和中国最近在有争议的环礁萨宾娜浅滩附近的僵持局面,中国海警船只在该水域撞击菲律宾船只,向它们发射水炮。
“The order of the day should be de-escalation” in the South China Sea, said Mr. Sullivan, who, during his talks in Beijing, raised America’s commitment to defend the Philippines as a treaty ally.
南中国海的“当务之急应该是缓和局势”,沙利文说。在北京与中国官员会晤时,他提到了美国作为菲律宾的条约盟友有捍卫该国的承诺。
“Nobody is looking for a crisis — not the Philippines, not the United States and, we hope, not the P.R.C.,” he said, referring to the People’s Republic of China.
“没有人想要一场危机——菲律宾不想,美国不想,我们希望PRC也不想,”他用的是中华人民共和国的英文首字母缩写。
Such regional tensions have led to chilly relations between the Pentagon and the Chinese military over the past several years. China suspended military-to-military communications in 2022 after Nancy Pelosi, who was speaker of the House at the time, visited Taiwan. They were restored in December when President Biden’s senior military adviser, Gen. Charles Q. Brown, held a videoconference call with his Chinese counterpart, Gen. Liu Zhenli.
这些区域的紧张局势已在过去几年里导致五角大楼与中国军方的关系变得冷淡。2022年,时任美国众议院议长的佩洛西访台后,中国暂停了两军之间的沟通。去年12月,拜登的首席军事顾问查尔斯·布朗上将与中国的刘振立上将举行了视频会议后,两军之间的沟通得以恢复。
2024年8月29日
AT WAR WITH OURSELVES: My Tour of Duty in the Trump White House, by H.R. McMaster
《与我们自己为敌:在特朗普的白宫履行我的职责》,作者:H·R·麦克马斯特
Recently on the campaign trail, Donald Trump has talked up his aggressive stance on China, positioning himself as a tough negotiator in a brutal trade war. But a new memoir by Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, one of Trump’s national security advisers, throws that narrative, and many other stories that Trump tells about his time in office, into stark relief.
在近日的竞选活动中,唐纳德·特朗普大谈自己咄咄逼人的对华姿态,将自己塑造成一个残酷贸易战中的强硬谈判者。然而在H·R·麦克马斯特中将新出版的回忆录中,这位特朗普的国家安全顾问的讲述与这一形象乃至特朗普说过的许多任内故事大相径庭。
As McMaster writes in “At War With Ourselves,” the president could sometimes be kept on the straight and narrow with a clever dose of reverse psychology (Xi Jinping wants you to say this, Xi Jinping wants you to say that). But just as often, McMaster shows Trump to have been an unpredictable waffler who undermined himself to the advantage of his competitors on the world stage.
麦克马斯特在《与我们自己为敌》中写道,用一点聪明的反向心理(习近平想让你说这个,习近平想让你说那个),有时候能让这位总统保持在正轨上。但同时,麦克马斯特说他也经常会变得不知所云,难以捉摸,导致在与世界上的对手打交道时处于下风。
In November 2017, President Trump visited China on the third leg of a 13-day trip around Asia. It was his “most consequential” destination, McMaster explains. As they flew to Beijing, he warned Trump that Xi would try to trick him into saying something that was good for China, but bad for the United States and its allies. “The C.C.P.’s favorite phrase, ‘win-win,’” he recalls telling his boss at one point, “actually meant that China won twice.”
2017年11月,特朗普总统在为期13天的亚洲之行的第三阶段访问了中国。那是他“最关键的”目的地,麦克马斯特说。在飞往北京途中,他提醒特朗普,习近平会试图诱使他说出一些对中国有利、对美国及其盟友不利的话。“CCP最喜欢说的‘双赢’,”他记得有一次对自己的这位顶头上司说,“实际上意思是中国赢两次。”
Trump seemed to hear him, but in the Great Hall of the People, the president strayed from his talking points. He agreed with Xi that military exercises in South Korea were “provocative” and a “waste of money” and suggested that China might have a legitimate claim to Japan’s Senkaku Islands. McMaster, his stomach sinking, passed a note to Gen. John Kelly, the chief of staff: Xi “ate our lunch,” it read.
特朗普看上去是有在听的,但到了人民大会堂,总统偏离了他既定的谈话要点。他对习近平说的韩国军事演习属于“挑衅”,且“浪费钱”表示了认同,并表示中国对日本的尖阁诸岛(Senkaku Islands,中国称钓鱼岛。——译注)也许存在正当的领土主张。大感不妙的麦克马斯特给幕僚长约翰·凯利将军写了张便条,上面写着习“吃了我们的午餐”。
“At War With Ourselves” is intended to be a companion to “Battlegrounds,” McMaster’s 2020 assessment of U.S. foreign policy backsliding since the Cold War, but it works well as a stand-alone and serves as essential reading for anyone countenancing a potential second round of Trump as a global leader. The general shows how, despite his best efforts to help the president, the supposed master of the “art of the deal” was treated like a “chump” by a roster of the world’s top authoritarians.
《与我们自己为敌》本意是应该与《战场》(Battlegrounds)配合阅读的,后者是麦克马斯特在2020年对冷战以来美国外交政策的倒退做出的评估,不过单独作为一本读物也未尝不可,对于那些想支持特朗普第二次成为领导人的人来说,则是必读。本书让我们看到,尽管麦克马斯特尽全力帮助总统,这位“交易艺术”大师还是被形形色色的专制大国领导人“当猴耍”。
Flattery and pomp from leaders like Xi, Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Russian president Vladimir V. Putin seem to have been all that was required to get in Trump’s good graces. In 2018, McMaster found Trump in the Oval Office scrawling a cheerful note to Putin across a New York Post article reporting that the Russian president had denigrated the American political system but called Trump a good listener. Like a child with his Christmas wish list, the leader of the free world asked McMaster to send it to the Kremlin. It was especially bad timing: Evidence was coming to light that Putin had directed an assassination on British soil. McMaster did not forward the note, later explaining to an infuriated Trump that his letter would “reinforce the narrative that you are somehow in the Kremlin’s pocket.”
像习近平、土耳其的埃尔多安和俄罗斯的普京这样的领导人对他百般奉承,似乎已经足以让特朗普放下一切戒心。2018年,麦克马斯特发现特朗普正在椭圆形办公室里给普京写一封热情洋溢的信,因为《纽约邮报》的一篇报道说,这位俄罗斯总统刚刚贬低了美国的政治体制,但赞扬特朗普善于倾听。于是自由世界的领袖就像攥着圣诞节心愿单的孩子一样,要麦克马斯特把信发到克里姆林宫去。时机很不凑巧:当时已经有证据表明,普京下令在英国领土上进行了一场暗杀。麦克马斯特没有把信发出,后来他跟怒不可遏的特朗普解释说,这封信会“强化你在替克里姆林宫做事的叙事”。
“At War With Ourselves” is beautifully written and never dull. Its author is as concerned with the commander in chief as he is with the destructive bickering among the president’s deputies who hurled “accusations of disloyalty” in their efforts to reach Trump’s ear. In tale after tale, McMaster shows how the former president allowed his own prejudices and the petty rivalries within his administration to undermine his policy goals in what McMaster terms a “vortex of vitriol.” Trump’s “indiscipline,” he writes, “made him the antagonist in his own story.”
《与我们自己为敌》的文笔优美,不会让人感到枯燥。除了三军统帅本人,作者同样也关注总统的助手们的纷争,这些助手们给别人“扣上不忠诚的帽子”,以求让特朗普能听到他们的想法。麦克马斯特通过一个又一个故事展现出这位前总统自己的偏见和政府官员们的狭隘内斗给他的政策目标构成了怎样的损害,作者形容那就是一个“尖酸刻薄的漩涡”。特朗普的“缺乏约束”,他写道,“使他在自己的故事里成了大反派”。
The book is rife with literary references to, among others, Chaucer, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius and Shakespeare. Steve Bannon, Trump’s chief strategist, is described both as Iago, the soldier villain who plays on his leader’s insecurities in “Othello,” and as one of the “weird sisters” who incite Macbeth with splenetic prophecies.
书中大量使用文学典故,比如乔叟、爱比克泰德、马可·奥勒留和莎士比亚。在他的笔下,特朗普的首席策略师史蒂夫·班农是《奥赛罗》中的伊阿古,一个利用主子的疑心病搬弄是非的反派,同时又是《麦克白》中的“怪异姐妹”,用包藏祸心的预言蛊惑主人公。
The Shakespearean metaphors only go so far. Does McMaster really think of Trump, like Othello, as a “noble and valiant” outsider who was sadly poisoned by the strain of his office and the selfishness of his officers? The answer is probably not: Beyond having what McMaster terms a “disruptive nature,” it is hard to see what good there was before things got worse. Perhaps McMaster, who served in the military for three and a half decades, can’t shake his basic sense of duty to the presidency — on the final page, he talks about how he hopes young people will take the lesson that there are “tremendous rewards” associated with serving “any administration.”
然而莎剧的隐喻有其局限。麦克马斯特真的认为特朗普就像奥赛罗一样,是一个“高尚而英勇”的局外人,不幸被自己的地位和下属的自私所毒害?回答可能是否定的:除了麦克马斯特所说的“颠覆的本性”,即使在情况恶化之前,我们也很难看到他的身上有什么值得赞许的地方,也许,三十五年的军旅生涯让麦克马斯特无法摆脱忠于总统的本能——在全书最后一页,他说他希望年轻人能从中学到的是,无论供职于“哪一届政府”,都是会有“无与伦比的收获”的。
If McMaster respects the office of the president, the Trump he depicts in the book seems to go out of his way to disrespect it. Time and again, Trump can’t seem to focus on briefings and responds to serious problems with inane suggestions. “Why don’t we just bomb the drugs?” he asks when the conversation turns to Mexico. (McMaster, in an apparent act of self-soothing, suggests that Trump “only” meant to shock his advisers with such statements, but he never seems to ask himself to what end.)
如果说麦克马斯特对总统之位充满了敬意,那么他在书中描绘的那个特朗普则是在想尽办法侮辱这个位置。我们一次又一次看到,特朗普在听取汇报时无法集中注意力,总是就一些重大的问题给出毫无意义的建议。“我们为什么不干脆把毒品炸了呢?”他在谈起墨西哥的时候说道。(麦克马斯特显然是在自我安慰地说,特朗普“只是”想用这样的言论吓一吓他的顾问们,但从来没问过自己这样做是想达到什么目的。)
McMaster even traces President Biden’s signature foreign policy failure, the chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal in 2021, to the “atmosphere of inconsistency” promulgated by Trump. What’s more, with the 2024 presidential election in sight, McMaster questions whether the 78-year-old Trump can still “perform well the sometimes grueling job of president.” He notes that the 13-day trip to Asia “tired” him and stretched his patience — and that was seven years ago.
麦克马斯特甚至提到,拜登总统的标志性外交惨败——2021年那场混乱的阿富汗撤军——祸起于特朗普散布的“反复无常的气氛”。眼看2024年总统大选即将到来,麦克马斯特还对78岁的特朗普能否“胜任有时相当繁重的总统工作”表示怀疑。他提到那次13天的亚洲之行让他“疲惫不堪”,耐心已经到了极限——而那还是七年前的事。
The confusion and capriciousness that permeate the administration in “At War With Ourselves” are terrifying to consider in retrospect; even more so when one imagines them in the context of today’s world, so close to regional wars in the Middle East and the South China Sea.
如今回头看,《与我们自己为敌》中特朗普政府的混乱与任性可谓骇人听闻;再将其放到今日世界的语境下,想到中东和南海的地区战争一触即发,就更是可怕。
The message of the book appears to be that Trump is unsuited for another term, although McMaster, known for what the New Yorker writer Patrick Radden Keefe once described as “strenuous expressions of humility,” never explicitly goes so far as to say so, and he even lays some blame on senior advisers like himself. He does, however, indulge in a few rounds of old-school psychoanalyzing. “Seneca emphasized the need to have control over one’s own mind,” he writes, noting that “Trump’s anxieties and insecurities rendered him vulnerable.”
从本书所传达的讯息来看,特朗普无法胜任第二个任期,不过,曾被《纽约客》作家帕特里克·拉丹·基弗形容“恪守谦恭态度”的麦克马斯特没有明确说出来,甚至还表示像他这样的高级顾问也负有一定责任。不过他倒是放手给出了一些老派的心理分析。“塞内卡强调了控制自己的意志的必要性,”他写道,而“特朗普的焦虑和安全感缺失成了他的软肋”。
This, as Hamlet might say, is the vicious mole of nature, the thing in Trump that Trump, let alone McMaster, could not tame or fight. In the end, the most Shakespearean character in McMaster’s tragedy might be the general himself. He gave his all to a leader he is convinced is fatally flawed, but whose tempest of energy he never stops believing he can direct toward some greater purpose — only to be summarily fired and discarded thanks to a bickering and back-stabbing cabal, and the man who yields to it.
正如哈姆雷特会说的,这正是人性中的“丑陋的黑痣”,别说麦克马斯特,即使特朗普自己也无法制服或对抗它。归根结底,麦克马斯特的悲剧中最具莎剧人物特色的可能正是将军自己。他毫无保留地辅佐一个他明知存在致命缺陷的领导人,他的赤诚之心让他始终相信,他可以促成一些好的结果——到头来却被草草革职,原因只是一场争执和背刺的阴谋,而特朗普也没有做出反对。
AT WAR WITH OURSELVES: My Tour of Duty in the Trump White House | By H.R. McMaster | Harper | 357 pp. | $32.50
AT WAR WITH OURSELVES: My Tour of Duty in the Trump White House | By H.R. McMaster | Harper | 357 pp. | $32.50
2024年8月29日
After a new tax increase incited weeks of deadly riots in Kenya early this summer, President William Ruto announced that he was reversing course. He abandoned the finance law he had proposed, and then he shook up his cabinet.
今年夏初,新的增税政策在肯尼亚引发了持续数周的致命骚乱,随后,总统威廉·鲁托宣布将改变政策。他放弃了自己提出的金融法,然后改组了内阁。
Last week, the government reversed itself again. The newly appointed finance minister announced that some of those discarded tax increases would be reintroduced.
上周,该国政府再次改变了态度。新任命的财政部长宣布,将重新推出一些之前放弃的增税措施。
The Ruto administration is desperately trying to raise revenue to pay off billions of dollars in public debt and avoid defaulting on its loans, even as critical public assistance and services are being cut.
鲁托政府正拼命试图增加收入,以偿还数十亿美元的公共债务,避免贷款违约,即使关键的公共援助和服务正被削减。
Governments throughout Africa are facing the same dilemma.
非洲各国政府都面临同样的困境。
The continent’s foreign debt reached more than $1.1 trillion at the end of last year. More than two dozen countries have excessive debt or are at high risk of it, according to the African Development Bank Group. And roughly 900 million people live in countries that spend more on interest payments than on health care or education.
截至去年年底,非洲大陆的外债总额已超过1.1万亿美元。据非洲开发银行集团称,20多个国家存在过度举债或面临高债务风险的情况。大约有9亿人生活在利息支出高于医疗保健或教育支出的国家。
Outsize debt has been a familiar problem in the developing world, but the current crisis is considered the worst yet because of the amounts owed as well as the huge increase in the number and type of foreign creditors.
在发展中国家,巨额债务一直是普遍问题,但目前的危机被认为是迄今为止最严重的一次,因为债务数额巨大,而且外国债权人的数量和类型都大幅增加。
And in Africa, a continent pulsating with potential and peril, debt overshadows nearly everything that happens.
而在非洲这个充满潜力和危险的大陆,债务几乎给一切笼罩上了阴影。
刚果民主共和国的一个猴痘治疗中心。许多非洲国家背负的巨额债务使得用于医疗保健等服务的资金减少。
It leaves less money for investments that could create jobs for what is the youngest, fastest-growing population on the planet; less money to manage potential pandemics like Covid or mpox; less money to feed, house and educate people; less money to combat the devastating effects of climate change, which threaten to make swaths of land uninhabitable and force people to migrate.
这样一来,为这个星球上最年轻、增长最快的人口创造就业机会的投资资金会减少;用于应对新冠或猴痘等潜在流行病的资金会减少;人们吃饭、住房和受教育的资金会减少;应对气候变化破坏性影响的资金也会减少,气候变化可能使大片土地无法居住,迫使人们迁移。
If nothing is done to help countries manage the financial crunch, “a wave of destabilizing debt defaults will end up severely undermining progress on the green transition, with catastrophic implications for the entire world,” warned a new report from the Finance for Development Lab at the Paris School for Economics and Columbia University’s Initiative for Policy Dialogue.
巴黎经济学院金融促发展实验室和哥伦比亚大学政策对话倡议组织的一份新报告警告说,如果不采取任何措施帮助各国应对金融危机,“一波破坏稳定的债务违约将最终严重破坏绿色转型的进程,给整个世界带来灾难性影响。”
At the same time, economic stagnation in combination with government corruption and mismanagement has left many African countries more vulnerable to brutal wars, military coups and antigovernment riots.
与此同时,经济停滞,加上政府腐败和管理不善,使许多非洲国家更容易发生残酷战争、军事政变和反政府骚乱。
In Nigeria, where foreign debt amounts to $40 billion, rising inflation and widespread hunger spurred a string of violent antigovernment protests this month. Forty percent of the country’s 220 million people live in extreme poverty. Yet more than a third of the revenue collected by the government is used to pay the interest on its public debt.
在外债高达400亿美元的尼日利亚,不断上升的通货膨胀和大范围的饥荒在本月引发了一系列暴力反政府抗议活动。该国2.2亿人口中,有40%生活在极端贫困中。然而,政府收入的三分之一以上用于支付公共债务的利息。
尼日利亚约拉市的中央市场,这个国家正在经历通货膨胀水平的上升。
In Uganda, where foreign creditors are owed $12 billion, demonstrations in July targeted corruption. And in Kenya, which has $35 billion worth of external debt, some protesters have said they are ready to march again after the latest news of impending tax increases.
