北美帝国海军权威叫嚣：不惜一切代价在南海击败中央帝国

（说实话，这位专家的言论是十分昭和的，大有帝国兴亡在此一举的气势。但是他的最后一句话却让人又好气又好笑，大大削弱了严肃的气氛。众所周知，美国被戏称为新罗马帝国，他却在文中指控中国想做当代“罗马”，贼喊捉贼莫过于此，充满了喜剧效果）

北美帝国海军权威叫嚣：不惜一切代价在南海击败中央帝国

喵星驻神圣泰拉秘密观察员 喵斯拉大王

致 喵星外时空种群特别情报局 第M78宇宙9527号星系第三悬臂分站

神圣泰拉历2020年7月30日；喵族公历MEOW-9999年 小鱼干月 肝泥日

分类：人类 地缘政治 海权

威胁评级：星球3级；星系0级

是否建议执行撤喵行动：否

简报： 这可以算是《帝国利益》发表的“我比国务卿聪明”系列文章第二弹。但是与保罗希尔老先生不同的是，本文作者詹姆斯·霍姆斯作为帝国海军战争学院海洋战略系主任，从一个老牌鹰派和帝国主义走狗的角度，对国务卿关于南海问题的讲话进行了批判。他强调，国务卿严重低估了中央帝国对南海地区的野心，讲话调子还是太软。

霍姆斯先生从现实商业利益、传统海权和地缘政治理论、构建反华外交包围网三个方面，详细论述了北美帝国必须在南海击败的理由。归根结底一句话：如果北美帝国在南海地区与中央帝国的对峙中退缩，将引发多米诺骨牌效应，导致北美帝国多年以来的全球海上霸权崩溃。这位有着深厚军方背景的鹰派果然不同凡响，反华立场比钛合金还要强硬，事实上是在公然发出战争威胁。对一个以海权立国的国家来说，这个论断调子之高，拿老话来说就是在上纲上线。此言一出，任何试图在南海地区缓和局势的北美帝国军政界高层，都将有被扣上“美奸”帽子的政治风险。

    山雨欲来风满楼。作为军方人士的霍姆斯先生如此作态，联想到近日日本媒体连续放风北美帝国海军将对我黄岩岛进行轰炸，恐怕某种程度上也能反映北美帝国军界对政界的胁迫。北美帝国政界迫于巨大的内外压力，对帝国海军的军事冒险行动开绿灯，甚至帝国海军独走“误炸”的风险都在急剧增加。建议中央帝国方面对此高度警惕，切实做好对等报复、坚决回击的斗争准备，万万不可心存幻想。

James Holmes is J. C. Wylie Chair of Maritime Strategy at the Naval War College.

作者：詹姆斯·霍姆斯是帝国海军战争学院海洋战略系主任。

Know this: Surrendering the South China Sea would embolden other coastal states to repeal the law of the sea by fiat if they felt strongly about offshore seas and possessed sufficient physical might to enforce their will. 

要点：放弃南中央帝国海将鼓励其他对近海有强烈要求并且具有足够物质力量执行自身意志的国家，通过颁布法令来废除现行的海洋法。

（喵：潜台词就是如果北美帝国在南海地区与中央帝国的对峙中退缩，将引发多米诺骨牌效应，导致北美帝国多年以来的全球海上霸权崩溃）

It feels like 2014 again. That’s when it came to light that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had embarked on a seemingly quixotic project: manufacturing islands out of reefs and atolls in the South China Sea and then fortifying them to extend its sway vis-à-vis Southeast Asian rivals impertinent enough to insist on their maritime rights. The region was a fixture in headlines that year and into the next while Washington and Beijing traded barbs accusing each other of “militarizing” the situation.

目前的情况，让人感觉好像是2014年的重演。当时，中央帝国开始了一个貌似不切实际的项目：将南海的珊瑚礁和环礁扩建为岛屿，然后对其进行要塞化，从而扩大其对东南亚对手的影响力。而这些对手又摇摆不定、不够坚决，无法坚持他们主张的海洋权利。这使得南海地区局势成了当年乃至下一年的头条新闻，而北美帝国和中央帝国则互相指责对方将局势“军事化”。（喵：这位帝国海军专家完全回避了时间更近对抗更激烈的冲突，即2016年由于无效判决引起的南海对峙，也许是为当时帝国海军的退缩而感到羞耻，所以不愿意提及吧）

This week the Trump administration renewed the controversy, issuing a revised “U.S. Position on Maritime Claims in the South China Sea.” In the key paragraph Secretary of State Mike Pompeo proclaimed that “the world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire. America stands with our Southeast Asian allies and partners in protecting their sovereign rights to offshore resources, consistent with their rights and obligations under international law.

本周，大统领政府重申了这一争议，发布了一份修改后的“北美帝国就南海海洋权利主张的立场”。国务卿蓬佩奥在关键段落中宣称，“世界将不允许中央帝国将南海视为其海洋帝国。北美帝国与我们的东南亚盟国和伙伴站在一起，保护他们对近海资源的主权，这符合他们在国际法下的权利和义务。

We stand with the international community in defense of freedom of the seas and respect for sovereignty and reject any push to impose ‘might makes right’ in the South China Sea or the wider region.”

