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The First World War
第一次世界大战
Look back with angst
再回首 忧心忡忡
A century on, there are uncomfortable parallels with the era that led to the outbreak of the First World War
一战过去已有一个世纪，回望一战却发现与当今世界有不少相似之处，令人不安。
AS NEW YEAR approached a century ago, most people in the West looked forward to 1914 with optimism.
一个世纪前，同是新年将至，许多西方人对即将来临的1914年充满期待。
The hundred years since the Battle of Waterloo had not been entirely free of disaster—there had been a horrific civil war in America, some regional scraps in Asia, the Franco-Prussian war and the occasional colonial calamity.
滑铁卢战役百年来，世界仍未完全摆脱灾难—美国爆发严重内战，亚洲部分地区变成废墟，普法战争爆发，殖民地灾难时有发生。
But continental peace had prevailed.
不过，各大陆整体来说还是和平的。
Globalisation and new technology—the telephone, the steamship, the train—had knitted the world together.
全球化进程加深，加上电话，蒸汽船，火车等新技术应运而生，世界各国紧密相连。
John Maynard Keynes has a wonderful image of a Londoner of the time, sipping his morning tea in bed and ordering the various products of the whole earth to his door, much as he might today from Amazon—and regarding this state of affairs as normal, certain and permanent, except in the direction of further improvement.
凯恩斯精彩描绘了当时伦敦人的生活情景，躺在床上啧吧啧吧喝着早茶，订购来自全世界各地的各种产品还送货上门，就像现在从亚马逊上购物一样—他们认为这种状态正常，必然且不变，要变也只会变更好。
The Londoner might well have had by his bedside table a copy of Norman Angell's The Great Illusion, which laid out the argument thatEurope's economies were so integrated that war was futile.
他们的床头桌上可能还放着一本诺曼?安吉尔的《大幻觉》，例举种种说明欧洲经济高度一体化，战争无用。
Yet within a year, the world was embroiled in a most horrific war.
然而不到一年，整个世界卷入了一场极端可怕的战争。
It cost 9m lives—and many times that number if you take in the various geopolitical tragedies it left in its wake, from the creation of Soviet Russia to the too-casual redrawing of Middle Eastern borders and the rise of Hitler.
一战中，900万人丧生；一战后，苏联建国，中东地区的国家边界被草率划定，希特勒迅速崛起，若把这些尾随一战而来的地缘政治惨剧都囊括在内的话，死亡人数可就要翻好几番了。
From being a friend of freedom, technology became an agent of brutality, slaughtering and enslaving people on a terrifying scale.
而科技，从自由之友摇身变成暴行的代理人，无数人因此遭屠杀、被奴役。
Barriers shot up around the world, especially during the Great Depression of the 1930s.
世界各地壁垒林立，在20世纪30年代经济大萧条时期更是如此。
The globalisation that Keynes's Londoner enjoyed only really began again in 1945—or, some would argue, in the 1990s, when eastern Europe was set free and Deng Xiaoping's reforms began bearing fruit in China.
凯恩斯笔下伦敦人享受的全球化真正再次出现已是1945年，或是有人认为的20世纪90年代，那时西欧解放，邓小平在中国的改革开放已初见成效。
The driving force behind the catastrophe that befell the world a century ago wasGermany, which was looking for an excuse for a war that would allow it to dominate Europe.
德国一直伺机寻找借口发动战争欲征服欧洲，是百年前那场大灾难的助推手。
Yet complacency was also to blame.
然而他国的骄傲自满也难辞其咎。
Too many people, inLondon,Parisand elsewhere, believed that because Britainand Germanywere each other's biggest trading partners after America and there was therefore no economic logic behind the conflict, war would not happen.
不论是在伦敦、巴黎还是其它地方，有太多人认为英德两国互为仅次于美国的第二大贸易合作伙伴，也就不会有经济方面的纠纷，战争也就不会爆发。
As Keynes put it, The projects and politics of militarism and imperialism, of racial and cultural rivalries, of monopolies, restrictions and exclusion, which were to play the serpent to this paradise, were little more than the amusements of…daily newspaper.
正如凯恩斯所言，军国主义和帝国主义，种族和文化对抗，贸易垄断、限制和排外等种种计划和政策正如失乐园的撒旦化身大蛇一样，然而在伦敦人看来，不过是日报上的娱乐新闻罢了。
Playing your role
演好角色
Humanity can learn from its mistakes, as shown by the response to the economic crisis, which was shaped by a determination to avoid the mistakes that led to the Depression.
从经济危机的应对便可看出，人类能从错误中吸取教训，尤其当人们下定决心不再重蹈经济大萧条的覆辙时。
The memory of the horrors unleashed a century ago makes leaders less likely to stumble into war today.
回忆起百年前这场恐怕的战争，各国便不太可能再度卷入战争。
So does the explosive power of a modern conflagration: the threat of a nuclear holocaust is a powerful brake on the reckless escalation that dispatched a generation of young men into the trenches.
同样，想到现代冲突带来的爆炸威力：核毁灭的威胁有力的刹住了不顾后果的冲突升级，新一代年轻男子也就无需匍匐战壕了。
Yet the parallels remain troubling.