乌干达欠下了120亿美元的外债,7月,当地爆发针对腐败的示威活动。在外债总额高达350亿美元的肯尼亚,一些抗议者表示,在最新的增税消息传出后,他们准备再次游行。
In many African countries, there has been zero per capita income growth in the past decade. The debt crisis has caused the value of many currencies to depreciate, further sapping purchasing power.
在许多非洲国家,过去十年的人均收入为零增长。债务危机导致许多货币贬值,进一步削弱了购买力。
The string of economic shocks produced by the coronavirus pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine helped to supercharge the debt crisis. Food and energy prices soared as government coffers dwindled. The moves by central banks in wealthy countries to fight inflation with higher interest rates caused borrowing costs to rapidly climb.
新冠病毒大流行和俄罗斯入侵乌克兰造成的一系列经济冲击加剧了债务危机。食品和能源价格飙升,而政府金库里的钱却在减少。富裕国家的央行通过提高利率对抗通胀的举措导致借贷成本迅速攀升。
The issue, though, is not just how much money countries like Kenya and Nigeria have borrowed, but whom they have borrowed from.
不过,问题不仅在于肯尼亚和尼日利亚等国借了多少钱,还在于它们从谁那里借钱。
In recent decades, the pool of potential lenders has exploded to include thousands of private bondholders and a major new geopolitical player: China.
近几十年来,潜在贷款人数量激增,包括数以千计的私人债券持有者和一个重要的地缘政治新参与者:中国。
Seeking to spread its own clout and counter American and European influence, China has transformed itself into the world’s biggest national lender, financing roads, ports, bridges, airports, power plants, telecommunications networks and railways in developing countries.
为扩大自己的影响力,对抗美国和欧洲的影响,中国已成为世界上最大的国家贷款机构,为发展中国家的道路、港口、桥梁、机场、发电厂、电信网络和铁路提供融资。
Many nations, bristling at loan conditions dictated by Western lenders or the International Monetary Fund, were eager to find an alternative source of financing. Agreements with China often came without environmental, financial or human rights restrictions, though they were more opaque so difficult for outsiders to assess.
许多国家对西方贷款机构或国际货币基金组织规定的贷款条件感到不满,迫切希望找到其他融资来源。与中国达成的协议往往没有环境、财政或人权方面的限制,不过它们更加不透明,因此外界很难评估。
内罗毕高速公路是中国在肯尼亚援建的基础设施项目之一。
China now accounts for 73 percent of bilateral borrowing in Kenya, 83 percent in Nigeria and 72 percent in Uganda, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.
根据联合国贸易和发展会议的数据,中国目前在肯尼亚、尼日利亚和乌干达的双边借款中分别占到73%、83%和72%。
Over the past two decades, one in five infrastructure projects in Africa was financed by China, a report from the National Bureau of Asian Research found, and Chinese firms built one in three projects.
美国国家亚洲研究局的报告发现,在过去20年里,非洲五分之一的基础设施项目由中国资助的,三分之一的项目由中国公司承建。
Some of them — like Kenya’s railway between Nairobi and Mombasa — have turned into showcases of corruption and blunders. Many of these large-scale infrastructure projects will never produce enough revenue to justify the costs.
其中一些项目——比如肯尼亚内罗毕和蒙巴萨之间的铁路——已经变成了腐败和失误的展示。许多这样的大型基础设施项目永远不会产生足够的收入,来抵消成本。
Economic conditions and loan repayment prospects have soured, but China has been reluctant to offer debt relief. It has instead been holding out for repayment, extending credit swaps and rollovers that end up putting off the day of reckoning.
经济状况和贷款偿还前景已经恶化,但中国一直不愿提供债务减免。相反,它仍然期待得到还款,通过延长贷款置换和展期,最终推迟了清算的日子。
It took Zambia nearly four years to reach a loan restructuring agreement after it defaulted in 2020, for example, primarily because of opposition from China, the country’s single largest creditor.
例如,赞比亚在2020年违约后,花了近四年时间才达成贷款重组协议,主要原因是该国最大的单一债权国中国的反对。
The monumental increase in the number of private bondholders and creditors has further complicated efforts to resolve debt crises.
私人债券持有人和债权人数量的大幅增加,使解决债务危机的努力进一步复杂化。
肯尼亚总统威廉·鲁托在6月爆发致命骚乱后撤回了增税提议。但上周,他的财政部长表示,将重新引入其中一些增税措施。
The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank encouraged poor and middle-income countries to embrace Wall Street and seek private loans overseas in the 2010s, said Jayati Ghosh, an economist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Interest rates were extremely low, investors were on the hunt for higher returns and development officials hoped countries could tap a big new source of capital.
马萨诸塞州立大学阿姆赫斯特分校的经济学家贾亚蒂·高什说,2010年代,国际货币基金组织和世界银行鼓励贫穷和中等收入国家接受华尔街,寻求海外私人贷款。当时利率极低,投资者在寻找收益更高的项目,发展官员希望各国能够利用一个新的巨大资金来源。
As a result, governments looking to rally political support or finance development borrowed too much and creditors seeking gains lent too much.
其结果是,寻求获得政治支持或为发展融资的政府借贷过多,而寻求收益的债权人放贷过多。
When interest rates suddenly rose, countries were forced to take out new loans, at high costs, to repay the money they had previously borrowed.
当利率突然上升时,各国被迫以高成本获得新的贷款,以偿还它们以前借的钱。
Investors were also able to impose costly loan terms like higher rates on struggling nations that were sometimes on the edge of default — what’s known as a risk premium. Kenya’s government paid more than 10 percent on international bonds to pay off a $2 billion debt that was due in June.
投资者还能够向陷入困境、有时处于违约边缘的国家施加成本高昂的贷款条款,比如更高的利率,也就是所谓的风险溢价。肯尼亚政府为偿还6月份到期的20亿美元国际债券支付了超过10%的利息。
Countries that borrow more than they can afford end up experiencing intense economic and social pain as output crashes, employment dries up, and inflation and poverty rise. The systemic problem, said Indermit Gill, chief economist at the World Bank, is that lenders who also made bad decisions by extending too much credit often don’t pay a financial penalty.
由于产出崩溃、就业枯竭、通货膨胀和贫困加剧,负债已超出承受能力的国家最终将经历严重的经济和社会痛苦。世界银行首席经济学家英德米特·吉尔说,系统性问题在于,同样是做出了错误决定,发放过多信贷的放贷机构通常不会受到财务上的惩罚。
一名示威者在乌干达坎帕拉的反腐抗议活动中被拘捕。
“You got paid a risk premium for a reason,” Mr. Gill said of the lenders, adding that if they don’t absorb losses, they will make more reckless loans. “That’s a major weakness in the way the system works.”
“你得到风险溢价是有原因的,”吉尔在谈到贷款机构时说。他还说,如果它们不消化损失,就会发放更多鲁莽的贷款。“这是该系统运作方式的一个主要弱点。”
The debt overhang leaves countries unable to make the kind of investments that could put their economies on stable footing, which would enable them to repay their loans.
债务积压使各国无法进行能够使其经济稳定并得以偿还贷款的投资。
And money that was intended for economic development ends up being siphoned off: Emergency loans from international institutions like the I.M.F. and the World Bank have been used to pay off private foreign creditors or China.
原本用于经济发展的资金最终被抽走:国际货币基金组织和世界银行等国际机构提供的紧急贷款被用来偿还外国私人债权人或中国。
In Kenya, the central bank announced in June that private creditors would get $500 million of a World Bank loan.
在肯尼亚,中央银行6月宣布,私人债权人将从一笔世界银行的贷款中获得五亿美元。
As the Finance for Development Lab report concluded, “The global community is currently funding loans to developing countries, which end up ‘leaking out’ to pay off other creditors.”
正如发展融资实验室的报告所总结的那样,“国际社会目前为发展中国家的贷款提供的资金最终会‘漏’出去,用于偿还其他债权人。”
2024年8月29日
Senior American and Chinese officials meeting in Beijing discussed plans for a call between President Biden and China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, as well as talks between their military commanders in the region, as the two countries work to stabilize relations.
在北京会晤的美中高级官员讨论了拜登总统和中国最高领导人习近平的通话计划,以及两军战区领导会谈。目前,双方正在努力稳定关系。
The White House said in a statement after the talks on Wednesday that the countries were “planning for a leader-level call in the coming weeks.”
白宫在周三会谈后的一份声明中表示,两国“计划在未来几周内进行领导人级别的通话”。
Jake Sullivan, President Biden’s national security adviser, and Wang Yi, China’s top foreign policy official, met for nearly 11 hours over two days, the fifth round of negotiations in less than 18 months between the two top officials. They met at Yanqi Lake, a resort on the outskirts of Beijing, near the Great Wall.
周二和周三,拜登总统的国家安全顾问杰克·沙利文与中国外交政策最高官员王毅进行了近11个小时的会谈,这是两位高级官员在不到18个月的时间里进行的第五轮谈判。他们的会面地点是位于长城附近的北京郊区度假村雁栖湖。
The Biden administration has sought to smooth over tensions with China while continuing to turn up the pressure by curbing China's access to the U.S. economy and technology. The meetings between Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Wang, following talks between Mr. Biden and Mr. Xi last November in California, are also aimed at showing that the rival powers can manage their differences.
拜登政府一直试图缓和与中国的紧张关系,同时继续加大对中国的压力,限制它进入美国的经济和技术领域。继去年11月拜登与习近平在加利福尼亚州举行会谈之后,沙利文和王毅的会晤也旨在表明,这两个敌对大国能够管控分歧。
“This is a mature and unusually candid channel. Sullivan and Wang have spent a lot of time together over the last year, and that has created some stability even as the relation has grown significantly more competitive,” said Rush Doshi, a former Biden administration official now at the Council on Foreign Relations, who participated in four earlier meetings between Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Wang.
“这是一个成熟且异常坦诚的渠道。沙利文和王毅在过去一年中花了很多时间打交道,这为两国关系带来了一定的稳定性,尽管中美关系的竞争性显著增强,”前拜登政府官员、现就职于外交关系委员会的拉什·多西表示,他曾参加过沙利文和王毅此前的四次会晤。
One big question in the discussions is how or when the two leaders might talk in the coming months. They are running out of time to schedule the next meeting as Mr. Biden is preparing to leave office in January.
讨论中的一个重要问题是,两位领导人将如何在未来几个月举行会谈,或者何时举行会谈。由于拜登准备在明年1月卸任,安排下次会晤的时间已经不多了。
China said there had been discussion of a “new round of interaction between the two heads of state in the near future.”
中方称双方就“两国元首近期开展新一轮互动”进行了讨论。
Both sides said they had agreed to a video call between their top military commanders in the region. The United States said that such a call would be held in the “near future,” but China was more noncommittal, saying that it would take place “at an appropriate time.” Admiral Dong Jun, China’s defense minister, met with Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III in May in Singapore.
双方都表示同意双方的战区领导举行视频通话。美国表示,这样的电话会议将在“不久的将来”举行,但中国的态度更为含糊,称将“适时”举行。今年5月,中国国防部长董军在新加坡会见了美国国防部长劳埃德·奥斯汀。
“This theater-command-level dialogue is essential for crisis prevention but has been resisted by the Chinese military,” said Danny Russel, a diplomacy and security analyst at the Asia Society Policy Institute. But while the two sides did agree on an initial call, they did not establish the ongoing line of high-level communication between the countries’ militaries that the Biden administration has sought.
亚洲协会政策研究所的外交与安全分析师丹尼·拉塞尔表示:“这种战区司令级别的对话对于预防危机至关重要,但遭到了中国军方的抵制。”虽然双方就首次通话达成了一致,但他们并没有建立拜登政府所寻求的两国军方之间持续的高层沟通渠道。
Mr. Sullivan is also scheduled to meet on Thursday with General Zhang Youxia, vice chairman of China’s Central Military Commission, which oversees China’s military. That would be the first meeting between a Biden administration official and a vice chairman of the commission, which is led by Mr. Xi.
沙利文还将于周四与中国中央军委副主席张又侠将军会晤,中央军委负责监管中国军队。这将是拜登政府官员与习近平领导的中央军委的副主席之间的首次会晤。
The United States has long sought more contact between the two countries’ militaries, in the hope that improved links might reduce the risk of miscommunication in case of a future crisis.
长期以来,美国一直寻求增加两军接触,希望加强联系可以减少未来发生危机时沟通不畅的风险。
Worries about possible miscommunication or escalation during a conflict have increased as China has deployed military forces ever closer to longtime American partners in the region like Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines.
随着中国部署的军队越来越接近台湾、日本和菲律宾等美国在该地区的长期合作伙伴,人们对冲突中可能出现的沟通不畅或冲突升级的担忧与日俱增。
Just on Monday, a Chinese military surveillance plane breached Japanese territorial airspace for the first time, according to Japan, for unclear reasons. A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said on Wednesday that the two countries were discussing the matter and that “Chinese military aircraft have no intention of intruding into the airspace of any country.”
就在本周一,据日本称,一架中国军用侦察机首次侵入日本领空,原因不明。中国外交部发言人周三表示,两国正在讨论此事,“中方军机无意侵入任何国家的领空”。
China’s regional and global ambitions are one of the points of contention between the United States and China. The Chinese statement after the meetings between Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Wang said that the two sides should have a “correct understanding” of the relationship in order to peacefully coexist — phrasing that China uses to mean that the United States should not regard China as seeking to dominate the world.
中国的地区和全球野心是中美之间的争议点之一。中方在沙利文和王毅会晤后发表的声明中表示,双方应“正确认知”中美关系,实现和平共处——中方用这一措辞的意思是,美国不应将中国视为寻求主宰世界。
Yun Sun, the director of the China program at the Stimson Center, a research group in Washington, said the Chinese statement indicated that Beijing was using Mr. Sullivan’s visit to “present an image of the U.S. ‘correcting its attitude,’” therefore enabling China to agree to stabilize relations.
华盛顿研究机构史汀生中心中国项目主任孙韵表示,中方的声明表明,中国政府正在利用沙利文的访问“展示美国正在‘端正态度’”,从而使中国有理由同意稳定两国关系。
The Chinese statement also emphasized Beijing’s unhappiness with American technology export controls and its stance on Taiwan, an island democracy that China claims as its territory.
中国的声明还强调了北京对美国技术出口管制,以及美国在台湾问题上的立场的不满。中国声称台湾这座民主岛屿是其领土。
The White House statement said American officials urged China to work with the United States to fight trafficking in narcotics that end up on the American streets, and it raised concerns over the detention of American citizens in the country.
白宫的声明称,美国官员敦促中国与美方合作打击最终流向美国街头的走私毒品,并对美国公民在中国遭到拘留表示关切。
American officials are scheduled to hold further talks with other top officials in downtown Beijing on Thursday.
曾为拜登政府和奥巴马政府制订经济政策的布拉德·塞策表示,两国在安全问题上的进展似乎超过了解决导致两国分歧的许多经济争端方面的进展。美国一直在向中国施压,要求其放慢对新工厂的巨额投资,称这将导致产能过剩。中国否认产能过剩是一个问题。
Brad Setser, a former economic policymaker in the Biden and Barack Obama administrations, said that the two countries appeared to have made more progress on security issues than on the many economic disputes that divide them. The United States has been pressing China to slow its heavy investments recently in new factories, contending that they would cause overcapacity. China has denied that overcapacity is a problem.
“美国的重点一直是建立信任措施,以限制未来发生误解的风险,美国当然欢迎‘战区’领导人之间即将进行的通话,”塞策在电子邮件中写道。
2024年8月29日
This month, X closed its Brazil operations after one of its executives was threatened with arrest for not taking down certain content. Last year, Changpeng Zhao, the founder of Binance, pleaded guilty to federal money-laundering violations that took place on his cryptocurrency platform. In 2021, Twitter executives in India faced arrest over posts that the government wanted removed from the site.
本月,X关闭了巴西业务,起因是一名当地高管因未删除某些内容而受到逮捕威胁。去年,加密货币平台币安的创始人赵长鹏对平台违反联邦反洗钱法的指控认罪。2021年,Twitter在印度的高管因政府希望删帖而面临逮捕。
And on Saturday, Pavel Durov, who founded the online communications tool Telegram, was arrested in France as part of an investigation into the platform’s complicity in crimes including possession and distribution of child sexual abuse imagery.
上周六,在线通讯工具Telegram的创始人帕维尔·杜罗夫在法国被逮捕,这是法国对该平台涉嫌参与拥有并传播儿童遭性虐待图片等犯罪行为所做调查的一部分。
For years, internet company executives rarely faced personal liability in Western democracies for what took place on their platforms. But as law enforcement agencies, regulators and policymakers ramp up scrutiny of online platforms and exchanges, they are increasingly considering when to hold company leaders directly responsible.
多年来,在西方民主国家,互联网公司的高管很少因平台上发生的事情而承担个人责任。但随着执法机构、监管部门和政策制定者加强对在线平台和平台上交流的审查,他们正在越来越多地考虑是否让公司领导人承担直接责任的问题。
That shift was punctuated by Mr. Durov’s arrest over the weekend, raising questions over whether tech executives like Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg also risk being arrested when they next set foot on European soil.
杜罗夫上周末的被捕表明了这个转变已经发生,同时也提出了像Meta的扎克伯格等科技公司高管下次踏上欧洲土地时是否也会面临被捕风险的问题。
For now, tech executives have little to fear, with cases like Mr. Durov’s likely to be outliers, experts said. Historically, companies have been held responsible for a platform’s transgressions, rather than individuals. And legally, the bar is high in the United States and Europe to prosecute individuals for activities at their companies, especially with U.S. laws like Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects internet platforms from being responsible for harmful speech.
