Korean roulette
金正恩的轮盘赌
Kim Jong Un has raised the stakes; it is time to get tougher with the nastiest regime on the planet
既然金正恩已经加大了赌注，那么现在就该是对这个最龌龊的政权更加强硬的时候了
Apr 6th 2013 |From the print edition
EVEN by its own aggressive standards, North Korea's actions over the past couple of weeks have been extraordinary. Kim Jong Un, the country's young dictator, has threatened the United States with nuclear Armageddon, promising to rain missiles on mainland America and military bases in Hawaii and Guam; declared a “state of war” with South Korea; announced that he would restart a plutonium-producing reactor at its Yongbyon nuclear site, while enriching uranium to build more nuclear weapons; and barred South Korean managers from entering the Kaesong industrial complex, almost the only instance of North-South co-operation. All this comes after the regime set off a nuclear test, its third, in February. Tensions are the worst on the peninsula since 1994, when North Korea and America were a hair's breadth from war.
即便以其自身那种好斗的习性来衡量，北韩在过去几周内的行为也是非常罕见的。该国年少轻狂的独裁者金正恩以核末日来威胁美国，甚至叫嚣要将导弹倾泻到美国本土以及夏威夷和关岛的军事基地；他宣称已与南韩处于“战争状态”；他一边宣布重启宁边核设施的钚反应堆，一边进行铀浓缩以制造更多的核武器；他还禁止南韩管理人员进入作为北南合作唯一成果的开城工业园。上述所有行为都是这个政权于今年2月进行了第三次核试验之后发生的，当前这种紧张气氛是朝鲜半岛自1994年——当时北韩与美国差一点爆发战争——以来最为严重的一次。
The questions are what to make of all this, and how to respond. Neither is easy. The White House has tried to play down the aggression, talking of a “disconnect between rhetoric and action”, and some parts are pure bluster. The nuclear threat against mainland America is patently hollow: it will be years before the North has the technology to dispatch nuclear-tipped missiles. North Korea has yet to order a large-scale mobilisation of its 1.1m-strong army. Pyongyang, the capital, does not seem like a city that is about to go to war (see article).
摆在我们面前的问题是：他们这样做的原因是什么，我们又应该如何去应对这些行为。然而，对于这两个问题，哪一个都不容易得到解答。白宫对北韩的叫嚣一直采取淡化处理的原则。在谈到这些行为时 ，白宫除了称他们的“言辞与行动脱节”之外，还表示有些行为完全是赤裸裸的恐吓。至于对美国本土的核威胁，那是没有任何实质内容的东西。比如说，北韩需要数年才能具备发射带核弹头导弹的技术，他们到目前为止还没有对110多万人的军队进行大规模的调动，而首都平壤看上去也不像是一个做好战争准备的城市。
Only connect
唯有沟通
But there are also depressing reasons to take Mr Kim all too seriously. It does not take much to imagine the cycle of provocation and deterrence getting out of hand, especially if South Korea and the United States misjudge North Korea's actions—or vice versa. And even without nuclear missiles, conflict on the crowded Korean peninsula would be savage. Decrepit North Korea would certainly be outgunned by South Korea and America. But nobody should doubt the cult-like commitment of the North's armed forces. The human cost of war would be huge: 1.7m men serve in uniform on the peninsula, and North Korean artillery batteries are trained on the megalopolis of Seoul. American generals guess that a conflict could kill at least 1m, including thousands of Americans. Oh, and it would also be curtains for Asia's thriving economy.
