【英语国际】美国首次开始衰落

Towards the end of next January, the US and Europe are going to wake up with a jolt. A new American president will be told that, for the first time in its history, the US is a nation entering relative decline. Europeans will discover simultaneously that the departure of George W. Bush has deprived them of an alibi.

Amid the stacks of briefing papers presented to John McCain or Barack Obama will be an assessment of the likely contours of the geopolitical landscape over the next 15 years. We can assume it will state the obvious: that if there was a unipolar moment after the end of the cold war, it passed as quickly as it emerged.

An important word in this analysis is “relative”. The US can expect to be the sole superpower for some time yet, if we mean by the term a state capable of deploying effective power almost anywhere in the world. Measured by economic weight, technological capability or military prowess, the US will remain the pre-eminent power. But the shift in its relative position vis a vis the rising nations of Asia, particularly China, will tighten the constraints on the exercise of its power.

I say all this is obvious, but it may not seem so to the US voters listening to the two presidential candidates. Mr McCain speaks of using America's hard power more effectively, combining it with stronger engagement with US allies. His aides promote the (almost certainly doomed) idea of a global league of democracies. Mr Obama promises to rely more on the power of example than on the example of power in asserting US leadership.

Both, though, imagine the world as it appeared after the collapse of communism removed the only serious challenge to US primacy. The assumption is that the mistakes and events of the past eight years can be wiped from the slate. This is not the reality the winner on November 4 will encounter when he steps over the threshold of the White House.

To speak in Washington of a multipolar world is to invite opprobrium. The phrase carries too much baggage. The implication is of others ganging up against the benevolence of US hegemony. An image that springs to mind among many US policymakers is of Russia's Vladimir Putin standing shoulder to shoulder with France's Jacques Chirac and Germany's Gerhard Schr?der when the Atlantic alliance fractured over Iraq.

That particularly grubby coalition always said more about the character of Messrs Schr?der and Chirac and the nationalist ambitions of Mr Putin than about any sustained strategic shift. A more contemporary version of the geopolitical nightmare is that of a new authoritarian alliance led by an energy-rich and belligerent Russia and a newly assertive China. Hence the call among some of Mr McCain's advisers for a countervailing partnership of democracies.

Such sinister scenarios speak to only one version, however, of a multipolar world – one of competing poles of attraction in which great powers are divided as between those, to borrow Mr Bush's phrase, who are “for or against” the US.

The reality is likely to be more fluid – a global environment in which there are indeed new poles, but of power rather than of attraction. This world would see shifting interests and alliances, regional and global, that defy the neat divisions of America's neo-conservatives.

To take one example: anyone who spends time in China, as I have done again this week, will doubt the permanency of any Beijing-Moscow axis. I take away no sense of a Chinese leadership that wants to walk in lockstep with Mr Putin. The issues likely to divide China and Russia are likely significantly to outweigh in the long term the opportunism that might unite them momentarily.

Whatever the precise constellation of powers, the incoming US president will be told to abandon the preconceptions of the campaign trail. The past cannot be reclaimed. I caught a sense of the briefing he may be offered when the US National Intelligence Council co-hosted a conference recently with Chatham House in London. Near the top of the president's reading list will be the NIC's Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World. This document, the subject of extensive consultation among experts within and outside the US, will offer the new administration as good a glimpse into the strategic future as he will get.

The final report has yet to be written, but I took from the Chatham House conference that it will foresee a fundamental upheaval in the multilateral order created by the US after the second world war. The question it may find harder to answer is whether there will be anything substantial to replace it.

More likely, we will face a mixed economy of crimped multilateralism, of great power competition and of balancing alliances. The relationship between these elements – between co-operation and competition, strategic stability and instability – will be shaped by decisions made in Washington, Beijing, Moscow and, to the extent that Europe claims a role, London, Paris and Berlin.

If the new US president will discover that the most powerful leader in the world is not quite as powerful as he was, Europe will find the new world disorder equally discomfiting. America's mistake has been to disdain multilateralism and to overreach itself. Europe's misjudgment has been to assume the inexorable advance of the rules-based system that it presents as a model to the world.

When things have gone wrong in recent years, the European reflex has been to blame Mr Bush's unilateralism. Europe too thought it could go back to the future. All would be well once Mr Bush had gone. In truth, a new US president will rob them of their excuses.

Mr Putin's invasion of Georgia has already provided a brutal demonstration of the limits of Europe's normative power. Subsequent negotiations with Moscow have served only to underline the latter's disdain for anything but force. Whether a European Union incapable of agreeing on how to counter Russian energy blackmail has learnt this lesson, I hesitate to say. I suppose the answer comes from looking around the continent's capitals at the quality of its leaders.

The conclusion I draw is that the US and Europe have only a small window of opportunity – a year or two after inauguration day, perhaps – to restore the credibility of the multilateral order. If they are to seize it, leaders on both sides of the Atlantic will have to see the world as it is rather than as they would like it to be. Am I optimistic they will do so? Not really.