专家们表示,就目前而言,科技高管还不用担心,因为杜罗夫的这种案子可能是特殊情况。从历史上看,平台违规行为的责任者是公司,而不是个人。从法律上看,美国和欧洲国家因公司活动对拥有公司的个人提起诉讼的门槛很高,尤其是在美国,因为美国有保护互联网平台免于对平台上的有害言论负法律责任的《通信规范法》第230条等法律。
But the threshold for holding executives liable for what takes place on their sites is lowering in specific areas, particularly child safety, said TJ McIntyre, an associate professor at University College Dublin’s School of Law.
都柏林大学法学院副教授T·J·麦金泰尔表示,但在某些具体领域,尤其是涉及儿童人身安全方面,因网站上发生的事情追究网站高管法律责任的门槛正在降低。
Last year, Britain passed an online safety law that can hold tech leaders personally responsible if their company is made aware of content that risks child safety and systematically fails to remove it. Even Section 230 doesn’t apply to some forms of outlawed speech, such as child sexual abuse.
去年,英国通过了一项网络安全法,如果科技公司意识到了其平台上存在危害儿童人身安全的内容,但未能系统性地将其删除的话,科技公司领导人将承担个人责任。即使是美国的第230条也不适用于某种形式的非法言论,例如描述儿童遭受性虐待的言论。
“There’s a 30-year arc here,” Mr. McIntyre said. Since the 1990s, he said, tech executives have not typically been held responsible for what users did on their platforms, though that approach is now being questioned by those who want stronger accountability.
“这条主线有30年的历史,”麦金泰尔说。他说,自20世纪90年代以来,科技高管们通常不会为用户在他们平台上的行为负责,但这种做法目前正受到希望加强问责制的人的质疑。
Mr. Durov, 39, has not been formally charged with any offenses and could remain in the custody of French authorities through Wednesday. While French authorities have provided few specifics, he faces a raft of potential charges related to activities on Telegram, including child sexual abuse material, drug trafficking, fraud, money laundering, abetting criminal transactions and refusing to cooperate with law enforcement.
现年39岁的杜罗夫尚未被正式指控犯有任何罪行,法国当局可能会将他拘留到周三。虽然法国当局没有提供具体细节,但他面临一系列与Telegram平台上的活动有关的潜在指控,包括儿童遭受性虐待的内容、贩毒、欺诈、洗钱、怂恿犯罪交易,以及拒绝与执法部门合作等。
Mr. Durov made himself a target with an anti-authority ethos that governments should not restrict what people say and do online except in rare instances, experts said. Unlike Meta, Google and other online platforms that typically comply with government orders, Telegram was also called out by French authorities for failing to cooperate with law enforcement.
专家们说,杜罗夫反权威的道德观让他本人成为打击目标,他认为政府不应该限制人们在网上的言行,除非在极少数情况下。与通常遵守政府命令的Meta、谷歌和其他在线平台不同,Telegram也曾因不与执法部门配合而受到法国当局的警告。
After Mr. Durov’s arrest, Telegram said that it abided by E.U. laws and that it was “absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform.”
Telegram在杜罗夫被捕后表示,该平台遵守欧盟法律,并表示,“声称平台或其所有者应对滥用平台的行为负责任是荒谬的”。
Tech companies are paying close attention to the legal liability that their executives may face. This year, Meta successfully fought to have Mr. Zuckerberg, its chief executive, removed as a named defendant in a lawsuit brought by New Mexico’s attorney general against the company for child protection failures.
科技公司正在密切关注高管可能面临的法律责任。今年,Meta成功争取到将首席执行官扎克伯格的名字从新墨西哥州总检察长对该公司提起的诉讼中撤掉,诉讼涉及该公司未能保护儿童的问题。
In China, Russia and other authoritarian countries, U.S. tech companies have sometimes pulled out their employees to prevent them from being arrested. The concern is employees will be used as leverage to force companies to do things like remove content unfavorable to the government.
在中国、俄罗斯和其他专制国家,美国科技企业为了防止员工被捕,有时会将他们撤离。这些公司担心,员工将被用作筹码,迫使公司做一些事情,比如删除不利于政府的内容。
Previously, only a few notable cases surfaced in which tech executives were seen as potentially liable for activities that took place on their services. In 1998, Felix Somm, a former executive at CompuServe, an online services company, was given a suspended two-year sentence in Germany for complicity in the proliferation of pornography on the internet. He was later acquitted. In 2002, Timothy Koogle, a former chief executive of Yahoo, faced charges in France for the sale of Nazi memorabilia on the website. He was also later acquitted.
此前,仅在少数曝光的引人注目的案件中,科技公司高管被认为可能要对服务平台上的活动负有责任。1998年,在线服务公司CompuServe的前高管菲利克斯·宋姆曾在德国被判处两年有期徒刑、缓期执行,罪名是在互联网上传播色情内容的同谋。他后来被判无罪。2002年,雅虎前首席执行官蒂莫西·库戈勒曾在法国面临指控,因为有人在雅虎网站上出售纳粹纪念品。他后来也被判无罪。
In 2012, Kim Dotcom, the founder of Megaupload, was arrested by U.S. authorities for copyright infringement related to his website. Ross W. Ulbricht, the creator of the Silk Road online black market, was convicted in the United States for facilitating illicit drug sales in 2015. In 2016, Brazil briefly imprisoned a Facebook executive for failing to turn over WhatsApp messaging data in a drug trafficking investigation.
2012年,Megaupload的创始人金姆·道特康姆曾被美国当局逮捕,因为其网站上有侵犯版权行为。2015年,名为“丝绸之路”的在线黑市创始人罗斯·乌布利希在美国被判有罪,罪名是为非法毒品销售提供便利。2016年,巴西曾短暂监禁了一名Facebook高管,因为他没有向一项贩毒调查移交WhatsApp短信通讯平台的数据。
These instances were capped over the weekend by Mr. Durov’s arrest.
杜罗夫上周末被逮捕这件事已超过了以前的情况。
One challenge for prosecutors and law enforcement agencies is proving a tech executive had knowledge of illegal activity on their platforms and did not try to curb the harms, said Daphne Keller, a professor of internet law at Stanford University Law School.
斯坦福大学法学院研究互联网法的教授达芙妮·凯勒表示,检察官和执法机构面临的一个挑战是,证明科技高管知道他们的平台上存在非法活动,却没有试图遏制这些危害。
That’s difficult to demonstrate, since TikTok, YouTube, Snap and Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, have worked to take down and report illegal content to law enforcement officials, so their executives can argue they tried to do the right thing.
这很难证明,因为TikTok、YouTube、Snap,以及拥有 Facebook和Instagram的Meta一直在努力删除非法内容,并将这些内容报告给执法官员,所以这些平台的高管能辩称,他们一直在努力做正确的事情。
“Knowledge is the key issue here,” said Ms. Keller, a former lawyer for Google. “It’s the usual trigger for anyone losing immunity.”
“是否知情是这里的一个关键问题,”凯勒说,她曾担任谷歌的律师。“这通常是一个人失去起诉豁免的触发因素。”
Still, the risk of prosecution is needed to force tech companies to act, said Bruce Daisley, who was a vice president at Twitter before Elon Musk bought the site in 2022 and renamed it X.
尽管如此,起诉风险是迫使科技公司采取行动的必要条件,布鲁斯·戴斯利说,他曾任Twitter副总裁,那是在2022年埃隆·马斯克收购了该网站、将其改名为X之前。
“That threat of personal sanction is much more effective on executives than the risk of corporate fines,” Mr. Daisley wrote recently in The Guardian.
“与公司被罚款的风险相比,个人受制裁的威胁对高管们来说要有效得多,”戴斯利最近在《卫报》上写道。
Mr. Musk, who takes a hands-off approach to policing content on X, may be putting himself at particular risk just like Mr. Durov, said Kate Klonick, an associate professor at St. John’s Law School who is researching E.U. regulation of online platforms.
马斯克对X上的内容采取不干涉的管理方式,他也许正在将自己置于杜罗夫面临的那种特定的危险之中,圣约翰法学院副教授凯特·克洛尼克说,她正在研究欧盟对在线平台的监管。
“If I was a betting person, I would say that there will be a day that Elon Musk is on trial or be in prison in some country because of his refusal and his thumbing the nose at the rule of law,” she said.
“如果我是个爱打赌的人,我会说,有朝一日,埃隆·马斯克会因为拒绝监管、蔑视法律而在某个国家受审或入狱,”她说。
Mr. Musk did not respond to a request for comment, but that prospect appears to be on his mind, too. The tech mogul, who has declared Mr. Durov’s arrest an affront to free expression, posted on X on Saturday: “POV: It’s 2030 in Europe and you’re being executed for liking a meme.”
马斯克没有回复置评请求,但他似乎也设想过这种前景。这位科技大亨宣称逮捕杜罗夫是对言论自由的侮辱,他周六在X上发帖:“观点:这是2030年的欧洲,你却因为喜欢一个米姆而被处死。”
2024年8月28日
For two years, a rural town in the middle of Michigan has been embroiled in a civil war over plans by a Chinese-owned electric vehicle battery company to build a $2.4 billion factory.
在过去两年里,密歇根州中部的一个乡间小镇卷入了一场内战,因为一家来自中国的电动车电池公司计划投资24亿美元在这里建厂。
On Tuesday, the local furor collided with presidential politics as the Trump campaign sought to leverage anti-China sentiment and concerns over the future of the electric vehicle industry in Michigan for political gain.
周二,当特朗普竞选团队试图利用反华情绪和人们对密歇根电动车行业未来的担忧谋取政治利益时,当地的愤怒与总统政治发生了冲突。
The fight over the E.V. battery facility has turned Green Charter Township, which is about 60 miles north of Grand Rapids, into the latest battleground over Chinese investment in the United States. Residents have expressed various concerns about the factory, including that it will be used by China to spy on Americans and will pollute the local environment.
围绕电池工厂的争斗,把位于大急流城以北约100公里的格林查特镇变成了中国在美投资的最新战场。当地居民对这家工厂表达了各种担忧,包括担心它会被中国用来监视美国人,会污染当地环境等。
The debate over the intentions of the Chinese company, Gotion, has led to angry town hall meetings, the ousting of the township’s board in an election last November and litigation over the future of the project.
围绕中国公司国轩高科的争吵,导致该城多次召开群情激愤的市政厅会议,去年11月的选举中还把本镇的董事会赶下台,并引发了围绕该项目未来的诉讼。
Michigan is a pivotal swing state in the November election, and a New York Times/Siena poll this month showed Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, leading former President Donald J. Trump, the Republican nominee, by 4 percentage points.
密歇根州是11月大选的一个关键摇摆州,《纽约时报》和锡耶纳本月联合进行的民调显示,民主党候选人、副总统贺锦丽领先共和党候选人、前总统特朗普4个百分点。
At a 150-acre horse farm owned by one of the most vocal “No Gotion” activists, Senator JD Vance, Mr. Trump’s running mate, blamed Ms. Harris for Gotion’s arrival in Michigan. In 2022, Ms. Harris cast the deciding vote that enabled passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, which created billions of dollars in new green energy subsidies and has lured foreign companies to the United States.
在一个占地60公顷的马场(这里的主人是“对国轩高科说不”运动的主要成员),特朗普的竞选伙伴、参议员JD·万斯指责贺锦丽是国轩高科落户密歇根的肇始者。2022年,贺锦丽投下了决定性的一票,使《通货膨胀削减法案》得以通过,该法案包括数十亿美元的新绿色能源补贴,并吸引了外国公司来美国落户。
“Kamala Harris not only wants to allow the Chinese Communist Party to build factories on American soil, she wants to pay them to do it with our tax money,” Mr. Vance said on Tuesday afternoon. “Democrats are helping China to destroy and replace our auto industry from the inside out.”
“贺锦丽不仅想让中共在美国领土上建厂,还想拿我们纳的税给他们建厂,”万斯在周二下午说。“民主党人正在帮助中国从里到外摧毁和取代我们的汽车业。”
The crowd of approximately 500 supporters of the Trump campaign, some of whom were wearing shirts accusing Chinese companies of using forced labor, erupted in boos when Mr. Vance mentioned Gotion.
当万斯提到国轩高科时,现场约500名特朗普的支持者发出嘘声。其中一些人还穿着指责中国公司使用强迫劳动的衬衫。
The Treasury Department has estimated that only 2 percent of the clean energy investments made in the United States during the Biden administration have been made by Chinese companies and that American companies or U.S. allies have made the rest.
据财政部估算,拜登政府期间在美国进行的清洁能源投资中,只有2%来自中国企业,其余则来自美国公司或美国的盟友。
During his brief tenure in the Senate, where he represents Ohio, Mr. Vance has been hawkish on China. He introduced a 2024 bill to combat Chinese currency manipulation and another piece of legislation that would ensure that inventions created by taxpayer-funded research cannot be manufactured in adversarial countries such as China.
在代表俄亥俄州担任参议员的短暂任期内,万斯一直对中国持鹰派立场。他在2024年提出了一项打击中国汇率操纵行为的法案,以及另一项确保纳税人资助的研究所创造的发明不能在中国等敌对国家进行生产的立法。
密歇根州大急流城和邻近的格林查特镇民众对国轩高科的建厂计划表达了各种担忧,包括担心它会被中国用来监视美国人,会污染当地环境等。
Mr. Trump has also talked tough on China, imposing steep tariffs on its exports while president and moving to ban TikTok from U.S. app stores over national security concerns. He has since equivocated on TikTok, saying that, if elected, he would “save TikTok.” And despite his anti-China views, as president Mr. Trump welcomed U.S. investment by Taiwan’s Foxconn, which derives much of its revenue from its Chinese factories.
特朗普的对华言论也很强硬,在担任总统期间对来自中国的出口产品征收了高额关税,并出于国家安全考虑,准备在美国的应用商店禁止TikTok。此后,他对TikTok的态度变得模棱两可,称如果当选的话,他将“拯救TikTok”。尽管持反华观点,特朗普在担任总统期间还是欢迎台湾的富士康到美国投资,富士康的大部分收入都来自它在中国的工厂。
At the 2018 groundbreaking for Foxconn’s $10 billion plant in Wisconsin to make flat-screen televisions, Mr. Trump called the project the “eighth wonder of the world.” Plans for the factory later sputtered amid changing market dynamics and much of the planned site remains undeveloped.
在2018年,在为富士康在威斯康星州投资100亿美元建设液晶面板厂举行的奠基仪式上,特朗普称该项目为“世界第八大奇迹”。然而,由于市场形势的变化,建厂计划后来搁浅,大部分规划用地依旧处于未开发状态。
Mr. Vance’s decision to wade into the fight over Gotion came in the wake of another shift by Mr. Trump, who earlier this year indicated openness to foreign investment. During remarks in March and at his July convention speech, Mr. Trump suggested that he would welcome foreign companies, including those from China, building car factories in the U.S. if they were staffed by American workers.
万斯决定介入国轩高科建厂之争之前,特朗普又一次态度转变,他在今年早些时候表示对外国投资持开放态度。在3月的讲话和7月的共和党全国大会的演讲中,特朗普表示,他欢迎包括中国公司在内的外国企业在美国建汽车厂,只要这些工厂的员工是美国人。
“If they want to build a plant in Michigan, in Ohio, in South Carolina, they can, using American workers, they can,” Mr. Trump said in March, adding that they could not send Chinese workers to staff those plants. “If they want to do that, we’re welcome, right?”
“如果他们想在密歇根、俄亥俄、南卡罗来纳州建厂,可以使用美国工人,他们可以的,”特朗普在3月表示,并补充道,他们不能派中国工人来这些岗位。“如果这一点他们能接受,我们欢迎,对吧?”
Gotion’s vice president of North American manufacturing, Chuck Thelen, embraced those remarks during a virtual town hall last month, suggesting that Mr. Trump was supportive of Chinese companies such as Gotion setting up shop in the U.S.
国轩高科负责北美业务的副总裁查克·希伦在上个月的虚拟市政厅会议上对此表示赞同,暗示特朗普支持像国轩高科这样的中国公司在美国落地。
Last week, Mr. Trump changed his tenor on the issue. He said that he opposed the Gotion project, which has been supported by Michigan Democrats. They include Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who has praised it as a win for the state. The battery factory is projected to create more than 2,000 jobs in the region.
就在上周,特朗普对该问题的态度再次发生转变。他表示反对国轩高科项目,该项目得到了密歇根州民主党人的支持,包括州长格雷琴·惠特默,她称赞这是该州的胜利。预计这家电池工厂将为该地区创造2000多个就业机会。
“The Gotion plant would be very bad for the State and our Country. It would put Michiganders under the thumb of the Chinese Communist Party in Beijing,” Mr. Trump wrote on social media. “I AM 100% OPPOSED!”
“国轩高科的工厂对密歇根州和我们的国家都非常不利。它将使密歇根人受制于北京的中国共产党,”特朗普在社交媒体上写道。“我百分之百反对!”
Mr. Thelen said in a statement that he had not meant to suggest that Mr. Trump supported the Gotion facility but noted that the company had a good relationship with the Trump administration. He said that the company was moving forward with its plans.
希伦在一份声明中表示,他并非有意暗示特朗普支持国轩高科的设施,但他指出,该公司与特朗普政府有着良好的关系。他说,该公司正在推进自己的计划。
“Speaking last month in Grand Rapids, former President Trump supported the onshoring of electrification manufacturing in our state and the United States by Chinese-affiliated companies,” Mr. Thelen said. “Trump wants the people of Michigan and our local economy to thrive from these types of jobs, and so do we.”
