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The United Nations--today it is the largest organization in the world.
联合国——今天它是世界上最大的组织。
Nearly every country on earth is a member.
地球上几乎每个国家都是其成员。
And it's core the UN is a simple yet remarkably profound concept--a place where sovereign nations can settle disputes with each other into the battlefield.
联合国的核心是一个简单却非常深刻的概念——一个主权国家可以在战场上解决彼此争端的地方。
Not too long ago, however, the UN was nothing more than an idea and an office building in New York city.
然而，就在不久前，联合国还只是一个想法，一座纽约市的办公楼。
What helped turn it into the powerful force it is today was the leadership of its second Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold.
使该组织成为今天这样强大的是其第二任秘书长达格·哈马舍尔德的领导。
Plucks from his obscure Swedish cabinet post had placed in the chair of the world's most powerful diplomat,
哈马舍尔德从他鲜为人知的瑞典内阁职位上被提拔为世界上最有权势的外交官，
Hammarskjold hit the ground running guiding the infant organization into maturity, navigating treacherous Cold War politics and staring down some of the world's most powerful leaders.
他一马当先地带领着这个新生的组织走向成熟，驾驭着变幻莫测的冷战政治，并盯着世界上一些最有权势的领导人。
He was an enigma loved by many yet understood by very few.
他神秘莫测，许多人喜欢他，却很少有人了解他。
One thing was very clear to everyone, however, Dag Hammarskjold was a man entirely committed to the ideals of the United Nations, to the idea of world peace.
然而，有一件事大家都很清楚，达格·哈马舍尔德是一个完全致力于联合国理想和世界和平理念的人。
So much so that in the end it cost him his life.
以至于最后他付出了生命的代价。
In early 1953, the United Nations was in crisis.
1953年初，联合国陷入危机。
The body's first Secretary General the Norwegian Trygve had resigned in November, 1952, and the Security Council was gridlocked and unable to choose his replacement.
该机构的第一任秘书长挪威人特里格韦于1952年11月辞职，安理会陷入僵局，无法选择他的继任者。
By this point, the United States and this Soviet Union were locked into a high-stakes chess game, known as the Cold War
此时，美国和苏联陷入了一场高风险的棋局，也就是所谓的“冷战”。
that saw the two global superpowers resorting to every trick short of nuclear war to try and gain an edge on each other.
这两个全球超级大国使出了除核战争之外的一切手段，试图在对方身上获得优势。
Since they were both members of the Security Council, they each held a veto power over the council's decisions,
由于他们都是安理会成员，他们都对安理会的决定拥有否决权，
meaning that any candidate to replace lie that was considered too close to one side was rejected by the other.
这意味着任何被认为过于接近一方的候选人都将被另一方拒绝。
Months of gridlock led to some worry for the future of this new diplomatic organization.
几个月的僵局使人们对这个新的外交组织的未来感到担忧。
If the superpowers couldn't even agree on someone to run it, the UN was surely doomed to failure just like the League of Nations two decades earlier.
如果超级大国不能达成一致，联合国肯定会像20年前的国际联盟一样失败。
What was needed was a compromise candidate-- someone that offended neither East nor West.
我们需要的是一个既不冒犯东方也不冒犯西方的候选人。
It just happened that Anthony Ede, the British Foreign Secretary, knew Dag Hammarskjold, a obscure 48-year-old Swedish government minister,
碰巧，英国外交大臣安东尼·埃德认识48岁的瑞典政府部长达格·哈马舍尔德。
who had enjoyed a successful if unremarkable career in Sweden's civil service.
哈马舍尔德并不出名，但在瑞典的公务员生涯中颇有成就。
With everyone running out of ideas who to appoint, Ede suggested him to the U.K.'s representative on the Security Council.
由于大家都不知道该任命谁，埃德建议他担任英国在安理会的代表。
The U.S. and the Soviet Union barely knew who Hammarskjold was and believed him to be a harmless bureaucrat perfect for their purposes.
美国和苏联几乎不知道哈马舍尔德是谁，并相信他是一个无害的官员，完全符合他们的目的。
On March 31, 1953, the Security Council voted in favor of Hammarskjold becoming the new Secretary General of the UN, a nomination that was confirmed without a fuss by the General Assembly.
1953年3月31日，安理会投票赞成哈马舍尔德成为联合国新秘书长，这一提名在联合国大会上毫不费力地得到了确认。
The oddest part of the whole affair was that nobody in New York had bothered to ask Hammarskjold if it'd be interested in the job.
整个事件中最奇怪的部分是，纽约没有人费心去问哈马舍尔德是否对这份工作感兴趣。
That simply wasn't the time.
那根本不是时候。
The first he heard about the nomination was when he received a phone call from a journalist in the middle of the night right after the vote occurred.
他第一次听到提名的消息是在投票结束后的半夜接到记者的电话。
He believed it to be an April Fool's Day joke and angrily hung up the phone.
他以为这是愚人节的玩笑，生气地挂了电话。
But a few hours later, an official cable came from New York asking him to accept the job.
但几个小时后，一封来自纽约的官方电报让他接受这份工作。
Hammarskjold was flabbergasted, having never shown any interest in the job prior to that moment.
哈马舍尔德大吃一惊，在此之前他从未对这份工作表现出任何兴趣。
In fact, during a conversation with the painter Bo Beskew some weeks before, he had reacted strongly to Beskew's assertion that he would be a good candidate for the post,
事实上，在几周前与画家博·贝斯丘的一次谈话中，他对贝斯丘声称他将是这个职位的优秀候选人的说法做出了强烈反应，
saying, "nobody is crazy enough to propose me, and I would be crazy to accept."
他说，“没有人疯狂到提议我任职，如果那样的话，我也会疯狂地接受。”
After consulting with the Swedish government though, he felt as though he couldn't refuse the call to serve his fellow man, even if he felt completely unqualified to step out onto the world stage.
不过，在与瑞典政府磋商后，他觉得自己似乎无法拒绝为同胞服务的召唤，即使他觉得自己完全没有资格走上世界舞台。
A week later, he was sworn in and he took up the mantle of UN Secretary General at the United Nations building in New York city.
一周后，他在纽约市的联合国大楼宣誓就职，成为联合国秘书长。
His nomination would prove to be one of the most impactful decisions of the 20th century.
他的提名被证明是20世纪最具影响力的决定之一。