快到明年1月底时，美国和欧洲将猛然惊醒。美国新总统将获悉，在其历史上，美国将第一次成为步入相对衰落的国家。欧洲人会同时发现，乔治•W•布什(George W. Bush)的离职使他们丧失了借口。在呈交给约翰•麦凯恩(John McCain)或是巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)的一摞摞简报文件中，会有一份对未来15年地缘政治前景可能概况的评估。我们可以假定，它将说明一件显而易见的事实：冷战结束后，倘若出现过单极时期，那么它的终结与它的出现是一样迅速。

这份分析报告中，一个重要的词就是“相对”。美国仍可以指望在一段时间内作为唯一的超级强权，如果我们衡量的条件是一个国家是否能在几乎全世界各地都部署有效力量。以经济影响力、科技能力或军事威力来衡量，美国仍将是显赫的强国。然而，与日益兴起的亚洲国家（尤其是中国）相比，美国相对地位的改变将使其在行使权力时更受克制。

我认为所有这些都显而易见，不过对于那些听从两位总统候选人的美国选民们而言，事情看起来也许不是这样。麦凯恩宣称，要更有效地利用美国的硬实力，与此相结合的是与美国盟友更加紧密的联系。他的助手们宣传建立全球民主国家联盟这样一个（几乎注定会失败的）主张。奥巴马承诺，将更加依赖于（美国）榜样的实力，而非权力的榜样，来维护美国的领导力。

尽管二人都以为——就如共产主义瓦解后看起来的那样——世界消除了对美国优势地位唯一的真正挑战。其假设是，过去8年的过失和事件都能从历史记录上抹去。而当11月4日的获胜者踏入白宫大门时，这并不是他将要面对的现实。

在华盛顿谈及“多极世界”就是在招惹非难。这个词承载了太多的涵义。其含意就是暗指其它国家联合起来，一致对抗美国霸权的滥施。跃入许多美国政策制定者脑海的一幅画面是：当大西洋联盟在伊拉克问题上发生分裂时，俄罗斯的弗拉基米尔•普京(Vladimir Putin)与法国的雅克•希拉克(Jacques Chirac)和德国的格哈德•施罗德(Gerhard Schr?der)肩并肩地站在一起。

相比，那个尤为龌龊的联盟一贯更多地谈论施罗德和希拉克先生的性格，以及普京的民族主义野心，。一个更现代的地缘政治噩梦的景象是，由能源富足且好战的俄罗斯与新近想要发出自己声音的中国所引领的新独裁主义联盟。因此，麦凯恩的几位顾问要求民主国家建立一道与之抗衡的联盟。

然而，这些险恶的假想只说明了多极世界的一种形式——互相竞争的吸引力层面多极世界，其中，强国被划分成（借用布什的话讲）“拥护或反对”美国的两极。

现实可能更加易变——在当前全球环境，的确有新的极出现，但是在权力层面，而非吸引力层面。这个世界将出现地区性和全球性的利益和同盟的转变，这会公然挑衅美国新保守派的简单划分。

举个例子：正如我上周再次去中国，在这里呆段时间的任何人都会怀疑任何北京——莫斯科轴心的持久性。我看不出中国领导人有任何道理要与普京步调一致。从长期来看，可能会割裂中俄关系的问题，其分量会远远超过可能将两国立刻联合起来的机会主义。

无论强国的确切格局是什么，未来的美国总统将被告知要放弃竞选过程中的偏见。历史不能被重写。在美国国家情报委员会（National Intelligence Council，简称NIC）近期与英国皇家国际事务研究所(Chatham House)联合主办的一次会议上，我预感到了未来美国总统可能会收到的简报。他的参考书目最靠前的几本中会有NIC的《全球趋势2025：改变的世界》(Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World)。这份文件是美国国内外专家进行的广泛讨论会的主题，将给新政府提供其所能获得的最好的战略远景一瞥。

最终报告还没写好，但我从皇家国际事务研究所讨论会了解到，该报告将预见多边秩序的一种根本剧变。这个秩序是美国于二战结束后创立的。报告会感到更难以解答的问题也许是：是否会有什么实质性东西能替代它。

更有可能的是，我们将面临一种混合经济，形式既是扭曲多边的，又是强权竞争的，以及相互制衡的同盟间的。这些因素——合作与竞争之间，战略稳定性与不稳定性之间——的关系将根据华盛顿、北京、莫斯科，以及（就欧洲应该得到的职能来说）伦敦、巴黎与柏林的决定而成形。

如果美国新总统发现，全球最有权势的领导人都不及他的权势大，欧洲会发现世界新秩序同样地令人失望。美国的错误在于摒弃了多边主义，且不自量力。而欧洲的判断失误在于以为它所提出的规章化体系会无可阻挡地进步是世界模式。

随着近年来问题的出现，欧洲人的反应是指责布什的单边主义。欧洲还认为它能回到未来。一旦布什离任，一切都将立刻好转。事实上，一位新的美国总统将使他们丧失借口。

普京入侵格鲁吉亚已无情地证明了欧洲规范性强权的局限性。随后欧洲与莫斯科的谈判只会突出后者唯武至上的观念。未能就如何阻遏俄罗斯能源勒索达成一致意见的欧盟(EU)是否从中得到了教训，我很不愿讲。我猜想，到欧洲大陆的各国首都转转，看看其领导人的素质就能知道答案了。

我的结论是，美国和欧洲仅有一点机会——也许是新总统就任后1年或2年——来恢复多边秩序的信誉。如果大西洋两岸的领导人想要抓住机会，他们必须实事求是地看待世界，而不是用一厢情愿的方式。我是否乐观地认为他们会这样做？不是的。

译者/陈云飞