“前总统特朗普上个月在大急流城发表讲话时,支持中资企业将电气化制造业回流到本州和美国,”希伦说。“特朗普希望密歇根人民和我们当地的经济能够从这些类型的工作中获利,我们也希望如此。”
Gotion received $800 million in state subsidies, such as grants and tax exemptions, from Michigan’s strategic fund. The company could also be eligible to receive tax credits from the Inflation Reduction Act.
国轩高科从密歇根州的战略基金获得了8亿美元的州补贴,包括赠款和免税。该公司还有资格从《通货膨胀削减法案》中获得税收抵免。
The Coalition for a Prosperous America, which represents American manufacturers, estimates that Chinese companies could gain access to $125 billion in U.S. tax credits related to “green energy manufacturing” investments. Republicans in Congress have introduced legislation that would prevent Chinese companies from accessing such tax credits.
代表美国制造商的“繁荣美国联盟”估计,中国企业可能获得与“绿色能源制造”投资相关的1250亿美元的税收抵免。国会中的共和党人已经提出了立法,旨在阻止中国公司获取这些税收抵免。
The debate over the future of Gotion has led to arguments about the environment, national security and the local economy.
围绕国轩高科未来的争论引发了关于环境、国家安全和当地经济的争论。
“It’s important for Michigan to have jobs in these new industries,” said Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business. “The question is, should we be giving subsidies to a Chinese company so we can have these jobs or could there be another alternative?”
“对密歇根来说,在这些新兴行业创造就业机会非常重要,”密歇根大学罗斯商学院教授埃里克·戈登表示。“问题是,我们是否应该向一家中国公司提供补贴,从而获得这些工作岗位,还是有其他选择?”
The Biden administration has expressed concern about Chinese companies benefiting from the 2022 climate and tax law but officials have said that the legislation does not allow them to exclude foreign companies from getting tax incentives.
拜登政府对中国企业从2022年的气候和税法中受益表示担忧,但官员们表示,该立法不允许他们将外国公司排除在税收优惠之外。
The Harris campaign did not immediately have a comment on Mr. Vance’s criticism of the vice president.
贺锦丽的竞选团队没有立即对万斯对副总统的批评发表评论。
In June, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. proposed adding a military facility located near the planned Gotion factory to a list of sites that would give the investment review panel more authority to block foreign transactions. However, the rule would not be retroactive and could only obstruct Gotion from buying additional land in the area.
今年6月,美国外国投资委员会提议,将位于计划中的国轩高科工厂附近的一处军事设施列入清单,这将赋予投资审查委员会更大的权力来阻止外国交易。然而,该规定没有追溯力,只能阻止国轩高科在该地区购买更多土地。
Mr. Vance, speaking after his prepared remarks, made no promises about what Mr. Trump might be able to do to stop construction of the Gotion factory if he is elected.
万斯的话是在事先准备好的发言之后说的,但他没有承诺如果特朗普当选,他可能会采取什么措施来阻止国轩高科工厂的建设。
“Hopefully it progresses slowly and there is something we can do about it,” Mr. Vance told reporters.
万斯对记者说,“希望进展缓慢,让我们能做点什么。”
The feud has divided Green Charter Township and the surrounding area in Michigan, leading to protests at town meetings and an aggressive “No Gotion” social media campaign. The township’s Republican board of trustees that had approved the Gotion factory was voted out last November and replaced with officials who pledged to stop the project.
这场争斗使密歇根州的格林查特镇和周边地区分裂,引发了镇会议上的抗议活动,以及社交媒体上一场声势浩大的“对国轩高科说不”运动。去年11月,批准国轩高科工厂的共和党董事会被投票否决,取而代之的是承诺停止该项目的官员。
Those efforts, which have included a move to block Gotion from accessing the local water supply, have so far been stymied by a lawsuit that the company filed against the township that alleges the officials are backing out of a legally binding agreement.
这些努力,包括阻止国轩高科获得当地水资源的行动,迄今一直受到该公司对该镇提起的诉讼的阻碍,该诉讼指控官员背弃了一项具有法律约束力的协议。
At Mr. Vance’s rally, many expressed hope that a Trump administration would support their efforts to stop Gotion.
在万斯的集会上,许多人表示希望特朗普政府会支持他们阻止国轩高科的努力。
“I’m really worried that they’re going to end up polluting the river,” Don Taylor, 82, of Hersey, Mich., said. “I don’t trust the communist Chinese, either.”
“我真的很担心它们最终会污染这条河,”82岁的唐·泰勒说,他来自密歇根州赫西说。“另外我也不相信共产中国。”
Lori Brock, leader of the movement to stop Gotion and owner of the Majestic Friesians Horse Farm where Mr. Vance spoke, said on Tuesday that it was “reckless and absurd” that the state and federal government are subsidizing a company controlled by China, which has a history of spying on the United States.
洛莉·布洛克是阻止国轩高科运动的领导人,也是万斯集会所在的雄伟弗里斯马场的所有者。她在周二表示,州政府和联邦政府补贴一家由中国控制的公司是“鲁莽和荒谬的”,而中国有对美国进行间谍活动的历史。
“We are against it and we don’t want it here,” Ms. Brock said. “The Chinese Communist Party is the biggest national security threat that our country has faced in decades.”
“我们反对它,我们不希望它出现在这里,”布洛克说。“中国共产党是我国几十年来面临的最大国家安全威胁。”
2024年8月28日
When Donald J. Trump ran for president in 2016, there was not much love for tariffs in Washington. Many Republicans and Democrats believed that putting levies on imports created economic inefficiencies and that freer trade was the best recipe for growth.
当特朗普在2016年竞选总统时,华盛顿对关税并没有多少好感。许多共和党人和民主党人认为,对进口商品征税会导致经济效率低下,更自由的贸易才是促进经济增长的最佳良方。
That view has largely fallen out of fashion in 2024. While Mr. Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, differ greatly in their campaign proposals, both of their parties are increasingly embracing tariffs as an essential tool in protecting American manufacturers from Chinese and other global competitors.
到2024年,这种观点基本上已经过时了。尽管特朗普和民主党候选人、副总统贺锦丽在竞选中提出的方案存在很大分歧,但两党都日益将关税视为保护美国制造商免受中国和其他全球竞争对手冲击的重要工具。
It has been a sharp reversal from previous decades, when most politicians fought to lower tariffs rather than raise them. But the loss of American manufacturing jobs as a result of globalization and China’s focus on churning out cheap exports have created a bipartisan backlash against more open trade. Given that Mr. Trump’s 2016 win capitalized on such sentiments, Democrats have been striving to avoid losing voters opposed to free trade.
这与过去几十年的情况截然相反,当时大多数政治人士都在努力降低关税,而不是提高关税。但是,由于全球化和中国专注于大量生产廉价出口产品,导致美国制造业工作岗位的流失,两党对更开放的贸易产生了强烈反对。特朗普2016年的胜利正是利用了这种情绪,因此民主党人一直在努力避免失去反对自由贸易的选民。
“On economic policy and trade issues, you have both major parties moving in the same direction,” said Nick Iacovella, a senior vice president at the Coalition for a Prosperous America, which advocates tariffs and domestic investments in industry.
“在经济政策和贸易问题上,两党在朝着同一个方向前进,”倡导关税和国内工业投资的繁荣美国联盟高级副总裁尼克·亚科维拉说。
Mr. Iacovella said that Mr. Trump would most likely go further on tariffs than Ms. Harris would, but that no matter who won the election “it’s still going to be a tariffs administration, and an industrial policy one.”
亚科维拉说,特朗普在关税问题上很可能会比贺锦丽走得更远,但无论谁赢得选举,“都将是一个关税政府,一个产业政策政府”。
Ms. Harris has sought to differentiate herself from Mr. Trump’s trade proposals, which include tariffs of 10 percent to 20 percent on most imports, as well as levies of more than 60 percent on China. Many economists say that level of tariffs would drive up prices for consumers, since companies would be likely to pass on higher import costs.
贺锦丽试图将自己与特朗普的贸易提议区分开来,后者包括对大多数进口商品征收10%至20%的关税,以及对中国征收60%以上的关税。许多经济学家表示,这一关税水平将推高消费者的价格,因为企业可能会将更高的进口成本转嫁给消费者。
At the Democratic National Convention in Chicago last week, Ms. Harris described the proposals as “a national sales tax — call it a Trump tax” — and said the plans “would raise prices on middle-class families by almost $4,000 a year.”
上周在芝加哥举行的民主党全国代表大会上,贺锦丽将这些提议描述为“一种全国性的销售税——称之为特朗普税”——并表示,这些计划“将使中产阶级家庭的生活成本每年上涨近4000美元”。
Economists’ estimates vary, but the left-leaning Center for American Progress Action Fund calculated that the tariffs could increase costs on a middle-income family by $3,900 per year.
经济学家的估计各不相同,但根据左倾的美国进步中心行动基金的计算,关税可能会使一个中等收入家庭每年增加3900美元的成本。
Ms. Harris has not said much about how she would approach tariffs, including whether she would impose additional levies on China. But Charles Lutvak, a spokesperson for the Harris-Walz campaign, said in a statement that Ms. Harris would “employ targeted and strategic tariffs to support American workers, strengthen our economy, and hold our adversaries accountable.”
贺锦丽没有透露她将如何处理关税问题,包括是否会对中国征收额外关税。但贺锦丽-沃尔兹竞选团队的发言人查尔斯·卢特瓦克在声明中表示,贺锦丽将“采用有针对性的战略性关税来支持美国工人,加强我们的经济,并让我们的对手承担责任。”
Despite early criticisms of Mr. Trump’s trade policy, the Biden administration has kept the former president’s initial tariffs on China in place and proposed adding another $18 billion of new levies on some Chinese products, including a 100 percent tax on electric vehicles. The administration also proposed new tariffs on electric vehicle batteries, semiconductors, steel and medical products, in an effort to ensure that newly invested American factories can stay in business.
尽管在早期批评了特朗普的贸易政策,拜登政府还是保留了前总统最初对中国征收的关税,并提议对一些中国产品再征收180亿美元的新关税,包括对电动汽车征收100%的关税。拜登政府还提议对电动汽车电池、半导体、钢铁和医疗产品征收新关税,以确保新获得投资的美国工厂能够继续经营。
副总统贺锦丽试图将自己的贸易提案与特朗普的区分开来。一名竞选官员表示,她将在上任后实施“有针对性和战略性的关税”。
The Biden administration is set to issue its final determination on those levies before the end of August. Last month, it also imposed additional tariffs on certain metals from Mexico, seeking to block Chinese materials from a route into the United States.
拜登政府将在8月底之前发布关于这些关税的最终决定。上个月,政府还对来自墨西哥的某些金属征收了额外关税,试图阻止中国材料进入美国。
Inu Manak, a trade policy expert at the Council on Foreign Relations, said politicians of both parties were now more willing to argue that they could increase tariffs without any negative effects. She pointed to a recent poll by the Cato Institute that showed that Republicans and Democrats had high levels of support for hypothetical tariffs imposed by their party but not the other party.
美国外交关系委员会贸易政策专家伊努·马纳克表示,两党政界人士现在都更愿意声称他们可以在不产生任何负面影响的情况下提高关税。她指出,卡托研究所最近的一项民意调查显示,共和党人和民主党人对本党征收的假想关税支持率都很高,而对另一党征收的假想关税则不然。
“When Harris criticizes Trump, she’s not criticizing tariff policy, she’s criticizing his tariff policy,” Ms. Manak said. “And I’m sure if she proposed something, Democrats would think that’s great.”
“当贺锦丽批评特朗普时,她不是在批评关税政策,而是在批评他的关税政策,”马纳克说。“我敢肯定,如果她提出一些关税,民主党人会认为很好。”
The tariffs that Mr. Trump has floated are orders of magnitude larger than what President Biden’s administration has proposed, presumably covering more than $3 trillion of trade, and implying a much bigger impact on the economy.
特朗普提出的关税比拜登政府要高得多,可能涉及超过三万亿美元的贸易,对经济的影响也要大得多。
In addition to a universal tariff on all imports and higher tariffs on China, he has suggested a reciprocal policy in which the United States will match tariffs that another nation imposes on American exports.
除了对所有进口商品征收普遍关税和对中国征收更高的关税外,他还提出了一项互惠政策,即美国将对另一个国家征收的关税,将与该国对美国出口商品征收的关税相匹配。
Speaking in Asheville, N.C., last week, Mr. Trump said he might double the 10 percent tariff he had already proposed on most foreign goods.
特朗普上周在北卡罗来纳州阿什维尔发表讲话时表示,他已提议对大多数外国商品征收的10%关税,他可能会把这个数字提高一倍。
“We are going to have 10 to 20 percent tariffs on foreign countries that have been ripping us off for years,” he told the crowd.
“我们将对那些多年来一直抢劫我们的国家征收10%到20%的关税,”他对人群说。
Economists generally agree that tariffs of this size would have a noticeable effect on consumer prices, while also raising costs for manufacturers that buy imported parts or materials. About a third of U.S. imports are inputs that go into American farms and factories.
经济学家普遍认为,这种规模的关税将对消费者价格产生显著影响,同时也会提高购买进口零部件或材料的制造商的成本。美国大约三分之一的进口流入美国农场和工厂。
Large tariffs could also incite retaliation from foreign countries, kicking off a damaging trade war. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the director general of the World Trade Organization, said this year that a 10 percent American import tariff could lead to a “free-for-all which would upend the stability and predictability of trade.”
高额关税还可能引发其他国家的报复,从而引发破坏性的贸易战。世界贸易组织总干事恩戈齐·奥孔乔-伊维拉今年表示,对美国进口商品征收10%的关税,可能会导致“一场混战,颠覆贸易的稳定性和可预测性”。
Mary Lovely, an economist at the Peterson Institute, said tariffs seemed to be the “solution du jour — a supposed remedy for a hollowed-out manufacturing sector, left-behind communities, and income inequality.”
彼得森国际经济研究所的经济学家玛丽·洛夫里表示,关税似乎是“当前的解决方案——一种被认为可以解决制造业空心化、落后社区和收入不平等的补救措施。”
“Unfortunately, tariffs remedy none of these ills, and, sadly, higher tariffs will make them worse,” Ms. Lovely said.
“不幸的是,关税无法补救这些弊病,而且令人遗憾的是,更高的关税会让它们变得更糟,”洛夫里说。
保罗·威尔伯恩是阿拉巴马州阿什兰威尔伯恩橱柜公司的总裁。他认为关税挽救了他的公司和整个行业。
But the tariffs have proved popular with industries that have faced stiff competition from Chinese firms, like makers of kitchen cabinets. Paul Wellborn, the president of Wellborn Cabinet, a manufacturer of kitchen and bath cabinets in Ashland, Ala., credited tariffs with saving his company and the industry.
但事实证明,这些关税在那些面临中国企业激烈竞争的行业中很受欢迎,比如厨柜制造商。保罗·威尔伯恩是阿拉巴马州阿什兰的厨房和浴室柜制造商威尔伯恩橱柜公司的总裁。他认为关税挽救了他的公司和整个行业。
Wellborn Cabinet’s sales fell after the Great Recession, when the housing market collapsed and with it demand for new cabinets. But as the economy started to recover, business was still slow, Mr. Wellborn said. The industry realized that Chinese companies had taken over about 40 percent of the market and that their share was continuing to grow.
经济大衰退后,房地产市场崩溃,对新橱柜的需求下降,威尔伯恩橱柜公司的销售额随之下降。但威尔伯恩说,随着经济开始复苏,生意也没有好起来。该行业意识到,中国公司已经占据了大约40%的市场份额,而且这一份额还在继续增长。
Wellborn Cabinet joined with others in its industry to mount an investigation into Chinese trade practices, which resulted in tariffs ranging from 4 percent to nearly 300 percent on Chinese cabinets. The industry was further helped as Mr. Trump added first 10 percent and then an additional 15 percent of tariffs on top.
与业内其他公司一道,威尔伯恩橱柜公司对中国的贸易行为进行了调查,该调查结果最终令当局对中国橱柜征收4%至近300%的关税。特朗普先是增加了10%的关税,然后又增加了15%,进一步帮助了该行业的发展。
“He’s right on the money as far as tariffs,” Mr. Wellborn said of Mr. Trump.
“在关税问题上,他是对的,”威尔伯恩在谈到特朗普时说。
Other companies have been more critical. Thomas Shaw, the founder of Retractable Technologies, a maker of syringes, said that he supported tariffs and American manufacturing, but that the government had not given his company time to relocate before imposing the levies.
其他公司则提出了更多的批评。注射器制造商Retractable Technologies的创始人托马斯·肖表示,他支持关税和美国制造业,但政府在征收关税之前没有给他的公司重新部署的时间。
The company makes some of its syringes and needles in a plant in Little Elm, Texas, while making others in China. Mr. Shaw claimed he had been blocked from producing more in the United States by anticompetitive behavior, and had been forced to go to China to manufacture what he described as an innovative product that had reduced needle sticks for nurses and helped the government deploy vaccines during the pandemic.
该公司在得克萨斯州小榆树的一家工厂生产部分注射器和针头,在中国生产其他产品。肖声称,反竞争行为阻碍了他在美国生产更多产品,并且被迫去中国生产他所称的一种创新产品,这种产品可以减少护士被针头扎到的情况,并帮助政府在疫情期间部署疫苗。
This year, the Biden administration said it would give the company only a few months before a 50 percent tariff on Chinese syringes went into effect, which was an unrealistically short period to move a factory around the world, Mr. Shaw said.
今年,拜登政府表示,在对来自中国的注射器征收50%的关税生效之前,只会给该公司几个月的时间,肖说,要把工厂迁到别国,这个时间短到不切实际。
“We were forced to go to China, and now with the tariff we’re being forced to go back,” he said. “What it’s doing is it is making it more difficult for us every day.”