我们与国际社会站在一起，捍卫海上自由和尊重主权，反对任何在南海或更广大地区强加‘强权即公理’的做法。”

Now, empire is a freighted word for sure. Communist China defines itself in opposition to European and Japanese imperialism, a scourge CCP leaders decry for inflicting a “century of humiliation” on Asia’s leading power. Unsurprisingly, then, China’s embassy in Washington DC leapt to deny Pompeo’s accusation.

现在，帝国成了一个货真价实的词。中央帝国人民劳动党将自己定义为反对老欧罗巴列强和旭日帝国旧日帝国主义行径的力量。中央帝国人民劳动党领导人一贯谴责这些祸害给亚洲主要国家造成了“百年耻辱”。不出所料，中央帝国驻北美帝国大使馆立即否认了蓬佩奥的指控。

And indeed, the CCP is not seeking an empire in the South China Sea, strictly speaking. An empire exercises dominion over foreign territories from an imperial center. Beijing wants far more than a maritime empire. It covets ownership. It wants to make the South China Sea what Romans once called the Mediterranean Sea—namely mare liberum, or “our sea.”

事实上，严格说来，中央帝国劳动人民党并不是想寻求在南海建立帝国主义统治。所谓帝国主义统治是指从帝国中心对海外领土行使统治权。中央帝国想要的远不止一个海上帝国。它渴望拥有该区域的完全所有权。它想把南海变成罗马人曾经称之为“地中海”的地方，也就是“我们的海”（喵：指中央帝国是把南海当作本土而不是海外领土对待。西方对“帝国”的定义和认识，与传统上中央帝国对“帝国”这个词的认识有一些文化上的差别）

CCP magnates make no effort to conceal their aims. Since 2009, in fact, officialdom has frankly and regularly avowed that its paramount goal is “indisputable sovereignty” within a “nine-dashed line” enclosing the vast majority of the South China Sea. This is an extravagant claim. Think about what sovereignty is.

中央帝国劳动人民党的领导层毫不掩饰自己的目的。事实上，自2009年以来，中央帝国官方一直坦言，其首要目标是在包含了绝大多数南海区域的“九段线”内建立“无可争辩的主权”。这是一种要价很高的说法。想想看，什么是主权？

A sovereign government exercises a monopoly on the use of armed force within borders inscribed on the map. It ordains and others obey. The law of the sea, which proscribes national ownership of maritime space—with few, specific, and narrowly drawn exceptions, none of which justify Beijing’s claims—will be no more in the South China Sea if Xi Jinping & Co. get their way. The waters and land features within the nine-dashed line will be Chinese territory.

一个主权政府有权对在地图上边界线划定的区域行使武力垄断。它有权命令，而别人必须服从。除了少数具体的狭隘的例外，《海洋法》禁止主权国家占有公海。中央帝国对南海的主张，并不在这些例外之中。因此，如果中央帝国领导人关于南海的意志得逞，那么《海洋法》将在南海地区失去效力。“九段线”内的海洋和陆地都将成为中央帝国的领土。

And an awful precedent will have been set. Surrendering the South China Sea would embolden other coastal states to repeal the law of the sea by fiat if they felt strongly about offshore seas and possessed sufficient physical might to enforce their will.

一个可怕的先例将会被建立。放弃南中央帝国海将鼓励其他对近海有强烈要求并且具有足够物质力量执行自身意志的国家，通过颁布法令来废除现行的海洋法。

Hence Secretary Pompeo’s warning against letting the primeval principle that might makes right—that the strong seize what they want in international affairs and the weak accommodate themselves to the strong—prevail. Freedom of the sea is a pressing interest for the United States and any seafaring society. It should be nonnegotiable.

因此，蓬佩奥国务卿警告说，不要让“强者在国际事务中为所欲为，弱者迁就强者”的野蛮原则占上风。海上自由是北美帝国和任何海洋国家的核心利益。这是不可谈判的。（喵：我简直怀疑自己的眼睛，北美帝国居然在身体力行持强凌弱欺负了这么多小国之后，声明自己反对霸权主义。本喵从未见过如此厚颜无耻之人。）

But there are reasons apart from international law why Americans should care whether the Chinese Communist Party rules a faraway expanse of which they know little. First, access. As Alfred Thayer Mahan pointed out a century ago, the paramount goal of maritime strategy is to ensure commercial, diplomatic, and military access to important trading regions such as East Asia.

但除了国际法之外，北美帝国人还应该关心中央帝国人民劳动党是否知道如何统治一片他们所知甚少的辽阔疆域。首先是进入权。正如马汉一个世纪前指出的那样，海上战略的首要目标是确保自身的商业、外交和军事触角能够进入重要贸易区域，例如进入东亚。

Commerce is king. Military access assures political access assures commercial access and the blessings trade brings. At the same time access is a crucial enabler for maritime strategy.