但是，我们也用理由严肃认真地对待金正恩。不难想象，不管是南韩与美国对北韩的行为做出误判，还是北韩对南韩与美国的行为做出误判，这种挑衅与威慑或者威慑与挑衅的循环就会失去控制。同时，即使没有核武器，在这个人口密集的半岛上发生冲突也是一种野蛮的行为。装备陈旧的北韩肯定打不过美国与南韩。但是，没有人会对北韩军队那种类似于邪教的战斗力表示怀疑。战争的人力成本是巨大的：半岛上的现役军人达170万人之多，而北韩的火炮训练也是以首尔这座特大城市为目标。据美国军方高层估计，冲突至少会造成包括数千名美国士兵在内的100万军人的死亡。同时，战争还可能给正处于繁荣之中的亚洲经济带来灾难。
Moreover, Mr Kim heads a regime that cares nothing for its own brutalised people. Some 150,000-200,000 North Koreans—individuals and often whole families—rot as political prisoners in a vast gulag. Farmers are herded into collectives and forced into gruelling manual labour. Women trying to make a living by smuggling refugees across the border with China are shot if they do not know the right people to bribe.
除此之外，金正恩所领导的政权是一个对自己的民众受虐待也丝毫不关心的政权。一边是大约有150000-200000北韩人在忍饥挨饿，一边是大批政治犯被关进集中营。农民被圈禁在合作社中，被迫从事非人的体力劳动。妇女靠穿越边境把难民偷渡到中国的方式来支撑生活，如果她们在这个过程中不知道去贿赂应该贿赂的人，她们就有可能被打死。
In some ways the North is even scarier under its new ruler than it was under his father, who died in 2011. Early hopes that Mr Kim might prove a youthful agent of change seem entirely dashed by his nuclear explosion and boundless bombast. He is thought to have ordered the sinking of a South Korean naval corvette in 2010, with the deaths of 46 crewmen, and the shelling of a South Korean island later that year. Whereas Kim Jong Il was practised in the calibrated calculation of shaking down the outside world, his callow son has escalated tensions wildly. Nobody knows how to walk him back from the brink.
从某种程度上来看，相比已于2011年死去的父亲统治下的北韩，这个年轻人统治下的国家要更可怕。在核爆炸和大放厥词的影响下，人们先前对金正恩有可能证明自己是一个年轻改革者的预期已经彻底破灭。据称，他曾在2010年下令击沉南韩海军的一艘小型军舰，结果导致46名船员死亡；当年晚些时候，他又下令对南韩的一座岛屿进行炮击。金正日的手法是根据情况来降低外界对的计算，相比之下，他那位羽翼未丰的儿子总是竭力调高调门，制造紧张气氛。没有人知道该如何让他悬崖勒马。
Doing so depends partly on Mr Kim's motives. Perhaps aggression is a rite of passage to prove his leadership credentials to the country's ancient generals. Perhaps he will shrewdly claim he has seen off the imperialist threat and back down. Perhaps he gets a thrill from orchestrating the chaos—as if he were playing a video game. Or, most worrying, perhaps he is out of his depth and therefore more prone to miscalculation.
金正恩是否悬崖勒马部分取决与他自己想干什么。也许，他的灼灼逼人只是一种传递信息的方式，为的是证明他对国内那些老朽的将军们仍具有领导力；也许，他会适可而止地宣称已经粉碎了帝国主义的威胁，并且还让他们做出让步；也许，他在亲自指挥这场混乱的过程中如同玩电子游戏那样，体验到了某种刺激；最令人担心的是，也许他已经完全丧失理智，因而会更容易做出误判。
Whenever Mr Kim's father ratcheted up tensions, at least the pretence held that a bargain was to be had. In return for aid, oil or respect, North Korea would agree to discussions over dismantling its nuclear-weapons programme. The process was often a charade, but it kept the North engaged and it probably helped slow the development of nuclear weapons, as with the agreement to mothball the Yongbyon reactor in 2007. Now Mr Kim has declared that his nuclear capability is non-negotiable.
以前，每当金正恩的父亲挑起紧张之时，他至少还装出一付准备进行交易的样子。为了换来援助、石油和西方对他的尊敬，北韩会在解除核武器计划问题上同意进行谈判。虽然过程常常犹如猜谜一样，但是这能把北韩留在谈判桌上，并且还可能有助于延缓其开发核武器的进程，2007年达成的关闭宁边反应堆协议正是这种谈判的一个结果。如今，金正恩却宣称说，他的核能力不容讨价还价。
No prizes for backing off
穷追猛打
What should the West do? In the long term, the best way to destabilise Mr Kim is from within. A new merchant class is emerging—the only prospering bit of the economy. The world must redouble its efforts to engage with these and other possible agents of change. This includes teaching more mid-ranking officials how societies work when they are organised around market economies and underpinned by laws; and funding defector radio stations beaming news back into the North.