“我们是被迫去中国的,现在由于关税,我们又被迫回来,”他说。“这是让我们的日子一天比一天难过。”
Even if tariffs cause certain economic duress, they may still be a winning formula politically. One study put out this year by a prominent group of economists, for example, found that Mr. Trump’s China tariffs had little effect on employment in the industries protected by the tariffs. But politically, they were a success, resulting in more support for Mr. Trump and the Republican Party in the affected areas.
即使关税造成了一定的经济压力,但在政治上,它们可能仍然是一个制胜的法宝。例如,一个由著名经济学家组成的研究小组今年发表的一项研究发现,对于受关税保护的行业的就业,特朗普对中国征收的关税几乎没有产生任何影响。但在政治上,它们取得了成功,在受影响地区为特朗普和共和党赢得了更多支持。
“Some of the support it creates for Republicans might be due to the fact that people appreciate the government reacting to, standing up to China,” David Dorn, an economist at the University of Zurich and one of the study’s authors, said in an interview this year.
“它为共和党人带来的支持,可能是由于人们赞赏政府对中国做出了反应,站出来反对中国,”苏黎世大学经济学家、该研究的作者之一戴维·多恩今年在接受采访时说。
2024年8月28日
For Shanghai’s lonely and retired, love is elusive. Divorced or widowed residents gather in a dating corner in People’s Park every weekend looking for a chat. They mill about an Ikea canteen on Tuesdays in search of some fun.
对于孤单的上海退休人士来说,爱情难觅。每个周末,这些离异或丧偶的居民聚集在人民公园的相亲角,寻找聊天的机会。每个周二,他们则来到一个宜家的餐厅找消遣。
They arrive dressed a little nicer than usual, ready to talk about their virtues, their past lives and the future.
他们穿着比平时略微体面一点的衣服,准备谈论自己的优点、过去的生活,还有未来。
“I’m simple. I don’t smoke cigarettes or play mahjong,” said Xu Xiaoduo, 70, a twice-divorced former primary-school teacher who volunteers details about his pension (around $1,250 a month) and his dancing abilities (very good).
“我这个人很简单。不抽烟,也不打麻将,”现年70岁的徐晓铎(音)说,他曾是一名小学教师,离过两次婚,他主动谈到了自己的退休金和舞技的细节,前者是每月9000元,后者是非常好。
“But,” he added with a sigh, “I can’t find true love.” Others share his frustrations, but downplay any yearning to find love. More than a few say they have lost hope.
但他叹了口气补充道,“我找不到真正的爱情。”其他人也有与他一样的沮丧,但对爱情的渴望则轻描淡写。不少人说他们已经不抱希望了。
It should not be this hard. There are more people in China who are 65 or older than there are in any other country. And Shanghai has more older adults than any other Chinese city. Most of these residents stopped working long ago because China has one of the lowest retirement ages in the world, and many are either widowed or divorced. Everyone seems to be lonely, the children and grandchildren too busy with their own lives to visit.
爱情不应该这么难。中国65岁或以上的人口比任何国家都要多。上海上了年纪的人口已超过中国其他城市。由于中国是世界上退休年龄最低的国家之一,这些人当中的大多数早已不再工作,不少人要么丧偶,要么离婚。他们似乎都有些孤独,儿孙们忙于自己的生活,无暇探访。
The pool of older singles in China is only becoming bigger. Within the next three decades, the population of people who are 65 or older is expected to reach 400 million, according to the International Monetary Fund.
中国的单身老年人口只会越来越多。据国际货币基金组织的数据,在未来30年里,中国65岁或以上的人口预计将达到4亿。
人民公园的相亲角以吸引父母周末来这里为未婚子女找对象而闻名,现在也成为了老年人的社交中心。
人民公园的“相亲市场”主要是针对来这里为未婚子女找对象的父母,它也启发了老年人将公园作为聚会场所的想法。
As people in China live longer and as ideas about love and marriage change, more people are looking for a second, or third, chance at love. To help fill the void, dating shows have popped up with titles like “Not Too Late for Fate.” Online, there are chat rooms, livestreaming matchmakers and dating apps for the old and single.
随着中国人寿命的延长,以及爱情和婚姻观念的改变,越来越多的人正在寻找爱情的第二春或第三春。为了填补这一空白,《缘来不晚》等相亲节目应运而生。网上有为单身老年人提供的聊天室、媒人直播间,以及约会应用程序。
But there is no substitute for getting together.
但没有能代替社交聚会的东西。
Every week in Shanghai, hundreds of older adults return to the same designated corners of public parks and, for some reason that no one was able to explain, one dining area at an Ikea in the upscale district of Xuhui, hopeful of meeting a future spouse.
每周都有数百名老人抱着遇到未来伴侣的希望,回到公园里的老地方,以及回到一家位于“高大上”的徐汇区的宜家餐厅(为什么是这家餐厅没人知道原因)。
The gatherings are social events — people bring karaoke machines and speakers to the park to dance and sing. They bring thermoses to Ikea to fill with free coffee, and sit around birch and plastic white tables swapping stories about their childhoods.
这些聚会是社交活动。人们带着卡拉OK机和扬声器来公园唱歌跳舞。他们带着保温杯来到宜家餐厅,装满免费的咖啡,坐在桦木和白色塑料桌子旁,聊起各自的童年往事。
There are regulars, like Ma Guoying, 64, who has a warm smile and likes to wear bright colors and large, round glasses. She has spent a lot of time at Ikea and People’s Park over the past several months. Her friend Zhang Xiaolan, 66, has been coming for a decade.
这里有一些常客,比如64岁的马国英(音),她笑容亲切,喜欢穿鲜艳的衣服,戴一副大大的圆眼镜。过去几个月里,她在宜家和人民公园度过了很多时光。她的朋友、66岁的张晓兰(音)过去10年一直会来这里。
Neither of them has had much luck finding a man. The older ones always seem to want younger women.
她俩都没能找到合适的对象。年长的男人似乎总是喜欢年轻女子。
But it’s an activity that fills up a few hours of the day.
但这是一项可以消磨一天中好几个小时的活动。
“If we stay at home 24 hours a day, our brains would deteriorate,” Ms. Ma said. Divorced and retired many years ago, she said it was lonely at home. Her daughter calls only occasionally, mostly just to check on her.
“如果一天24小时呆在家里,大脑会退化的,”多年前离婚并已退休的马国英说。她说自己在家里很孤独,女儿只是偶尔打来电话,主要是为了看她是否安好。
父母们带着未婚的成年子女的履历来人民公园展示。
对于上海的老年人来说,在公园聚会是一件不可取代的事。每周都有数百人回到公园里的老地方,希望能遇到未来的伴侣。
A leafy plot of land at the center of Shanghai, People’s Park has a long history of serving as a meeting place, first for gamblers, then for student protesters and those hoping to practice their English. Today, it is better known for its “marriage market,” a place where parents return weekend after weekend with relentless optimism about finding a match for their unmarried and childless offspring. They bring résumés with personal details like the height and weight of their children, and they boast of attributes like I.Q. level, university degrees and test scores.
绿树成荫的人民公园位于上海市中心,长期以来一直是人们聚会的场所,先是赌徒的聚集地,后来成了学生抗议者和希望练习英语者的聚集地。如今,它又以“婚恋市场”而闻名,一个又一个周末,父母们带着不懈的乐观精神来到这里,希望为他们未婚无孩的子女找到合适的对象。他们带着简历,上面写着孩子的身高和体重等个人资料,还夸耀孩子们的智商水平、大学学位和考试成绩。
It seemed only natural that the park could also become a meeting point for another kind of romantic hopeful: the retired and bored.
这个公园也很自然而然地成了另一种渴望恋爱者的聚集地:退休的人和无聊的人。
“Gradually, someone thought if the children could find a partner, so can the parents,” said Liu Qiyu, who was dressed in a blue velvet corduroy sweatsuit and accessorized with a gold watch, chains and a silk scarf. As older men and women began to crowd around in groups nearby, Mr. Liu explained that he wasn’t looking for someone himself.
“渐渐地,有人觉得,如果孩子们能找到伴侣,那父母也能,”刘其宇(音)说。他穿着蓝丝绒运动服,戴着金表、链子和丝巾。当年长的男女开始三五成群地围拢过来,刘其宇解释说他自己并不是在找对象。
“I came here once or twice, looking for the other half, but I couldn’t find one,” he said.
“我来过一两次,想找另一半,但没找到,”他说。
Like the weekend park meet-ups, Tuesdays at Ikea tend to attract people between the ages of 60 and 80 looking for what has become known in China as “twilight love.”
就像周末的公园聚会一样,宜家每周二的活动也往往会吸引60到80岁的人,他们寻找在中国被称为“黄昏恋”的爱情。
For a few hours in the afternoon, the Swedish furniture retailer has the feel of a social club. The second floor of the store has some of the usual weekday traffic — shoppers who amble through the cafeteria’s metal stanchions picking out the famous meatballs, almond cakes and lingonberry juice. But many more have come for something other than Swedish fare, some bringing their own food and loitering from table to table, pulling chairs up to where friends and acquaintances are seated.
在下午的几个小时里,这家瑞典家具零售商给人一种社交俱乐部的感觉。商店二楼有一部分是平日里的那种客流——购物者在自助餐厅的金属架间穿行,挑选著名的肉丸、杏仁蛋糕和越橘汁。但更多的人来到这里不是为了瑞典美食,有些人自带食物,从一张桌子走到另一张桌子,把椅子拉到朋友和熟人坐的地方。
In the brightly lit bathroom, off to the side of the shop floor, women gather to gossip. One is putting on lipstick.
在大厅另一边灯光很亮的卫生间里,女人们在一起闲聊。一个人在涂口红。
每周二下午,这家宜家餐厅都会成为数十名老年居民聚会的地方。
Online dating isn’t really a thing for the men and women here. They have smartphones, or at least they have the means to buy one, but most say they don’t want to search for a partner online.
对这里的男女来说,网上约会并不流行。他们有智能手机,或者至少有能力购买智能手机,但大多数人表示,他们不想在网上寻找伴侣。
“When it comes to buying things, I go online,” said Li Zhiming, 69, who had styled his black hair with gel and was wearing eyeliner and bell bottoms. “I don’t think online dating is reliable.”
“我买东西都在网上,”69岁的李志明(音)说。他画着眼线,穿着喇叭裤,黑发用了啫喱来造型。“我觉得网上约会不可靠。”
Mr. Li said his wife had left him and their young son to go abroad in 1996, the early years of China’s reform and economic opening. He has been alone ever since. After retiring from a job as an engineer nine years ago, he started to plan his days with activities. He plays cards, dances to Latin music and can sing.
李志明说,他的妻子在1996年离开了他和他们年幼的儿子去了国外,那是中国改革开放的初期。从那以后,他一直孤身一人。九年前从工程师的岗位上退休后,他开始为自己的生活规划各种活动。他打牌,跟着拉丁音乐跳舞,还唱歌。
“I have my own apartment, a pension and a healthy body,” Mr. Li said.
“我有房、有养老金、身体健康,”李志明说。
He said he wanted to find a woman who was “young and beautiful.” In exchange, he promised to cook and take care of her. “I am lonely at home,” he said.
他说他想找一个“年轻漂亮”的女人。作为交换,他答应做饭和照顾她。“我在家里很孤独,”他说。
Zheng Yue, 70, chose to sit alone and wait for someone to come to her. Like many other women here, she did not want to give her full identity, instead providing the name she used on her public social media account.
70岁的郑悦(音)选择独坐,等着有人来搭讪。和这里的许多其他女性一样,她不想透露自己的完整身份,而是提供了她在公共社交媒体账户上使用的名字。
Ms. Zheng, whose husband was a former police officer and died from an injury he had suffered years earlier, is looking for a man who is “knowledgeable, sensible, mature, stable, amiable and kind.” Someone, she added, whom she could “hold hands with for a lifetime.”
郑悦的前夫是一名警察,多年前因伤去世,她想找一个“博学、理性、成熟、稳重、和蔼、善良”的男人。她还说,她想找一个可以“牵手一生”的人。
It takes a lot for women to come to these gatherings, she said. They tend to be more shy about finding a new partner.
她说,女性参加这些聚会需要付出很大的努力。她们往往更不好意思寻找新伴侣。
“We are brave enough to come by ourselves and take the first step.”
“我们有足够的勇气自己过来,迈出第一步。”
张晓兰(音)和马国英(音)是好友,她们穿着粉色衣服来到宜家,和其他老人一起喝下午茶。
上海单身老年人的聚会不仅仅是寻找伴侣的机会,也是他们的社交活动。
2024年8月28日
Making another heavy push to work with China in the waning months of the Biden administration, Jake Sullivan arrived in Beijing on Tuesday for talks aimed at showing that the United States and China can manage their differences.
在拜登政府剩下的几个月时间里,杰克·沙利文再次大力推动与中国的合作。他于周二抵达北京,参加旨在表明美中能管控双方分歧的会谈。
The U.S. national security adviser began his fifth meeting in less than 18 months with China’s top foreign policy official, Wang Yi, as the Biden administration seeks to reinforce its strategy on China despite uncertainty over the future of American foreign policy.
这是美国总统国家安全事务助理在不到18个月的时间里第五次与中国级别最高的外交政策官员王毅举行会谈。尽管美国外交政策面临不确定的未来,拜登政府仍在谋求进一步深化其对华战略。
There is much to talk about — but probably little on which they will agree.
虽然要谈的话题有很多,但双方达成共识的可能性很小。
Mr. Sullivan plans to discuss working with China on limiting the spread of fentanyl and expanding high-level military contacts. He will also stress the United States’ position on Taiwan and its concerns about China’s support of Russia.
沙利文打算在限制芬太尼扩散和扩大高层军事接触方面与中国讨论合作问题。他还将强调美国在台湾问题上的立场,以及美国对中国支持俄罗斯的关切。
China indicated it would raise its own objections during the talks — including over America’s support for Taiwan, the island democracy Beijing claims, and U.S. controls on exports of technology to China.
中国已表示将在会谈中提出自己的不同看法,包括美国对台湾的支持(中国声称对民主自治的台湾拥有主权),以及美国限制对华技术出口问题。
Beijing wants the United States to ease its pressure on China, in the hope that it would set the tone for smoother relations with the next U.S. administration, analysts said.
分析人士称,北京方面想要美国减轻对华施压,希望这能为中国与下一届美国政府建立更顺畅的关系定下基调。
“China’s priority is to maintain the stability of China-U.S. relations in the last several months of Biden’s presidency,” said Zhao Minghao, an expert on U.S.-China relations at Fudan University in Shanghai.
“中国的首要任务是在拜登总统任期的最后几个月里保持中美关系的稳定,”上海复旦大学中美关系专家赵明昊说。
The prospect of a potential meeting between President Biden and China’s leader, Xi Jinping, before Mr. Biden’s term ends, is likely to come up. (It was unclear if Mr. Sullivan would meet with Mr. Xi during his three-day visit.)
沙利文很可能会提出拜登与中国领导人习近平在拜登任期结束前举行会晤的前景。(目前尚不清楚沙利文是否会在这次为期三天的访问中见到习近平。)
Here are some of the issues Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Wang are expected to broach:
以下是沙利文和王毅预计将讨论的一些问题:
Taiwan and Ukraine
台湾和乌克兰
Perhaps the biggest flash points in relations between China and the United States are Russia’s war in Ukraine and China’s increasing aggression toward Taiwan.
中美关系问题的最大爆发点可能是俄罗斯对乌克兰发动的战争,以及中国对台湾越来越咄咄逼人的做法。
Mr. Sullivan is likely to urge China to reduce its support to Russia, which the United States and NATO say has helped sustain Russia’s war effort, now in its third year. China buys huge quantities of Russian oil and supplies Russia with dual-use technology that can be applied to the battlefield, U.S. officials say.
沙利文可能会敦促中国减少对俄罗斯的支持。美国和北约认为,中国对俄罗斯的支持帮助它继续在乌克兰作战,这场战争目前已进入第三年。美国官员说,中国购买了大量的俄罗斯石油,并向俄罗斯提供了可用于战场的军民两用技术。
Beijing is unlikely to turn its back on Moscow, its only major-power partner in counterbalancing the United States.
北京则不太可能背弃莫斯科,俄罗斯是中国在制衡美国上唯一的大国伙伴。
Chinese officials will seek to criticize U.S. support for Taiwan, which Mr. Xi has threatened to take by force, if necessary. Beijing accuses Washington of promoting “Taiwan independence” by supplying the island with arms and allowing for exchanges between American and Taiwanese officials.
中国官员将试图批评美国对台湾的支持,习近平曾威胁在必要时使用武力收复台湾。北京指责华盛顿推动“台湾独立”,包括向台湾提供武器,允许美台官员互访。
China said in a statement on Sunday that the United States needed to do more to repair relations. “The United States has kept containing and suppressing China,” a foreign ministry statement said. The relationship, it said, is “still at a critical juncture of being stabilized.”
中国政府在周日的一份声明中表示,美国需要在修复两国关系上采取更多行动。“美国继续对华遏制打压,”外交部的声明写道,并表示,“中美关系仍处在止跌企稳的关键关口”。
Taiwan was “the first and foremost red line that must not be crossed,” the statement read.
“台湾问题是中美关系第一条不可逾越的红线,”声明写道。
Technology Controls
技术限制
Mr. Sullivan has championed the Biden administration’s export controls designed to prevent China from getting its hands on advanced American semiconductors, or microchips, that can be used to develop weapons or computing power that could threaten U.S. national security.
沙利文一直在捍卫拜登政府的出口管制措施,该措施旨在防止中国获得美国先进的半导体或微芯片,它们可用于研发可能会对美国国家安全构成威胁的武器或数据处理能力。
拜登总统在台积电凤凰城工厂开工仪式上发表讲话,摄于2022年。
That has frustrated China, which has struggled to catch up with the United States in designing advanced chips despite investing billions of dollars in research. Beijing says the export controls are aimed at stunting China’s rightful development.