然而当今世界与一战的诸多相似之处，仍令人担忧。
The United StatesisBritain, the superpower on the wane, unable to guarantee global security.
现在的美国类似当时的英国，同是月满正亏的超级大国，同样无法保证全球安全。
Its main trading partner,China, plays the part of Germany, a new economic power bristling with nationalist indignation and building up its armed forces rapidly.
中国，美国最主要的贸易伙伴，则类似当时的德国，同为新兴经济力量，同样充斥着愤懑的民族主义者，同样在迅速地构建军事力量。
Modern Japan is France, an ally of the retreating hegemon and a declining regional power.
日本就如当时的法国，同为衰退霸权国的同盟者，在地区的影响力同样下降。
The parallels are not exact—China lacks the Kaiser's territorial ambitions and America's defence budget is far more impressive than imperial Britain's—but they are close enough for the world to be on its guard.
不过，并无完全相同，中国缺少德国扩张的野心，美国的国防预算也远强于那时的英帝国。然而，这种高度相似已足以令世界提高警惕。
Which, by and large, it is not.
但总体上并未引起世界各国的重视。
The most troubling similarity between 1914 and now is complacency.
自满才是1914年与当今世界最令人担忧的相似点。
Business people today are like businesspeople then: too busy making money to notice the serpents flickering at the bottom of their trading screens.
商人还像那时的的商人：忙着挣钱，对电子交易屏下若隐若现的撒旦毒蛇浑然不知。
Politicians are playing with nationalism just as they did 100 years ago.
政客也还像百年前的政客那样，耍弄老一套民族主义。
India may next year elect Narendra Modi, a Hindu nationalist who refuses to atone for a pogrom against Muslims in the state he runs and who would have his finger on the button of a potential nuclear conflict with his Muslim neighbours in Pakistan.
明年印度总统大选，纳伦德拉?莫迪或当选，作为一名印度教民族主义者，他拒绝弥补在他管辖的州内发生的屠杀穆斯林的行为；他一旦上台，有可能触发与穆斯林领邦巴基斯坦潜在的核冲突。
Vladimir Putin has been content to watch Syria rip itself apart.
叙利亚四分五裂，俄罗斯已表现出渔翁旁观之态。
And the European Union, which came together in reaction to the bloodshed of the 20th century, is looking more fractious and riven by incipient nationalism than at any point since its formation.
而欧盟，在20世纪为抵制杀戮而结成联盟，如今民族主义抬头，欧盟呈现出自成立以来最为分裂的状态，内部也极易起冲突。
I have drunk and seen the spider
酒醉蛛现
Two precautions would help prevent any of these flashpoints sparking a conflagration.
为防星星之火燎原，有两种预防措施。
One is a system for minimising the threat from potential dangers.
其一，构建安全体系，将潜在危险降到最低。
Nobody is quite clear what will happen when North Koreaimplodes, but America and Chinaneed to plan ahead if they are to safeguard its nuclear programme without antagonising each other.
一旦朝鲜内战爆发，谁也无法预料会发生什么，但中美两国必须未雨绸缪，届时才能既稳住朝鲜核项目，又不致引起敌对。
Eventually, somebody is bound to crash into somebody else—and there is as yet no system for dealing with it.
最终，定有迎头相撞的时候，而目前却还没有应对体系。
A code of maritime conduct for the area is needed.
因此，这个地区还需要一套海洋行为准则。
The second precaution that would make the world safer is a more active American foreign policy.
促进世界安全的第二个预防措施则需要美国采取更积极的外交政策。
Despite forging an interim nuclear agreement with Iran, Barack Obama has pulled back in the Middle East—witness his unwillingness to use force in Syria.
尽管同伊朗签订了临时核协议，奥巴马已从中东地区事务中抽手，他不愿对叙利亚动武即是例证。
He has also done little to bring the new emerging giants—India,Indonesia,Braziland, above all,China—into the global system.
此外，印度、印尼、巴西尤其是中国等新型大国加入全球体系，美国贡献甚微。
This betrays both a lack of ambition and an ignorance of history.
这一切都透露出：奥巴马历史缺乏，雄心不足。
Thanks to its military, economic and soft power,Americais still indispensable, particularly in dealing with threats like climate change and terror, which cross borders.
多亏军事、经济和软实力依旧强大，美国仍是必不可少的角色，尤其在应对全球气候变化和恐怖主义上。
But unlessAmericabehaves as a leader and the guarantor of the world order, it will be inviting regional powers to test their strength by bullying neighbouring countries.
但只有当美国扮演好领导者和世界秩序维护者的角色，其他地区大国才不会为试实力欺辱邻国。
The chances are that none of the world's present dangers will lead to anything that compares to the horrors of 1914.
也许当今世界的各种威胁还不致造成1914年那样可怕的战争。
Madness, whether motivated by race, religion or tribe, usually gives ground to rational self-interest. But when it triumphs, it leads to carnage, so to assume that reason will prevail is to be culpably complacent.
无论是种族、宗教还是部落驱动的疯狂行为，通常都会向理性的自身利益考量让步。一旦疯狂占据上风，屠杀就难以避免，因此假定理智永远会战胜疯狂的自满，本应受责。
That is the lesson of a century ago.
这就是我们应吸取的一战教训。
