什么才是希拉里的美国梦

Until recently most of the world yearned for the US to become a more normAl country. It had seen enough of George W Bush’s freedom agenda to put it off American exceptionalism for good. People should be careful what they wish for. Donald Trump may be the most gaffe-prone — and offensive — US presidential nominee in history. But he is also the first to scorn the belief that America’s mission should be to uphold universal values. It is not clear he even thinks such values exist. Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, is their unabashed cheerleader. “I believe with all my heart that America is an exceptional country,” she said in June. “We are still, in Lincoln’s words, the last best hope of earth.”

直到最近，世界大部分地区都渴望美国变成一个更平常的国家。他们受够了乔治•W•布什(George W Bush)在全球推动自由的议程，以至对美国例外论心生反感。人们应该小心自己的期盼。唐纳德•特朗普(Donald Trump)可能是美国历史上最出言不逊——以及最具攻击性——的总统候选人。但他也是第一个对以下信念——美国的使命应是维护普世价值观——表现出不屑的总统候选人。我们甚至不清楚他是否认为存在这些价值观。另一方面，希拉里•克林顿(Hillary Clinton)则是这些价值观的坚定拥护者。“我由衷地相信美国是一个例外的国家，”她6月时表示，“我们仍是——用亚伯拉罕•林肯(Abraham Lincoln)的话说——地球上最后、最好的希望。”

Long-suffering US realists — those who argue that America should merely pursue its national interests — must wonder what they did to deserve such a champion. Mr Trump vows to avoid foreign entanglements, such as pre-emptive wars in Iraq. That is what realists want to hear. Ditto for Mr Trump’s view that America’s allies should pay for more of their defence, or that China is entitled to occupy atolls in a sea named after it. Why should America always play the referee? But Mr Trump inevitably spoils things by adding his own gloss — promising a nuclear attack on Isis, for example, or claiming that President Barack Obama founded the terrorist group. The key to successful realism is tactical guile and deep knowledge of the world. Mr Trump epitomises the opposite. With friends like Mr Trump, realists need no enemies.

长期不如意的美国现实主义者——那些主张美国应该只追求本国国家利益的人士——一定惊讶于他们做了什么才会出现这样一位现实主义的拥护者。特朗普誓言要避免对外干涉，例如对伊拉克进行的先发制人的战争。这正是现实主义者希望听到的。他们也认同特朗普的其他一些观点：美国的盟友应更多地承担本国的防务开支，或是中国有权占有以其国名命名的海域内的岛礁。为什么美国总要担当裁判？但特朗普的口无遮拦不可避免地把事情搞糟了，例如，他许诺要对“伊斯兰国”(ISIS)进行核打击，或是宣称美国总统巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)创立了该恐怖组织。成功的现实主义的关键是在战术上的狡诈和对世界的深刻理解。特朗普恰恰是反面的典型代表。有了特朗普这样的队友，现实主义者不需要敌人。

There is also the likelihood that he will lose to Mrs Clinton in November. Mr Trump’s defeat would probably come in spite of his foreign policy instincts, rather than because of them. For years, the US public has said it is tired of military adventures, thinks Nato allies should shoulder more of the burden and that America’s global role should be more modest. Nation-building is no longer an election winner, if it ever was one. Mr Trump’s “America first” slogan might have unfortunate antecedents (it was picked up by Fascist sympathisers in the early 1940s), but many Americans are happy with its current meaning. If he loses it will be because of his manifestly unpresidential temperament and a tendency to insult almost every group in America.

而且，特朗普可能在11月的大选中输给希拉里。尽管在外交政策方面直觉不错，他还是可能会落败——他的失败倒不是因为这些直觉。多年来，美国民众已经表示出了对军事冒险的厌倦，他们认为，北约盟国应该承担更多的责任，美国扮演的全球性角色应该更加适度。国家建设议题不再是竞选中的制胜法宝（如果曾经是的话）。特朗普的“美国第一”的口号或许有令人遗憾的先例（上世纪40年代初法西斯主义的同情者提过），但许多美国人对其现在的含义感到满意。如果特朗普失败了，原因在于他明显毫无总统气质以及他侮辱美国几乎所有群体的倾向。

Unfortunately for realists, their ship may go down with him, which means the USS Exceptionalist would set sail again under Mrs Clinton next January. Where was it during the Obama years? Mr Obama’s foreign policy has been neither exceptionalist nor realist but a hybrid of the two. A few weeks after he took office, I asked whether he subscribed to the school of US exceptionalism. Mr Obama replied that he was a US exceptionalist in much the same way that “Brits subscribe to British exceptionalism, and Greeks subscribe to Greek exceptionalism”. His creed, in other words, was avowedly subjective. Given how harshly Mr Obama’s critics have questioned his patriotism, his answer today may be less ambivalent. It is hard to imagine Mrs Clinton saying that. A true exceptionalist leaves no room for doubt. They believe the US stands taller and sees further than other nations, as Madeleine Albright, the former secretary of state, once said.