美国的出口管制一直使中国感到不满。尽管中国在先进芯片设计研发上投入了数十亿美元,但在这方面一直难以赶上美国。中国政府表示,美国出口管制的目的是阻碍中国的正当发展。
The restrictions, which were first introduced in October 2022, have had far-reaching consequences by forcing countries to shift, or consider shifting, some production of semiconductors out of Asia back to North America and Europe.
美国最初的出口管制措施是2022年10月实施的,并已产生了深远影响,迫使各国将部分半导体生产从亚洲转移或正在考虑转移到北美和欧洲。
It is unclear what the long-term implications of U.S. export controls will be. China has seized on the restrictions to redouble efforts to become more technologically self-sufficient. Brokers have also used proxies to smuggle banned chips into China.
美国出口管制的长期影响是什么目前还不清楚。中国已抓住美国限制出口的机会,加倍努力实现技术自给自足。中间商们利用代理人将违禁芯片走私到中国。
Will Xi and Biden Meet Again?
习近平和拜登将再次见面吗?
Mr. Sullivan’s visit could lay the groundwork for one last summit between Mr. Xi and Mr. Biden. Discussions between Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Wang were key to organizing last November’s meeting.
沙利文的访问也许会为习近平和拜登举行最后一次峰会奠定基础。沙利文和王毅的讨论是筹备去年11月的“习拜会”的关键。
Though he will only serve one term, and one that was disrupted by the Covid pandemic, Mr. Biden could be the first president not to travel to China since President Carter.
尽管拜登将只担任一任总统,而且任期间的出行被新冠疫情扰乱,但他可能会是自卡特总统以来第一位没有去中国访问的美国总统。
Mr. Biden has visited China before, when he was vice president in 2011, a trip remembered for his stop at a local Beijing restaurant for noodles and dumplings. If a state visit is not possible, Mr. Xi and Mr. Biden could potentially meet at the APEC summit in Peru in November.
拜登以前访问过中国,那是在2011年他担任副总统期间。那次访问令人难忘的是,他在北京一家小餐馆吃了炸酱面和包子。如果无法安排国事访问的话,习近平和拜登仍有一个潜在的见面机会,那就是在亚太经合组织今年11月在秘鲁举行峰会期间。
Of course, China may not be interested in Mr. Biden’s lame duck presidency and could be focused on how best to approach the next administration. Writing in Foreign Affairs magazine this month, the Chinese international relations scholars Wang Jisi, Hu Ran and Zhao Jianwei said Beijing sees little difference between a Trump or Harris administration; they will both be driven by domestic pressure to be tough on China.
当然,中国也许对拜登的“跛脚鸭”总统任期不感兴趣,可能会把重点转到与下届政府接触的最佳方式上去。中国的国际关系学者王缉思、胡然、赵建伟本月在美国《外交事务》杂志上撰文称,中国政府认为美国下届政府无论是特朗普还是贺锦丽领导都差别不大;他们都将在国内压力驱使下对中国采取强硬态度。
“Beijing is preparing itself for the outcome of the U.S. elections with great caution and limited hope,” they wrote.
“中国政府正在以高度的审慎和有限的希望为这次美国大选的结果作准备,”他们写道。
2024年8月27日
The United States needs a strategy for dealing with China as an economic and national security threat, and Donald Trump’s blustery “America First” approach ain’t it. Kamala Harris has a better shot because of her belief in strengthening alliances.
美国需要制定一项战略,以应对中国的经济和国家安全威胁,而特朗普高调的“美国优先”政策并不能实现这一目标。贺锦丽的机会更大,因为她相信加强联盟的力量。
In her acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention on Thursday, the vice president promised to make sure that “America, not China, wins the competition for the 21st century.” In the same sentence, she hinted at how she intends to make that happen. She promised to “strengthen, not abdicate, our global leadership.”
在周四的民主党全国代表大会上发表的接受提名演说中,这位副总统承诺要确保“赢得21世纪竞争的是美国,而不是中国”。在同一句话中,她暗示了自己打算如何实现这一目标的方式。她承诺要“加强而非放弃我们的全球领导地位”。
Trump’s go-it-alone approach can’t work because the United States isn’t powerful enough to take on China alone.
特朗普单打独斗的做法行不通,因为美国的实力不足以单独对抗中国。
There is a better way. I read about it in an important article in the September-October issue of Foreign Affairs by Aaron Friedberg, a professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University. Its title is “Stopping the Next China Shock: A Collective Strategy for Countering Beijing’s Mercantilism.”
有一个更好的办法。我在《外交事务》杂志九月/十月合刊上读到了普林斯顿大学政治与国际事务教授亚伦·弗里德伯格的一篇重要文章,里面谈到了这点。这篇文章的标题是《阻止下一次中国冲击:对抗北京重商主义的集体战略》。
First, the problem. Friedberg writes that 25 years after a surge in Chinese exports disrupted global trade, Beijing is again flooding the world with a wave of “heavily subsidized manufactured goods and materials.” For Beijing, this serves two purposes. It keeps Chinese workers employed at a time that domestic demand is weak. And it transforms China into “the world’s most productive, innovative and powerful state.”
首先是问题所在。弗里德伯格写道,在中国出口激增扰乱全球贸易25年后,北京再次向世界倾销“获得大量补贴的制成品和原材料”。对北京来说,这有两个目的。一个是在国内需求疲软的情况下保持就业水平。同时,此举也使得中国转变为“世界最具生产力、最具创新力和最强大的国家”。
Western economists and diplomats have argued for years that China could score a win-win by consuming more of what it makes instead of selling so much of it abroad. Boosting domestic consumption — and thus shrinking the trade surplus — would raise the living standards of the Chinese people while relieving pressure on foreign factory workers.
西方经济学家和外交官多年来一直认为,中国可以通过消费更多自己生产的产品,而不是大量销往国外,来实现双赢的局面。提振国内消费——从而缩小贸易顺差——将提高中国人民的生活水平,同时缓解外国工厂工人的压力。
But President Xi Jinping has no intention of taking the economists’ and diplomats’ advice, Friedberg writes. China’s leaders “can best be understood as mercantilist Leninists whose top priority is to acquire and exercise political power,” he writes. Enriching ordinary Chinese is not part of that plan. Making other countries dependent on China for essential goods most certainly is.
但习近平主席无意采纳这些经济学家和外交官们的建议,弗里德伯格写道。要理解中国领导人,最好把他们看做“重商主义的列宁主义者,他们的首要任务是获取和行使政治权力”,他写道。让普通中国人富裕起来并不是该计划的一部分。让其他国家在必需品上依赖中国则显然是这个计划的一部分。
Now, Friedberg’s solution. “Only by banding together in a trade defense coalition — an idea I developed with an economist in Asia — can countries with market-based economies protect themselves against China’s predatory practices,” he writes. (He is protecting the identity of the economist who helped him develop the idea, although he declined to say specifically why.)
那么,请看弗里德伯格的解决方案。“只有联合起来组成贸易保护联盟——这是我跟亚洲的一位经济学家共同提出的想法——市场经济国家才能保护自己免受中国掠夺性做法的伤害,”他写道。(他不愿透露帮他形成这一想法的那位经济学家的身份,也没有解释为什么要这样做。)
Forming such a coalition will require giving up on free traders’ dream of unrestricted commerce among all the world’s nations and falling back instead on “a core subsystem of countries” — China not among them — that “are genuinely committed to the concepts of openness, fairness and reciprocity, and are willing to defend and abide by them.”
组建这样一个联盟需要放弃自由贸易者在世界各国之间不受限制的贸易的梦想,转而依靠“各国的一个核心子系统”——中国不在其中——“真正致力于开放、公平和互惠的概念,并愿意捍卫和遵守这些概念。”
The trade defense coalition would need to include the United States, the European Union, and “most likely” Australia, Canada, India, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Turkey and the United Kingdom, according to Friedberg. Argentina and Indonesia would also be potential candidates, “as well as any other nations that seek to industrialize independently of China to safeguard their economic or military security.” Members would agree on a set of uniform tariffs on critical products that are “vulnerable to supply dominance by China.”
根据弗里德伯格的说法,贸易保护联盟需要包括美国、欧盟,“很有可能”还有澳大利亚、加拿大、印度、日本、墨西哥、韩国、土耳其和英国。阿根廷和印度尼西亚也可能是潜在候选国,“以及任何其他寻求独立于中国实现工业化以保护其经济或军事安全的国家。”成员国将就“易受中国供应主导影响的关键产品”征收统一关税达成一致。
China has attempted to circumvent tariffs by the United States and European Union members by shifting parts of production or assembly to other nations. To stop that, coalition members would have to get much better at detecting Chinese-origin content and imposing tariffs based on the percentage of it in a product. Not an easy task.
中国试图将部分生产或组装转移到其他国家,借此规避美国和欧盟成员国的关税。为了阻止这种情况,联盟成员必须更好地检测中国原产成分,并根据产品中中国成分的比例征收关税。这并非易事。
This open discrimination against Chinese goods would shatter the rules of the World Trade Organization. But Friedberg argues that “China has already warped and distorted the W.T.O.’s principles and now uses the organization’s procedures to shield its own discriminatory practices from scrutiny and avoid compliance.”
这种对中国商品的公然歧视将打破世界贸易组织的规则。但弗里德伯格认为,“中国已经歪曲和扭曲了世贸组织的原则,现在又利用该组织的程序来保护自己的歧视性做法不受审查,并避免合规。”
Could this really work? Coalition members would have to stick together to resist China’s inevitable riposte, namely to divide and conquer by showering benefits on countries that continued to cooperate with it.
这真能奏效吗?联盟成员必须团结一致,才能抵制中国不可避免的反击,即通过向继续与其合作的国家提供好处来分而治之。
I bounced Friedberg’s argument off several experts who participated with him in a conference sponsored by Princeton’s Center for International Security Studies this year. Alicia Garcia-Herrero, a senior fellow at Bruegel, a European economic think tank, agreed that “without a coalition, there’s no way the U.S. can contain China on its own.” She said Harris would be better at this than Trump for the reason I gave, which is that “you need an administration that can conceive that a coalition is the way to go about it.” Countries need to act now before China reaches free-trade agreements with countries that might prevent them from joining, she said.
今年,在普林斯顿国际安全研究中心主办的一次会议上,我跟几位参加会议的专家讨论了弗里德伯格的观点。欧洲经济智库布鲁盖尔的高级研究员艾丽西亚·加西亚-埃雷罗,“如果没有一个联盟,美国不可能单独遏制中国。”她表示,贺锦丽在这方面会比特朗普做得好,原因就像我说的,“你需要一个相信联合起来才是解决之道的政府”。她说,各国现在就需要采取行动,以防中国与一些国家达成自由贸易协定,阻止它们的加入。
Max Zenglein, the chief economist of the Mercator Institute for China Studies, which is based in Berlin, told me he also generally agreed with Friedberg’s argument. But he said China has become a leader in many technologies, and coalition members could lose access to Chinese innovations. (Example: Cheap Chinese electric vehicles.) Capping, rather than banning, Chinese imports could preserve access to Chinese innovation while making sure that protected domestic companies don’t get lazy, he said.
总部位于柏林的墨卡托中国研究中心首席经济学家曾林(Max Zenglein)告诉我,他大体上也同意弗里德伯格的观点。但他说,中国已成为许多技术领域的领导者,联盟成员可能无法获得中国的创新成果。(例如:廉价的中国电动汽车。)他说,限制而非禁止从中国进口产品,既能保留获取中国创新的机会,同时也能确保受保护的国内企业不会变得懒惰。
I emailed with two other experts. Stewart Paterson, a senior fellow at the Singapore-based Hinrich Foundation, supported Friedberg’s idea of alliances and pointed me to an article he wrote for Hinrich along the same lines in 2020.
我向另外两位专家发去了电子邮件。新加坡韩礼士基金会的高级研究员斯图尔特·帕特森支持弗里德伯格的结盟观点,并提到他在2020年曾为韩礼士基金会写过一篇观点类似的文章。
Daniel Rosen, a co-founder of the Rhodium Group, who leads the research firm’s work in China, wrote that a coalition along the lines of what Friedberg proposes “is a crucial element of a balancing coalition to reduce the dependence of market democracies on autocratic economies.”
荣鼎咨询的联合创始人荣大聂(Daniel Rosen)负责这家研究公司在中国的工作,他写道,与弗里德伯格的提议类似的联盟,“是减少市场民主国家对专制经济体依赖的平衡联盟的关键要素。”
He shared with me a note to clients in which he wrote that “there is no doubt in my mind, not the faintest iota of a doubt or second thought, that strategic Beijing strongly desires a Trump 2” over a Harris 1.
他与我分享了一份发给客户的报告,他在里面写道,“在我看来,毫无疑问,北京在战略上强烈期待特朗普的第二个任期,而不是贺锦丽的第一个任期。”
“Team Harris will have tweaks” to President Biden’s policies, which have shored up U.S. alliances, “but understands the strategic leaps and bounds that have been achieved,” Rosen wrote in the client note.
在这份给客户的报告中,荣大聂写道:“贺锦丽团队将对拜登总统的政策进行一些微调,这些政策巩固了美国的联盟关系,“但他们清楚已经取得的战略性飞跃。”
In contrast, “Trump ignored the advice of his competent nat-sec advisers to protect U.S. alliances, and would continue to eviscerate America’s global partnerships in a second term,” Rosen wrote. “Nothing could be more valuable to Beijing than such a unilateral withdrawal from the competition. Nothing.”
相比之下,“特朗普无视他那些称职的国安顾问提出的保护美国盟友的建议,并将在第二任期内继续破坏美国的全球伙伴关系,”荣大聂写道。“像这样的单方面退出竞争,对北京来说将是极具价值的。无与伦比的价值。”
A potential objection to Friedberg’s trade defense coalition is that it’s overkill — that it would needlessly antagonize China, heightening the risk that a trade war would spill into a shooting war, or at least depriving the world of the benefits of cross-border trade and investment. Another objection is that it simply wouldn’t work: Coalition members would squabble and defect. Countries outside China and its sphere of influence would not have the energy, patience or skill to rebuild production capacity in long-lost industries that have strategic value.
对弗里德伯格的贸易防御联盟的一个潜在反对意见是,它有点矫枉过正——它会不必要地激怒中国,增加贸易战蔓延成真刀真枪的战争的风险,或者至少剥夺了世界从跨境贸易和投资中获益的机会。另一个反对意见是,它根本行不通:联盟成员会争吵和叛逃。中国及其势力范围以外的国家将没有精力、耐心或技能来重建早已失去的那些战略性行业产能。
The “overkill” argument has lost force in recent years as Xi has demonstrated that he isn’t interested in allaying Western concerns. The “won’t work” argument is harder to refute. If Harris wins in November and takes the trade defense coalition route, she’ll have a chance to prove the doubters wrong.
近年来,“矫枉过正”的论点已经失去了说服力,因为习近平已经表明,他对消除西方的担忧并不感兴趣。“行不通”的论点则更难反驳。如果贺锦丽在11月获胜,并采取贸易保护联盟的路线,她将有机会证明怀疑者是错误的。
2024年8月27日
More than a decade ago, when Russia pushed Pavel Durov to shut down the pages of opposition politicians on a Facebook-like site he had created, the tech entrepreneur responded online by posting a cheeky picture of a hoodie-wearing dog with its tongue out.
十多年前,当俄罗斯敦促帕维尔·杜罗夫在他创建的类似Facebook的网站上关闭反对派政治人士的页面时,这位科技企业家在网上发布了一张放肆的照片,上面是一只穿着连帽衫、吐着舌头的狗。
“Official response to the intelligence services to the request to block groups,” he wrote unapologetically.
他毫无歉意地写道:“这是对情报部门要求封锁群组的正式回应。”
Thirteen years later, Mr. Durov’s anti-establishment streak appears to have gotten him into a fresh round of trouble with the authorities. On Saturday, he was arrested in France as part of an investigation into criminal activity on Telegram, the online communications tool he founded in 2013, which had grown into a global platform defined by its hands-off approach to policing how users behaved.
13年后,杜罗夫的反体制倾向似乎又给他带来了与当局的新一轮麻烦。上周六,他在法国被捕,这是对Telegram犯罪活动调查的一部分。Telegram是他于2013年创立的在线通信工具,已发展成为全球平台,其特点是不对用户行为进行监管。
On Monday, President Emmanuel Macron of France referred to Mr. Durov’s arrest and said that the country was “deeply committed to freedom of expression” but that “in a state governed by the rule of law, freedoms are upheld within a legal framework, both on social media and in real life.”
周一,法国总统马克龙提到杜罗夫被捕一事,并表示法国“坚定地致力于言论自由”,但是,“在一个法治国家,无论是在社交媒体上还是在现实生活中,对自由的维护应在法律框架内进行。”
Mr. Durov’s arrest has caused a firestorm, turning him into a folk hero among those concerned about free speech and government censorship, especially as scrutiny of online content has increased globally. Elon Musk, the owner of X, and Edward Snowden, the American intelligence contractor who fled to Russia after disclosing classified information, were among those who raced to Mr. Durov’s defense. The hashtag #FreePavel spread on X as debate raged over the murky intersection between tech and freedom of speech.
杜罗夫的被捕引发了轩然大波,在关注言论自由和政府审查的人当中,他成了民间英雄,尤其是考虑到全球范围内对网络内容的审查正变得越来越严格。X的所有者埃隆·马斯克和泄露机密信息后逃到俄罗斯的美国情报承包商雇员爱德华·斯诺登都在杜罗夫的辩护者之列。“#FreePavel”(#释放杜罗夫)标签在X上传播开来,围绕科技和言论自由之间模糊交叉点的争论愈演愈烈。
Telegram said in a statement on Sunday that it abides by European Union laws. “It is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform,” the company said.
