特朗普与中国对抗会怎么样？

The biggest surprise since Donald Trump’s election victory is his decision to pick a fight with China. Not once in his campaign did he mention the word Taiwan. Yet all of a sudden there is now a threat over America’s “One China” policy — a bedrock in today’s unstable global order. Beijing has so far chosen to blame a wily Taiwan for the call between Mr Trump and his Taiwanese counterpart — the US president-elect is “as ignorant as a child”, says China’s state media.

唐纳德•特朗普(Donald Trump)赢得美国大选以来最令人震惊的地方，是他选择与中国对抗。他在选战中一次都没提到过台湾。然而，突然之间，美国的“一个中国”(One China)政策(这是当今不稳定的全球秩序的一个基石)遭到了威胁。到目前为止，对于特朗普和台湾总统之间的通话，中国政府选择将其归咎于狡猾的台湾方面——中国官媒表示，美国候任总统“懵懂得像个小孩子”。

On Sunday China agreed to return an underwater drone it had seized from a US naval vessel. Mr Trump claimed it had been stolen. China accused him of “overhyping” the incident. Next time, Beijing is unlikely to let him off the hook so easily.

周日，中国方面同意归还从一艘美国海军舰艇附近捕获的一具潜航器。特朗普曾声称该装置是被偷走的。中国指责特朗普“炒作”这一事件。下一次，北京不太可能如此轻易地放过他。

Without realising it, the US electorate appears to have opened the gates to a new cold war in which America’s hand will be far less strong than it was first time round. One of the reasons the US won the original one was its skill at breaking China away from the Soviet block. Detente between Richard Nixon’s US and Mao Zedong’s China in 1972 cemented the Sino-Soviet split and weakened Moscow’s global appeal. Mr Trump plans to do the reverse.

美国选民似乎开启了通向新冷战的大门，他们却没有认识到这一点。而在这轮新冷战中，美国手上的牌面远没有第一次冷战时那么强。美国之所以赢得第一次冷战，其中一个原因是得益于美国把中国从苏维埃阵营中分化出来的技巧。1972年理查德•尼克松(Richard Nixon)领导的美国和毛泽东领导的中国关系缓和，强化了中苏的分裂，削弱了莫斯科在全球的号召力。而特朗普打算做的事却正好相反。

His strong rhetoric against China is mirrored only by his warm overtures to Vladimir Putin’s Russia. It remains to be seen what strategic gain Mr Trump will derive from doing deals with Russia — a country that is stoking illiberal democracy in Europe and that played a role in helping Mr Trump defeat Hillary Clinton. But Mr Trump’s antagonism towards China is a gamble without an upside.

特朗普对中国的强硬措辞，与他对弗拉基米尔•普京(Vladimir Putin)领导的俄罗斯的友好姿态形成反差。对于正在欧洲鼓动“非自由民主”体制、在帮助特朗普打败希拉里•克林顿(Hillary Clinton)方面发挥作用的俄罗斯，特朗普通过与它做交易能获得什么战略收益还有待观察。不过，特朗普与中国对抗将是一场全无好处的赌博。

Avoiding a US-China conflict will take Nixonian dexterity. Mr Trump is no Nixon. For all his abuse of domestic law, Nixon was a devout student of global affairs who grasped the geopolitical chessboard. Mr Trump is a 70-year-old neophyte with no interest in rectifying the gaps in his knowledge. He spurns the presidential daily intelligence briefings because they are too dull. Nor do any of Mr Trump’s advisers resemble Henry Kissinger, who was chief architect of the One China policy that Mr Trump is threatening to rip up. Mr Trump’s senior appointees reflect both his anti-China and pro-Russia intentions.

避免美中冲突需要尼克松式的灵活手段。特朗普却不是尼克松。尼克松尽管对国内法律有种种滥用行为，他却是位全球事务领域的专注学生，理解地缘政治大棋局。而特朗普则是一位对填补自身知识空白不感兴趣的70多岁的新手。他轻蔑地拒绝听取为总统提供的每日情报简报，原因是觉得它们太无聊。他身边也没有一位与亨利•基辛格(Henry Kissinger)相似的顾问，基辛格是特朗普威胁要颠覆的一个中国政策的首席设计师。特朗普对高级别职位的人选指定，既反映了他的反华意图，也反映了他的亲俄打算。

Michael Flynn, the retired lieutenant general who will play a key role as Mr Trump’s national security adviser, believes China is in league with Isis and other Islamist terrorist groups to defeat the US. It is a breathtaking fiction. Before he joined the Trump campaign, Mr Flynn believed Russia was part of the same anti-US axis. He has since dropped his Russia hawkishness for a Trumpian admiration.

将担任特朗普国家安全顾问这一关键角色的，是退役陆军中将迈克尔•弗林(Michael Flynn)。弗林认为，中国与“伊斯兰国”(ISIS)及其他伊斯兰恐怖组织暗中勾连，意图挫败美国。这是一种令人惊叹的虚构情节。在加入特朗普阵营之前，弗林还曾认为俄罗斯也是同一个反美轴心的一部分。而在加入特朗普阵营后，为获得特朗普的赞赏，他已放弃了对俄罗斯的鹰派立场。

Conversely, Rex Tillerson, Mr Trump’s nominee as secretary of state, is an old friend of Russia — Mr Putin awarded him the Russian Order of Friendship in 2013. At his confirmation hearings next month, the world will learn how warmly Mr Tillerson feels towards Moscow. Several Republican senators, including John McCain, America’s leading Russia hawk, plan to make Mr Tillerson’s declaration that Russia interfered in the US election a condition of their support for him — an intelligence finding Mr Trump angrily rejects.