西方应该怎么办？从长期来看，动摇金正恩政权的最佳方法是从内部着手。一个处于萌芽状态的商人阶层正在从北韩内部崛起，同时这也是该国经济的唯一亮点。世界各国必须加倍努力来扶持他们，同时还要扶持其他那些有可能支持变革的人们。这包括以下一些做法：当更多的中层官员因市场经济而形成一个团体并且还能够得到法律支持的时候，向他们传授社会是如何运作的知识；给叛逃者的广播电台提供资金，让他们把自己的声音传回北韩。
That, though, is for the long term. The imperative now is to face down Mr Kim. After all, he has ruled out the only promise worth having (suspending his nuclear programme again). North Korea—and other rogue regimes and would-be nuclear proliferators, such as Iran—need to know that actions have consequences. That is why President Park Geun-hye of South Korea, in turn, was right to make it clear that sneak attacks will be met with a much firmer response than in 2010. America is right to move missile defences to Guam. When it sent two nuclear-capable B-2 bombers to fly over the peninsula it was a warning not only to North Korea, but also a gesture of support to the South. If Ms Park doubts American backing, she will be tempted to seek nuclear weapons herself.
不过，这些做法只是针对长期而言。对当前来说，最紧迫的任务是让金正恩颜面扫地。他毕竟已经排除了唯一还有价值的承诺（再次叫停和计划）。北韩——以及其他一些流氓政权，甚至包括像伊朗那样有可能进行核扩散的国家在内——需要明白：任何行为都是有代价的。南韩总统朴槿惠曾明确表示，任何偷袭都必将遭到比2010年那次反应更为强烈的反击。她之所以这样说，原因正在于此。美国把导弹防御系统调遣到关岛是正确的做法，而派遣两架能够携带核武器的B-2隐形轰炸机飞跃朝鲜半岛的行为不仅是给北韩的一个警告，更是对南韩表示支持的一种姿态。如果朴槿惠对美国的支持有所怀疑，她必定会对由自己开发核武器的想法所打动。
Now more than ever, America needs to cajole China to press for change in its satellite. Apart from humanitarian aid to the North's stunted people, all other commercial favours towards the regime should be stopped. Sick of Mr Kim and his family racket, China signed up to fresh UN financial sanctions against North Korea after the latest nuclear test. China has the capacity to choke the most iniquitous sources of the criminal regime's cash. Yet its commitment to enforcing the sanctions seems half-hearted and it appears to have insisted that Shanghai accounts in two of its biggest banks, holding hundreds of millions of dollars on behalf of Mr Kim and his cronies, be excluded from the sanctions. Attempts at changing North Korean behaviour have so far patently failed. But then, as China shows, not everything has yet been tried.
如今，美国比任何时候都更需要讨好中国，为的是让中国对她的卫星国施加压力以促成变革。除了对北韩营养不良的民众提供人道主义援助之外，所有同该政权有商业利益的行为都应当被叫停。由于对金正恩及其家族花天酒地的生活感到厌烦，在北韩进行了最新一次核试验后不久，中国就同意联合国对其进行新一轮金融制裁。中国有能力切断这个罪恶政权用最不公平的手段获得资金的来源。不过，中国对强化制裁的承诺似乎缺少诚意，并且还坚持认为应该把北韩最大的两家银行在上海开设的账户从制裁名单中剔除出去，这些账户代表金正恩及其高官等人持有数百万美元的资产。从目前来看，改变北韩行为的努力已经彻底失败。但是，正如中国所表明的那样，我们还应当尝试一下其他的办法。
本文来源《ECO中文网》
—–白衬衫
本文由自动聚合程序取自网络，内容和观点不代表数字时代立场
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