Telegram在周日的声明中表示,它遵守欧盟的法律。该公司表示:“声称一个平台或其所有者应对该平台所受到的滥用负责是荒谬的。”
Telegram has long been underpinned by Mr. Durov’s anti-authority ethos and commitment to free speech. A devout techno-optimist with a flair for trolling authorities online, the 39-year-old has said he believes strongly that governments should not censor what people say or do on the internet.
长期以来,杜罗夫的反权威精神和对言论自由的承诺一直支撑着Telegram。作为虔诚的科技·乐观主义者,39岁的杜罗夫擅长在网上嘲弄权威。他说自己坚信政府不应该审查人们在互联网上的言行。
That guiding maxim helped Telegram become a popular chat app for Russians, Iranians and others living under authoritarian governments. But Mr. Durov’s laissez-faire approach to policing the platform has also attracted terrorists, extremists, gun runners, scammers and drug dealers.
这条指导原则帮助Telegram成为俄罗斯人、伊朗人和其他生活在威权政府统治下的人喜爱的聊天应用。但杜罗夫对该平台放任自流的管理方式也吸引了恐怖分子、极端分子、枪支贩子、骗子和毒贩。
Secrecy trumps the closer policing of online speech, he has said. “Privacy, ultimately, is more important than our fear of bad things happening, like terrorism,” he posted in 2015.
他说,保密原则优先于对网络言论更严密的监管。“归根结底,隐私比我们对恐怖主义等坏事发生的恐惧更重要,”他在2015年写道。
“To be truly free, you should be ready to risk everything for freedom,” Mr. Durov wrote on Instagram in 2018 beneath a photo of himself atop a horse in the desert.
“要想获得真正的自由,你应该准备好为自由冒一切风险,”杜罗夫2018年在Instagram上写道,配图是一张他在沙漠中骑马的照片。
On his personal social media accounts, Mr. Durov’s posts showcase an eclectic lifestyle. In one recent post, he claimed he had fathered more than 100 biological children in 12 countries as a sperm donor over the past 15 years. He said he was sharing the information to help destigmatize the topic, adding that he first donated sperm to help a friend struggling with infertility and that he planned to “open source” his DNA.
在杜罗夫的个人社交媒体账户上,他的帖子展示了一种不拘一格的生活方式。在最近的一篇帖子里,他声称在过去的15年中,他在12个国家捐精,有了100多个亲生孩子。他说,他分享这些信息是为了帮助这个话题去污名化,并称他最初捐献精子是为了帮助一位苦于无法生育的朋友,他还计划将他的DNA“开源”。
法国国家反欺诈办公室大楼,据报道,杜罗夫就被关押在那里。
But Mr. Durov’s biggest priority is Telegram. In 2014, he left Russia amid growing scrutiny from its security services and eventually decamped to Dubai, where he said the government would not interfere with his business. Since then, he has fought with Apple and major governments over content controls. Telegram has faced temporary or permanent bans in 31 countries, according to Surfshark, a maker of VPN software used to avoid internet blocks.
但杜罗夫最注重的还是Telegram。2014年,在俄罗斯安全部门越来越严格的审查下,他离开了俄罗斯,最终逃到了迪拜,他说那里的政府不会干涉他的业务。从那以后,他一直在与苹果公司和许多大国的政府就内容控制问题进行斗争。据用于避免互联网屏蔽的VPN软件提供商Surfshark称,Telegram在31个国家面临临时或永久禁令。
In an interview with Tucker Carlson that aired in April, Mr. Durov accused the Federal Bureau of Investigation of trying to hire a Telegram programmer so the U.S. government could gain access to user data. During the interview, one of his first in years, he sat in front of a bookcase that held two sculptures of chairs, one covered in knives and the other with phalluses — an apparent allusion to a Russian prison joke.
今年4月播出的塔克·卡尔森对杜罗夫的采访中,杜罗夫指责美国联邦调查局试图雇用一名Telegram程序员,以便美国政府获取用户数据。这是他多年来第一次接受采访,在采访中,他坐在一个书架前,书架上放着两个椅子雕塑,一把椅子上都是刀子,另一把椅子上面都是阳具——这显然是和俄罗斯监狱有关的一个笑话。
杜罗夫在今年4月播出的一次采访中与塔克·卡尔森交谈。这是杜罗夫多年来首次接受的几次采访之一。
The F.B.I. did not respond to a request for comment.
联邦调查局没有回应置评请求。
Born in 1984 in the Soviet Union, Mr. Durov moved with his family when he was 4 to northern Italy. His brother, Nikolai, a math whiz who became Telegram’s chief technology officer, was featured on Italian television solving cubic equations. In the early 1990s, after the Soviet Union collapsed, the Durovs returned to St. Petersburg, where Pavel and Nikolai participated in youth math competitions and coded on an IBM computer the family had brought back from Italy.
杜罗夫1984年出生于苏联,四岁时随家人移居意大利北部。他的哥哥尼古拉是数学天才,曾在意大利电视上表演解三次方程,后来成为Telegram的首席技术官。上世纪90年代初苏联解体后,杜罗夫一家回到圣彼得堡,帕维尔和尼古拉在那里参加青少年数学竞赛,并用他们从意大利带回来的一台IBM电脑编程。
In college in St. Petersburg, a friend showed Mr. Durov an early version of Facebook, founded by Mark Zuckerberg. Inspired, Mr. Durov set out to make his own version. Vkontakte, a service he started in 2006, dominated Russia within a few years. It also attracted notice from the Kremlin, which demanded information about Vkontakte’s users.
在圣彼得堡上大学时,一位朋友向杜罗夫展示了马克·扎克伯格创建的Facebook的早期版本。受到启发的杜罗夫开始制作自己的版本。他在2006年创办的Vkontakte几年内就在俄罗斯占据了主导地位。它也引起了克里姆林宫的注意,要求提供有关Vkontakte用户的信息。
Mr. Durov said he had begun building Telegram to be a more secure way to communicate after Russian security forces showed up at his apartment around 2011. Mr. Durov, who was still running Vkontakte while building Telegram, said the government had eventually given him an ultimatum: Hand over data about Vkontakte’s users or lose control of the company and be forced to leave the country.
杜罗夫说,2011年前后俄罗斯安全部队出现在他的公寓后,他开始打造Telegram,希望它成为一种更安全的通信方式。杜罗夫在创建Telegram的同时仍在运营Vkontakte,他说,政府最终给他下了最后通牒:要么交出Vkontakte用户的数据,要么失去对公司的控制,被迫离开俄罗斯。
“I chose the latter,” Mr. Durov said.
“我选择了后者,”杜罗夫说。
Since disavowing Russia, Mr. Durov has lived itinerantly surrounded by Telegram engineers. He moves location every few months, former employees said. He has spent time in Barcelona, Bali, Berlin, Helsinki and San Francisco, even as he made Dubai Telegram’s formal headquarters. He remains an earnest engineering leader, often obsessed with the app’s features at the expense of making money or moderating criminal activity, former employees said.
自从与俄罗斯断绝关系以来,杜罗夫的身边一直都有Telegram工程师的环绕。前雇员说,他每隔几个月就会搬家。虽然把迪拜作为Telegram的正式总部,他曾在巴塞罗那、巴厘岛、柏林、赫尔辛基和旧金山生活。前雇员说,他仍然是一名认真的工程师领导,经常沉迷于应用的功能,忽略赚钱或是遏制犯罪活动。
Mr. Durov has citizenship for the United Arab Emirates and France, according to Telegram. Though he travels by private jet, he has said he eschews buying things, keeping hundreds of millions of dollars in his bank account and Bitcoin to ensure he can be free. Bloomberg has estimated his net worth at more than $9 billion.
Telegram称,杜罗夫拥有阿联酋和法国国籍。虽然他乘坐私人飞机旅行,但他说自己总是避免购物,用存在银行里的数亿美元和比特币来确保自己可以自由自在。彭博社估计他的净资产超过90亿美元。
“I would rather make decisions that would influence how people communicate rather than choosing the color of seats in the house,” he said in the interview with Mr. Carlson.
“我宁愿做出影响人们沟通方式的决定,也不愿选择房子里座椅的颜色,”他在接受卡尔森采访时说。
Telegram is now approaching one billion users worldwide, making it larger than X. Telegram works as a messaging app, similar to WhatsApp or iMessage. But it also hosts groups with up to 200,000 users and has broadcasting features that help people and groups share views with even larger audiences. The service is particularly popular in Ukraine, Brazil, Indonesia, India and Russia.
Telegram目前在全球拥有近10亿用户,规模超过X。Telegram是一款即时通讯应用,类似于WhatsApp或iMessage。但它也拥有多达20万用户的群组,并有广播功能,帮助个人和群组与更多的受众分享观点。这项服务在乌克兰、巴西、印度尼西亚、印度和俄罗斯特别受欢迎。
As use of Telegram exploded, Mr. Durov’s light touch to policing content drew criticism. Policymakers, law enforcement and security researchers said the app had become a haven for disinformation, terrorism propaganda, far-right extremism, drug dealing, child pornography and weapons sales.
随着Telegram的快速增长,杜罗夫在内容监管上的宽松招来了批评。政策制定者、执法部门和安全研究人员表示,这款应用已成为虚假信息、恐怖主义宣传、极右翼极端主义、毒品交易、儿童色情和武器销售的避风港。
Over the years, Telegram has taken down some content, such as child sexual abuse material or posts explicitly aimed at inciting violence. But the authorities were often frustrated by Mr. Durov’s lack of cooperation. Others have raised concerns that Telegram maintains ties to the Russian government, which lifted a ban of the service in 2020. Security experts have also warned that the tool, which does not use the same encryption standards as apps like Signal, is not as secure as the company says.
这些年来,Telegram删除了一些内容,比如儿童性虐待,或明确旨在煽动暴力的帖子。但当局经常对杜罗夫的不合作感到不满。也有人担心Telegram与俄罗斯政府之间的联系,后者在2020年解除了对该服务的禁令。安全专家还警告,该工具没有采用与Signal等应用程序相同的加密标准,并不像该公司所说的那么安全。
On Monday, French prosecutors said Mr. Durov was being held as part of an investigation opened last month into crimes related to child pornography, fraud, drug trafficking and money laundering. French authorities noted Telegram’s lack of cooperation with law enforcement. Mr. Durov remained in custody, which can be extended through Wednesday.
周一,法国检察官表示,杜罗夫被拘留是上个月开始的一项调查的一部分,调查涉及儿童色情、欺诈、贩毒和洗钱等罪行。法国当局指出,Telegram缺乏与执法部门的合作。杜罗夫仍被拘留,羁押期限可延至周三。
2024年8月27日
A 15-year-old girl and her boyfriend are studying alone together on a hot summer day when she removes her jacket and clings to his shoulder. What should he do?
炎热的夏天,一个15岁女孩和男朋友单独在一起学习,她脱下外套,依偎在他的肩上。他该做什么呢?
In Hong Kong, the authorities advise the young man to continue studying or to seek a diversion, including badminton, to avoid premarital sex and other “intimate behaviors.”
在香港,政府建议这名年轻男子继续学习或转移注意力,包括去打羽毛球,以避免婚前性行为和其他“亲密的行为”。
Critics, including lawmakers and sex educators, say that the Chinese territory’s new sex education materials are regressive. But top officials are not backing down, and the standoff is getting kind of awkward.
包括立法者和性教育者在内的批评人士称,香港这块中国领土上的新版性教育教材是倒退的。但高层官员并没有让步,僵局变得有些尴尬。
“Is badminton the Hong Kong answer to sexual impulses in schoolchildren?” the South China Morning Post newspaper asked in a headline over the weekend.
“羽毛球是香港小学生性冲动的答案吗?”《南华早报》周末在文章标题中问道。
Hong Kong teenagers find it all pretty amusing. A few said on social media that the officials behind the policy have their “heads in the clouds.” Others have worked it into sexual slang, talking about “friends with badminton” instead of “friends with benefits.”
香港青少年觉得这一切都很有趣。一些人在社交媒体上表示,该政策背后的官员“头脑不清”。还有人把它变成了性俚语,用“羽毛球友”来代替“炮友”。
The sex ed materials were published last week by the Education Bureau in a 70-page document that includes worksheets for adolescents and guidance for their teachers. The document emphasizes that the lessons are not designed to encourage students to “start dating or having sexual behaviors early in life.” It also advises people in a “love relationship” to fill out a form setting the limits of their intimacy.
教育局上周公布了一份70页的性教育材料,其中包括给青少年的工作表和对教师的指导。该文件强调,这些课程并不是为了鼓励学生“过早谈恋爱或进行性行为”。它还建议“恋人”填写一份表格,为他们的亲密关系设定界限。
“It is normal for people to have sexual fantasies and desires, but we must recognize that we are the masters of our desires and should think twice before acting, and control our desires instead of being controlled by them,” the document says.
“人有性幻想和性欲是正常的,可是我们要认清自己是欲望的主人,应三思而后行,好好控制欲望,而不是被欲望控制,”该文件写道。
The curriculum, which replaces an older one, explains that while some adolescents masturbate, sexual impulses can generally be controlled by avoiding “publications or media” that stimulate them.
这个取代了旧课程的新课程解释称,虽然一些青少年有手淫行为,但性冲动通常可以通过避免接触刺激他们的“出版物或媒体”来控制。
It also recommends exercise and other activities that “draw attention away from undesirable activities,” and warns students to dress appropriately and avoid wearing “sexy clothing” that could lead to “visual stimulation.”
它还建议进行锻炼,以及其他“将注意力从不良活动中转移开”的活动,并警告学生要穿着得体,避免穿可能导致“视觉刺激”的“性感服装”。
Critics are wary, saying that the guidelines are irresponsible. Diana Kwok, professor of gender studies at the Education University of Hong Kong, told the South China Morning Post that the authorities should not emphasize the need to control sexual development, but instead teach young people how to face or understand it.
批评人士对此持谨慎态度,称这些指导方针是不负责任的。香港教育大学性别研究教授郭勤在接受《南华早报》采访时表示,当局不应该强调控制性发展的必要性,而应该教年轻人如何面对或理解它。
Doris Tsz-Wai Chong, the executive director of the Association Concerning Sexual Violence Against Women, a Hong Kong nonprofit that works in local schools, said that the new sex ed guidance was inadequate for its young audience. That is partly because it includes gender stereotypes, she said, including the idea that women see opposite-sex friendships as purely platonic while men see them as potential romantic opportunities.
在香港学校开展工作的非营利组织“关注妇女性暴力协会”的执行董事庄子慧说,新的性教育指导对年轻受众来说还不够。她说,这在一定程度上是因为它包含了性别刻板印象,包括女性将异性友谊视为纯粹的柏拉图式友谊,而男性则将其视为潜在的浪漫机会。
Ms. Chong said her organization was also concerned about the warning over “sexy clothing.”
庄子慧说,她的组织也对“性感服装”的警告感到担忧。
“Teaching the idea that someone’s choice of clothing can ‘visually stimulate’ or provoke sexual assault perpetuates harmful rape myths,” she added.
“人的着装选择会造成‘视觉刺激’或引发性侵犯,教授这样的观念会延续有害的强奸迷思,”她还说。
Officials aren’t flinching. Christine Choi, the education secretary, framed the guidance on Sunday as a kind of moral imperative and a way of protecting young people, particularly those who are 12 to 14.
官员们并没有退缩。教育局长蔡若莲周日将这项指导描述为一种道德要求,是保护年轻人的一种方式,尤其是12岁至14岁的年轻人。
“We should teach them to take responsibility for themselves correctly, to understand how to take care of themselves and respect others,” she said in a television interview. “When they grow up, they will face a more complex society and environment.”
“我们应如何告诉他们,正确为自己负责任,能懂得爱护自己及尊重别人,”她在电视采访中说。“当他们将来成长的时候,要面对更复杂的社会及环境。”
John Lee, Hong Kong’s leader, described the materials as good for the territory’s long-term future on Sunday. “I think that social culture has to be created collectively,” he said.
香港领导人李家超周日称,这些教材有利于香港的长远未来。“社会文化要共同营造,”他说。
It was not immediately clear on Monday how the Education Bureau developed the sex ed materials. The bureau did not respond to a request for comment. Neither did two local nonprofits whose work the bureau cited in its footnotes, or a local association of sexuality educators, researchers and therapists.
截止周一,人们尚不清楚教育局是如何制定性教育教材的。该局没有回应置评请求。教材脚注中引用了当地两家非营利组织的研究成果,以及当地一个由性教育者、研究人员和治疗师组成的协会,这些机构也没有回应置评请求。
Young people in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan often use slang to talk about sex, just like their peers around the world. If your date asks if you want to go back to their place to “watch my cat do back-flips,” don’t say you weren’t warned.
和世界各地的同龄人一样,中国大陆、香港和台湾的年轻人经常用俚语谈论性。如果你的约会对象问你要不要“来我家看猫咪后空翻”,不要说你没有得到警告。
Now, thanks to Hong Kong’s Education Bureau, new slang is in play. The sentence “I want to play badminton with you” will never be the same again.
现在,多亏了香港教育局,新的俚语开始流行了。“我想和你一起打羽毛球”从此有了新的含义。
2024年8月27日
In a significant escalation of trade tensions between Western countries and China, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Monday that Canada would impose 100 percent tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, joining the United States and the European Union in protecting domestic car production.