与弗林相反，特朗普的国务卿提名人雷克斯•蒂勒森(Rex Tillerson)则是俄罗斯的老朋友——普京曾在2013年为他颁发过俄罗斯友谊勋章(Order of Friendship)。在下个月针对蒂勒森的提名确认听证会上，世界将会了解他对莫斯科感情有多深。包括美国头号对俄鹰派约翰•麦凯恩(John McCain)在内，几位共和党参议员打算把蒂勒森宣称俄罗斯干预美国选举(这是特朗普愤怒否认的情报发现)作为支持蒂勒森的前提条件。

It is possible Mr Tillerson’s prospects could fall at that hurdle. More likely is that he will find a way of finessing the Russia hawks without contradicting Mr Trump.

蒂勒森的任职前景有可能因这一障碍而化为乌有。不过更有可能的情况是，他会想办法在不抵触特朗普的情况下，在对俄鹰派人士面前蒙混过关。

So what will result from Mr Trump’s China gamble? The initial effect will be confusion. Mr Trump’s Taiwan threat took China as much by surprise as it did everyone else. In its guarded response, China gave Mr Trump room to correct what it chose to interpret as a naive mistake. The next step will be escalating tension. Mr Trump wants to be known as the president who returns manufacturing jobs to the US, and keeps existing ones from moving overseas. Wresting concessions from China — such as the voluntary export restraint Japan adopted in the late 1980s — is a key part of the story he wants to tell the American people.

那么，特朗普的对华赌博会有什么结果?起初是让人大惑不解。特朗普在台湾问题上发出的威胁，令中国方面与其他所有人一样震惊。为防万一，中国选择将其解释为幼稚的错误，为特朗普留下了纠正的空间。而下一步将造成紧张关系升级。对于特朗普来说，他希望被视为一位让制造业工作岗位回流美国、并确保现有岗位不流失海外的总统。在他想要告诉美国人民的故事中，争取中国的让步——就像上世纪80年代末日本曾采取过自愿限制出口措施——是关键的一环。

Mr Trump is using the threat to the One China policy as leverage in that quest. If he persists, which I believe he will, it will backfire. China will respond by putting a further squeeze on disaffected US investors, whose complaints about thin profits and Chinese intellectual property theft are becoming louder by the day. Far from checking Washington’s China-bashing, as US businesses have done in the past, many will be cheering Mr Trump on.

特朗普正在把对一个中国政策的威胁作为满足上述诉求的手段。如果他坚持下去——我相信他会这么做——事情将适得其反。中国将通过进一步挤压已经心怀不满的美国投资者予以回应，这些投资者对利润微薄和中国窃取知识产权的抱怨声正变得越来越大。与美国商界过去阻止华盛顿攻击中国的做法大不相同的是，许多人会为特朗普鼓劲加油。

Once the dispute sets in, the risk of conflict will rise. China will find a way of testing Mr Trump’s resolve early into his presidency — something a little tougher than a seized naval drone. That is what happened with George W Bush in 2001 when it forced a US spyplane to land on China’s territory. The resulting stand-off, and eventual release of the American crew, was quickly forgotten after the 9/11 terrorist attacks a few months later.

一旦出现争端，双方爆发冲突的风险将会增加。中国会在特朗普上任之初设法试探他的决心——找一件比捕获潜航器更棘手的事情。2001年乔治•W•布什(George W Bush)就遭遇过这样的情况。当时，中国曾迫使一架美国侦察机在其领土着陆。这一事件导致的对峙、以及美国机组人员最终的获释，在几个月后的9•11恐怖袭击后被迅速淡忘。

Contrary to Mr Flynn’s view, China is a natural ally in America’s struggle against Islamist terrorism. The scope for an accident with today’s far more assertive China — whether over Taiwan, the South China Sea, or the East China Sea — is considerably greater than in 2001. China’s military clout is far greater than it was then. Just last week, new Chinese missile batteries were detected on reclaimed land in the South China Sea.

与弗林的看法相反，中国是美国在对伊斯兰恐怖主义斗争中的天然盟友。与远比当初自信的中国闹出事来的几率比2001年大了许多，不管是在台湾问题上还是在南中国海或东中国海问题上。中国的军事实力也远胜当年。就在上周，在南中国海中国填海造出的岛屿上，还发现有新部署的中国导弹发射装置。

Can we trust Mr Trump’s instincts in a crisis? Will Mr Putin act as a restraint — or even a mediator — between a defensive US and a rising China? We cannot yet know the answer. What we do know is that Mr Trump’s closest adviser is a man who sees China as a mortal foe.

一旦发生危机，我们能相信特朗普的本能反应么?在防守的美国和崛起的中国之间，普京会扮演劝架者、甚至是调停者的角色么?我们现在还无法知道答案。我们知道的是，特朗普最亲信的一位顾问把中国视为死敌。