商业为王。军事进入确保政治进入，政治进入确保商业进入，而商业贸易能够带来利益。同时，进入权是达成海上战略的关键因素。

Commerce generates wealth sufficient to fund a navy to protect commerce. Acquiescing in Beijing’s maritime claims would encumber freedom of movement for merchantmen and warships—threatening to interrupt this virtuous cycle and hurt American prosperity.

商业创造的财富足以资助海军保护商业。默许中央帝国的海权主张将阻碍商船和军舰的行动自由，威胁中断上述良性循环，这将严重损害北美帝国的繁荣。

It’s never a good time to put prosperity at hazard. Doing so in a pandemic year—a year rife with economic uncertainty—would amount to strategic malpractice. What happens in Southeast Asia has direct implications for Americans.

任何时候，对这种繁荣的威胁都是不能容忍的。特别是在这个经济充满巨大不确定性的艰难年份，容忍这种威胁将成为巨大的战略错误。东南亚发生的事情对北美帝国人有直接的影响。

Second, geopolitics. If U.S. foreign policy has aimed at securing commercial access since the age of Mahan, it also aims at keeping the “rimlands” of East Asia and Western Europe from falling under the dominion of some hostile power or alliance.

第二，地缘政治。如果说北美帝国的外交政策从马汉时代就着眼于确保商业准入，那么它也旨在防止东亚和西欧的“边缘地带”落入某些敌对势力或联盟的统治之下。（喵：祖传搅屎棍，大英帝国的好学生，欧亚大陆的离岸平衡手）

North America occupies a fortunate geographic position, buffered against Eurasian enmities by the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. If some geopolitical competitor unified one of the rimlands under its rule, however, it might wrest away martial resources sufficient to reach out across the ocean and do the United States harm in its own hemisphere.

北美洲拥有得天独厚的地理位置，能够凭借太平洋和大西洋抵御来自欧亚大陆的敌意。然而，如果某个地缘政治竞争对手将欧亚大陆边缘地带统一在其统治之下，那么它可能会夺走足以跨越大洋的军事资源，并在自己控制的半球对北美帝国的利益造成伤害。

To keep the rimlands fragmented among competing powers and hold danger at bay, U.S. diplomats and seafarers have to be able to get to the rimlands. Consequently, the U.S. Navy, affiliated joint forces, and allied military services must rule what geopolitics sage Nicholas Spykman termed the “girdle of marginal seas” adjoining the Eurasian perimeter. The South China Sea figures prominently among these marginal waterways—and thus to America’s rimlands strategy. Washington cannot let it go.

为了使欧亚大陆边缘地区在大国竞争中变得四分五裂，并遏制危险，北美帝国外交官和海上力量必须能够有效到达这些地带。因此，北美帝国海军及其联合作战力量和盟军必须统治所谓的“海陆边缘地带”。这是地缘政治学权威尼古拉斯·斯皮克曼对毗邻欧亚大陆边界地带的定义。南海是这些边缘地带中的重要水道，因此也是北美帝国“边缘地带战略”的重要组成部分。北美帝国绝不能允许中央帝国在这一区域自行其是。

And third, friends and allies. The United States has no strategic position in the Western Pacific without local partners and the harbors and bases they supply. It must keep its commitments to treaty allies such as the Philippine Islands lest they resign themselves to Chinese Communist supremacy and close their soil to U.S. forces.

第三，朋友和盟友。如果没有当地伙伴和他们提供的港口、基地，北美帝国在西太平洋就没有战略地位。它必须履行对签约盟国的承诺，例如对菲律宾群岛，以免它们屈从于中央帝国人民劳动党的霸权，并对北美帝国军队关闭领土。

America could find itself locked out of the region. Its commercially and geopolitically driven foreign policy would falter as a result. Manila is a primary target of CCP abuse in the South China Sea, having seen waters apportioned to it under the law of the sea purloined by China’s maritime militia, coast guard, and navy. Deterring new aggression while reversing past transgressions must be central to U.S. strategy.

如果那样，北美帝国可能会发现自己被排斥在这一地区之外。其由商业利益和地缘政治需要驱动的外交政策将因此动摇。马尼拉是中央帝国在南海滥用强的主要目标，根据《海洋法》本应受到保护的海域被中央帝国海上民兵、海岸警卫队和海军攫取。抵抗新的侵犯并将形势扭转到传统轨道上，必须成为北美帝国战略的核心。（喵：意思是要回到北美帝国在南海横行霸道的时代）

Clearly, then, failing to honor longstanding security guarantees to the Philippines and other allies would place U.S. foreign policy and strategy in jeopardy in manifold ways. If Americans prefer a world of wealth and safety, they have ample reason to take an interest in Southeast Asian affairs. Abandoning the region to a Roman fate risks sacrificing our own future.

显然，如果不遵守对菲律宾和其他盟国的长期安全保障，北美帝国的外交政策和战略将面临多方面的危险。如果北美帝国人想要一个富裕和安全的世界，他们有充分的理由对东南亚事务感兴趣。把这个地区得命运交给“罗马人”，有可能牺牲我们自己的未来。（喵：新罗马帝国把我们叫做“罗马人”，实在是太讽刺了）

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