在西方国家与中国之间的贸易紧张局势显著升级之际,加拿大总理特鲁多周一表示,加拿大将加入美国和欧盟的行列,保护国内汽车生产,对中国电动汽车征收100%的关税。
The move aligns Canada’s automotive policy with that of the United States, the market for the vast majority of Canadian-made vehicles where President Biden in May announced 100 percent tariffs on Chinese electric cars. And it also appears to be a form of insurance for the tens of billions of dollars in subsidies that Canadian governments have committed for the development of electric vehicle and battery factories being built in the country by Honda, Stellantis, Volkswagen, General Motors, LG and others.
此举使加拿大与美国在汽车政策上保持一致,美国是绝大多数加拿大所产汽车的市场,拜登总统在5月份宣布对中国电动汽车征收100%的关税。加拿大政府承诺为本田、斯特兰蒂斯、大众、通用汽车、LG等公司在该国建设的电动汽车和电池工厂提供数百亿美元补贴,关税似乎也是对这些补贴的一种保险形式。
In addition, Canada will also impose a new 25 percent tariff on Chinese steel and aluminum. The tariffs will most likely worsen the country’s rocky relations with China and could raise the possibility of retaliation by the Chinese government against Canadian agricultural exports.
此外,加拿大还将对中国钢铝征收25%的新关税。这些关税很可能会使加拿大与中国本就不稳定的关系进一步恶化,并可能引发中国政府对加拿大农产品出口的报复。
“I think we all know that China is not playing by the same rules,” Mr. Trudeau told reporters on Monday in Halifax, Nova Scotia. “What is important about this is we’re doing it in alignment and in parallel with other economies around the world.”
“我想我们都知道,中国没有按照同样的规则行事,”特鲁多周一在新斯科舍省哈利法克斯对记者说。“重要的是,我们正在与全球其他经济体步调一致和同步。”
Canada opened public consultations on the tariffs at the beginning of July. The 100 percent tariff on Chinese electric vehicles will go into effect on Oct. 1.
加拿大在7月初就关税问题征询公众意见。对中国电动汽车征收的100%关税将于10月1日生效。
The new U.S. tariffs are expected to begin by the end of August. And the European Union has said that, at the end of October, it would impose additional tariffs of 9 percent to 36.3 percent on Chinese electric cars, depending on the manufacturer, beyond the standard 10 percent tariff it already levies on imported vehicles.
美国的新关税预计将于8月底开始实施。欧盟表示,到10月底,将在对进口汽车征收10%的标准关税之外,对中国电动汽车征收9%至36.3%的额外关税,具体取决于制造商。
Twenty-five percent of federal subsidies for consumers to buy electric vehicles covered imports from China in 2023, according to government documents obtained by Automotive News Canada, an industry publication. A year earlier, just 2 percent of the subsidies went to Chinese-made cars, the government analysis said. Most of the Chinese-made vehicles being subsidized were Teslas produced in Shanghai.
行业刊物《加拿大汽车新闻》获得的政府文件显示,到2023年,联邦政府为消费者购买电动汽车提供的补贴中,有25%用于从中国进口的电动汽车。政府分析称,一年前,只有2%的补贴流向中国制造的汽车。大多数获得补贴的中国产汽车都是在上海生产的特斯拉。
The only zero-emission vehicle currently made in Canada is a General Motors delivery van.
目前唯一在加拿大生产的零排放汽车是通用汽车的送货货车。
Automotive manufacturing companies and Unifor, the union that represents autoworkers in Canada, have been pushing Mr. Trudeau’s government to match the U.S. tariffs on Chinese electric cars and trucks. Those calls grew louder after a lobbying firm working for BYD, a leading Chinese electric vehicle maker, filed notice that it was working to sell passenger cars in Canada.
汽车制造公司和代表加拿大汽车工人的工会Unifor一直在敦促特鲁多政府与美国一致行动,对中国电动汽车和卡车征收关税。一家为中国领先的电动汽车制造商比亚迪工作的游说公司提交通知,表示该公司正努力在加拿大销售乘用车后,这些呼声变得更加强烈。
BYD, which has been expanding around the world, currently only sells electric buses in Canada and the United States. The company has been selling imported electric and hybrid cars in Mexico and other Latin American countries.
比亚迪一直在全球扩张,目前只在加拿大和美国销售电动大巴车。该公司一直在墨西哥和其他拉美国家销售进口电动车和混合动力汽车。
Some environmentalists oppose high tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles and have urged the Canadian government to explore other ways to keep domestic manufacturers competitive. They argue that tariffs will slow the use of zero-emission vehicles by keeping prices relatively high.
一些环保人士反对向中国制造的电动汽车征收高关税,并敦促加拿大政府探索其他方式保持国内制造商的竞争力。他们认为,关税会使价格居高不下,从而减缓零排放汽车的使用。
“Canada made a decision today that will result in fewer affordable electric vehicles for Canadians, less competition and more climate pollution,” Joanna Kyriazis, the director of public affairs at the clean energy policy research group Clean Energy Canada, said in a statement on Monday. She added that Canada should have followed Europe in opting for lower tariffs.
“加拿大今天做出的决定将导致加拿大人买得起的电动汽车数量减少,竞争减少,气候污染加剧,”清洁能源政策研究组织“加拿大清洁能源”公共事务主管乔安娜·基里亚齐斯周一在声明中说。她还表示,加拿大应该效仿欧洲,只增加较低的关税。
Mr. Trudeau came to office in 2015 promising to renew relations with China, which had soured under a previous Conservative government. Instead, they sank to a new low in 2018 after the Royal Canadian Mounted Police arrested Meng Wanzhou, a senior executive at the Chinese technology company Huawei, on an extradition request from the United States.
特鲁多于2015年上台,承诺恢复与中国的关系。在上一届保守党政府执政期间,两国关系恶化。然而,在加拿大皇家骑警根据美国的引渡要求逮捕了中国科技公司华为的高管孟晚舟之后,两国关系在2018年跌至新低。
In what Canada characterized as hostage-taking, China then arrested two Canadians. Ms. Meng and the two Canadians were ultimately allowed to return to their home countries in 2021.
随后,中国逮捕了两名加拿大人,加拿大称这是挟持人质的行为。孟晚舟和两名加拿大人最终于2021年获准回国。
China also temporarily blocked imports of canola, an oil seed, from Canada. While the step was ostensibly taken because of insects in the grain, Canada viewed it as further retaliation.
当时中国还暂时禁止从加拿大进口油菜籽。虽然这一措施表面上是由于作物中的昆虫,但加拿大认为这是进一步的报复之举。
2024年8月27日
A Chinese military surveillance plane breached Japanese airspace off the country’s southwestern coast on Monday, marking what Japan’s defense ministry described as the first known incursion by China’s military into its territorial airspace.
一架中国军用侦察机周一侵入了日本西南海岸领空,日本防卫省称其为首个已知的中国军机侵犯日本领空事件。
According to a ministry official, a Chinese reconnaissance aircraft briefly entered Japanese territory near Nagasaki Prefecture around 11:30 a.m. on Monday. In response, Japan’s Self-Defense Force put fighter jets on high alert and issued a warning to the Chinese aircraft.
据防卫省官员说,一架中国侦察机周一上午11点30分左右短暂进入长崎县附近的日本领空。作为回应,日本自卫队战斗机处于高度戒备状态,并向中国飞机发出了警告。
While Chinese planes frequently appear in international airspace around Japan, this incident represents the first confirmed entry of a military aircraft into Japan’s territorial airspace.
虽然中国飞机经常出现在日本周边的国际空域,但这是第一次得到证实的中国军用飞机进入日本领空事件。
Over the past two decades, Japan has increasingly faced foreign aircraft encroachments. Last year, Japan’s Self-Defense Force scrambled fighter jets to intercept foreign planes on 669 occasions — more than three times the number of such responses two decades ago.
过去20年间,日本已越来越多地面临着外国飞机侵入的问题。去年,日本自卫队曾紧急出动战斗机拦截外国飞机669次,是20年前这类反应次数的三倍多。
Of these 669 cases, 479 were in response to Chinese aircraft sightings, according to Japan’s Ministry of Defense.
日本防卫省称,这669次拦截中有479次是针对中国飞机作出反应。
Military analysts suggest that Monday’s airspace violation could be a message from China challenging Japan’s delineation of its territorial border. China asserts control over a large continental shelf in the East China Sea, with its outer edge extending close to the Danjo Islands area, where the Chinese plane was spotted.
军事分析人士认为,周一的侵犯领空行为可能是中国向日本划定的领土边界发出挑战的信号。中国声称对东海的一大片大陆架有控制权,这片大陆架的外缘延伸至丹上群岛附近,中国的飞机就是在该群岛附近上空被发现的。
The airspace violation is the latest in a series of recent events heightening tensions between Japan and China.
此次侵犯领空事件是最近一系列加剧中日紧张局势事件中的最新一起。
Last week, a Chinese newscaster deviated from the script on a radio news program by Japan’s public broadcaster, asserting that the Senkaku Islands — controlled by Japan but claimed by China — are Chinese territory.
上周,日本公共广播机构的一名中国籍播音员在一个新闻节目中偏离稿子,声称日本控制的尖阁诸岛是中国领土,中国声称对其称为“钓鱼岛”的岛屿拥有主权。
That same day, graffiti was discovered at the Yasukuni Shrine war-commemoration site in Tokyo using Chinese characters that appeared to read “toilet.”
同一天,纪念阵亡将士的东京靖国神社遭人涂鸦,出现了看上去是“厕所”的汉字。
Japanese officials summoned Chinese Embassy representatives to a meeting on Monday evening and urged them to prevent future incursions into Japanese airspace, according to a statement from Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
据日本外务省的声明,日本官员周一晚间召见了中国大使馆的代表,敦促他们防止未来再次发生侵犯日本领空事件。
2024年8月27日
China will hold live-fire military drills near its border with Myanmar starting on Tuesday, fortifying its boundaries with a southern neighbor that has been engulfed in a civil war for more than three years.
中国将于周二开始在靠近缅甸的边境地区举行实弹军事演习,以加强与这个南部邻国的边界安全。缅甸陷入内战已逾三年。
China’s People’s Liberation Army’s Southern Theater Command said on Monday that it would conduct both land and air exercises in the southwestern province of Yunnan to test the “joint strike capabilities of theater troops and maintain security and stability in the border areas.” China conducted two similar drills in April.
中国人民解放军南部战区周一宣布,将在西南省份云南开展空地联合演习,以“检验战区部队联合打击能力,维护边境地区安全稳定”。中国在今年4月进行了两次类似演习。
The patrols, which will last until Thursday, come less than two weeks after China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, visited Naypyidaw, Myanmar’s capital, and reaffirmed Beijing’s support for the ruling military junta, which seized power in a coup in 2021. Analysts say that despite Mr. Wang’s pledge of support, Beijing is using the drills to send a signal to the junta that it would like the military to return to Chinese-led peace talks with rebels and refrain from intensifying the conflict.
此次武装巡逻将持续到周四,不到两周前,中国级别最高的外交官王毅访问了缅甸首都内比都,重申了中国对缅甸执政军政府的支持,本届军政府是在2021年通过政变夺取政权的。分析人士说,尽管王毅承诺支持,但中国政府正在用演习向军政府发出信号,表示中国希望缅甸军方重返由中国主导的与叛军的和平谈判,避免激化冲突。
Myanmar, a country of about 55 million long fractured by ethnic divisions, has been thrown into fresh chaos as the military resumed control. Thousands have been killed and tens of thousands detained by the junta, which has been accused of committing atrocities and killing civilians by bombarding the country with airstrikes.
缅甸约有5500万人口,这个国家因民族不和长期处于分裂状态,随着军方重新掌权,已陷入新的混乱。军政府受到犯下暴行的指控,外界指责它在国内用空袭轰炸杀死平民,导致了数千人死亡,还有数万人被军政府拘留。
The junta’s violence has led to the emergence of a resistance movement made up of both civilians from Myanmar’s urban areas who had become rebels and battle-hardened insurgents in the border regions who have been fighting for autonomy for decades. Together, they control about two-thirds of the country, mostly along its frontiers, while the military government holds the major cities located in the central lowlands of the Irrawaddy Valley.
军政府的暴行引发了抵抗运动。参加抵抗运动的人有来自缅甸城市地区加入了叛军的平民,也有边境地区身经百战的叛乱分子,后者几十年来一直在争取自治。他们已控制了缅甸约三分之二的领土,主要是沿边境地区,而军政府则控制着位于伊洛瓦底江中部低地的主要城市。
中国级别最高的外交官王毅本月初重申了北京支持缅甸执政的军政府。
Resistance forces have been on the offensive for months, putting the junta on the back foot outside its strongholds. Mounting losses in troops and territory led the junta to impose a mandatory draft earlier this year.
叛军几个月来一直在发动攻势,让军政府在据点之外的地区处于不利状态。士兵和领土的不断损失导致军政府在今年早些时候采取了强制征兵做法。
China has been growing uneasy about the conflict, which has drawn closer to its borders, disrupting trade and raising concerns about the safety of Chinese nationals. Earlier this month, rebel forces overran a regional military base less than 100 miles from the Chinese border.
中国对这场冲突的不安日益增长,冲突已逼近中缅边境,扰乱了贸易,引发了对中国公民人身安全的担忧。本月早些时候,叛军攻占了一个距离中缅边境不到160公里的区域军事基地。
Myanmar “plays a crucial role in the development of China’s southwestern economy and national security,” said Song Zhongping, an independent defense analyst based in Beijing and a former Chinese military officer. “China is very concerned about peace and stability in the region, and even more concerned about the security of our borders.”
缅甸“在中国西南经济和国家安全的发展中起至关重要的作用”,北京的独立国防分析师、中国退役军官宋忠平说。“中国非常关注这个地区的和平与稳定,也非常关注我们的边境安全。”
At stake are China’s investments in Myanmar, including multibillion-dollar plans to build an economic corridor from southwestern China to the Indian Ocean so that Chinese trade can bypass the Strait of Malacca, a high-traffic waterway near Malaysia. In July, anti-junta rebels captured a Chinese-backed nickel-mining project in the north about 160 miles from Mandalay.
中国在缅甸的投资已面临风险,包括耗资数十亿美元将中国西南部与印度洋连接起来的经济走廊建设项目,这条经济走廊让中国贸易能绕过马来西亚附近交通繁忙的水道马六甲海峡。今年7月,反军政府的叛军攻占了缅甸北部距离曼德勒约250公里一个中资支持的镍矿开采项目。
China’s strategy in Myanmar has been to play both sides, said Jason Tower, the Myanmar director at the United States Institute of Peace, a nonpartisan research organization funded by the U.S. Congress. China cultivates economic, military and diplomatic ties with the junta while providing weapons and other supplies to rebel groups along the border, he said.
中国在缅甸的策略一直是与两边同时保持关系,美国和平研究所缅甸部主任杰森·托尔说,该研究所是美国国会资助的无党派研究机构。他说,中国在与缅甸军政府发展经济、军事和外交关系的同时,也向边境叛军提供武器和其他物资。
云南瑞丽的一个中缅边境检查站。
China used that influence to call for negotiations last December between the junta and rebel groups near the border called the Three Brotherhood Alliance. Talks collapsed in May, Mr. Tower said.
去年12月,中国曾利用这种影响力呼吁缅甸军政府与边境附近被称为“三兄弟联盟”的叛军组织谈判。托尔说,谈判已在今年5月破裂。
The junta has been frustrated by Chinese aid to the rebels, sending supporters to protest Beijing outside the Chinese Embassy in Yangon, Myanmar’s former capital and its largest city, Mr. Tower said.
托尔说,缅甸军政府一直对中国向叛军提供援助感到失望,曾派支持者到中国驻缅甸大使馆外举行抗议活动。中国大使馆设在仰光,该市为缅甸最大的城市及前首都。
Earlier this month, after the regional military base fell, the junta leader, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, said that rebels were receiving arms, including drones and short-range missiles, from “foreign countries.” Though he did not name China, he said some arms and ammunition were coming from factories across the border with China. China is also a major supplier of weapons to the junta.
该区域军事基地被攻占后,缅甸军政府领导人敏昂莱大将在本月早些时候说,叛军正在从“外国”获得武器,包括无人机和短程导弹。虽然他没有点名中国,但他说,一些武器弹药来自中缅边境的工厂。中国也是缅甸军政府的主要武器供应国。
China needs to hedge because it is unclear who will ultimately hold power in Myanmar, said Ja Ian Chong, an associate professor of political science at the National University of Singapore.
中国需要两面下注,因为目前不清楚谁将最终在缅甸掌权,新加坡国立大学政治学副教授庄嘉颖说。
“Beijing wants stability and influence. They aren’t particularly wedded to any one party or approach, it seems to me,” Mr. Chong said.
“中国希望稳定和影响力。在我看来,他们并不特别致力于任何一方或任何一种方式,”庄嘉颖说。
During Mr. Wang’s visit to Myanmar, he said he hoped that Myanmar would protect Chinese citizens and projects in the country, maintain stability along the border, and work with China on cracking down on cross-border crimes.
在访问缅甸期间,王毅曾表示希望缅甸保护中国公民和中资项目,维护边境稳定,与中国一起打击跨境犯罪。
In China’s view, the junta appears too weak to consolidate power, and the rebels too disparate to form a unity government, Mr. Tower said.
在中国看来,缅甸军政府似乎太软弱,无法巩固权力,而叛军则由多方人员组成,没有能力组建联合政府,托尔说。
China is probably concerned that the junta may step up airstrikes on rebels near the Chinese border, where the regime has virtually no presence on the ground. “If the junta wants to recover some of the territory it lost, it will resort to using heavy airstrikes in the border areas,” Mr. Tower said. “That is a sensitive issue for China.”
中国可能担心军政府也许会加大对中缅边境附近的叛军进行空袭的力度,因为军政府在边境地区几乎没有地面部队。“如果军政府想收复其失去的部分领土的话,它将不得不对边境地区进行更猛烈的空袭,”托尔说。“这对中国来说是个敏感问题。”