对现实主义者而言，不幸的是，他们的大船或将与特朗普一同沉没，这意味着，“美国例外号巨轮”将于明年1月在希拉里的领导下再次起航。那么在奥巴马执政时期这艘船在哪里呢？奥巴马的外交政策既非美国例外主义，也非现实主义，而是两者的混合。奥巴马上任几周后，我问他是否信奉美国例外论。奥巴马回答说，他信奉美国例外论就像“英国人信奉英国例外主义，希腊人信奉希腊例外主义”。换句话说，他的政治纲领公开地带有主观性。鉴于奥巴马的批评者对他的爱国主义的强烈质疑，如果是今天回答上述问题，他的答案会更为明确。很难想象希拉里会那样说。一个真正的美国例外论者不会留下任何被质疑的余地。正如美国前国务卿马德琳•奥尔布赖特(Madeleine Albright)曾经说过的，他们相信美国比其他国家站得更高、看得更远。

What would this mean for a Clinton administration? Unexpected events would dictate much of her presidency, as is always the case. Ronald Reagan’s struggle with the Soviet Union’s “evil empire” was rendered moot by the rise of Mikhail Gorbachev. Bush junior took office promising a humbler foreign policy. He pivoted quickly to hubris after the 9/11 attacks. Mr Obama promised to wind down the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He will leave office with thousands of US soldiers in each country. Bill Clinton, meanwhile, vowed to uphold human rights and confront the “butchers of Beijing”. To his lasting regret, he turned a blind eye to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. This was largely because of what he learnt from another event — the “Black Hawk down” debacle in Somalia. He also brought China into the World Trade Organisation. In each case, however, the president’s philosophy shaped how they responded to events.

这对希拉里政府将意味着什么？像以往一样，不可预测的事件将主导她大部分总统任期。罗纳德•里根(Ronald Reagan)与苏联“邪恶帝国”的较量因米哈伊尔•戈尔巴乔夫(Mikhail Gorbachev)的崛起而失去意义。小布什上任时曾承诺实行谦和的外交政策。9/11恐怖袭击发生后，他的态度迅速地转向了自大。奥巴马承诺逐步结束在阿富汗和伊拉克的战争。到他离任时，这两国还将驻扎有数千名美军士兵。比尔•克林顿(Bill Clinton)曾誓言要维护人权，对抗“北京的屠夫”。让他始终感到懊悔的是，他对1994年卢旺达种族屠杀不闻不问。这主要是因为他从另一事件中学到教训——在索马里的“黑鹰坠落”事件。他还将中国带入了世界贸易组织(WTO)。然而，每一起事件中，美国总统的信念决定了他们会如何做出回应。

Many assume that Mrs Clinton would simply pick up the baton from Mr Obama, since she was his first secretary of state. But serving a president is very different from being one. On each military question that arose in Mr Obama’s first term, Mrs Clinton took the hawkish view. Sometimes she was on the winning side, such as on intervention in Libya. At others, such as on whether to arm Syrian rebels, her advice was overruled. In spite of her early involvement in the Iran nuclear talks, it is doubtful if she would have signed Mr Obama’s deal.

很多人认为，希拉里可能将只是延续奥巴马的执政方针，因为她是奥巴马手下的第一任国务卿。但是，效力于总统与自己当总统迥然不同。对于奥巴马第一任期出现的所有军事问题，希拉里都持强硬观点。有时她可以占上风，例如对利比亚的干预。有时——比如是否武装叙利亚叛军——她的建议被否决了。尽管参与了早期的伊朗核谈判，但如果还在国务卿之位的话，她是否会签署奥巴马的伊朗核协议值得怀疑。

Her campaign rhetoric is also strikingly different from Mr Obama’s. In 2008 he pledged to revive America’s moral authority in a world reeling from Mr Bush’s wars of choice. She vows to engage with a dangerous world with all the tools at her disposal. It is a different sensibility.

希拉里的竞选言辞也与奥巴马截然不同。2008年，奥巴马誓言在一个受到小布什“可打可不打的战争”冲击的世界里恢复美国的道德权威。而希拉里发誓要用所有可以诉诸的手段介入一个危险的世界。这是一种不同的觉悟。

Mr Obama once summed up his approach to foreign policy as “don’t do stupid shit”. In a rare critical moment, Mrs Clinton said Mr Obama’s maxim did not amount to an organising principle. She was right, of course. But in these hazardous times, the instinct to first do no harm may be worth more than we can appreciate.

奥巴马曾将自己的外交政策方针总结为“不做蠢事”。希拉里有一次罕见地对奥巴马提出批评，说他的座右铭并不等同于组织原则。当然，她说的没错。但在这些危急时期，首先不为害这种本能的价值可能超出了我们能理解的范畴。