[原创]老布什：擅长外交的美国总统 | 双语阅读

It was entirely logical that George H.W. Bush, who has died at the age of 94, would become president of the US, the 41st in its history. Born into privilege, the son of a pillar of Wall Street who had gone on to serve in the Senate, he enjoyed the patronage of the most powerful Republicans in the land across two generations, acquiring in the process a curriculum vitae in government more complete than any who have sought the highest office. As 1989 dawned, with an easy election victory behind him, Ronald Reagan’s vice-president appeared ready for the White House

乔治•赫伯特•沃克•布什（以下简称老布什）在美国休士顿去世，享年94岁。老布什能当上美国第41任总统毫不奇怪。他父亲曾是华尔街重要人物，后弃商从政、进入参议院。显贵的出身让他得到了美国两代共和党大佬的扶植，由此谱写了一份非常丰富的从政履历，超越美国其他任何曾竞选总统职位的候选人。1988年，曾经做了八年罗纳德•里根的副总统的老布什轻松赢得美国总统大选。

George Herbert Walker Bush was born on June 12 1924 in Milton, Massachusetts, and grew up in Greenwich, Connecticut. His father Prescott was a partner in Brown Brothers Harriman and his mother came from the family that lent its name to golf’s Walker Cup and bought the house in Kennebunkport, Maine, that was to become the summer White House. Their son was educated at the blue-chip Phillips Academy and Yale, where he earned an economics degree and played first base on the baseball team.

1924年6月12日，乔治•赫伯特•沃克•布什生于马萨诸塞州的米尔顿(Milton)，在康涅狄格州的格林尼治长大。他父亲普雷斯科特(Prescott)曾是布朗兄弟哈里曼银行(Brown Brothers Harriman)的合伙人，他母亲来自沃克(Walker)家族，高尔夫球沃克杯(Walker Cup)就是以这个家族的姓氏命名的，沃克家族还买下了位于缅因州肯纳邦克波特(Kennebunkport)的一所庄园，这所庄园后来将成为“夏季白宫”。老布什曾就读于名校菲利普斯学院(Phillips Academy)和耶鲁大学(Yale)，在耶鲁，他获得了经济学学士学位，还是棒球队的一垒手。

Before university, in mid-1943, he enlisted in the Navy, where he became, briefly, its youngest pilot. In September 1944, his bomber was shot down in the Pacific and was rescued from the ocean. He married the former Barbara Pierce in January 1945, and they had five children.

1943年年中，在上大学之前，他参加了海军，在短暂的一段时间里曾是海军最年轻的飞行员。1944年9月，他驾驶的轰炸机在太平洋上空被击落，搜救人员从海上把他救了起来。1945年1月，20岁的老布什与芭芭拉•皮尔斯（Barbara Pierce，婚后改随夫姓）结婚，两人育有5个子女。

She was to prove a formidable defender not only of her husband but also of the Bush family name. Underneath the prematurely white angelic halo of hair beat the heart of a street fighter and, as parents, the couple had the satisfaction of seeing their eldest son, George W. Bush, ascend to the presidency, thus prolonging a modern American political dynasty. With some pride, father and son were given the nicknames, “41” and “43”.

以后人们会发现，芭芭拉是个令人敬畏的卫士，不仅维护自己的丈夫，还捍卫布什这个姓氏。一头过早变白的头发为她笼罩上一轮天使般的光环，然而在这光环之下，她的身体里跳动着一颗街头斗士的心脏。作为父母，这对夫妻还自豪地看到他们的长子乔治•W•布什(George W Bush)当选总统，延续了这个现代美国政治家族的荣耀。父子俩人分别荣获“41”和“43”的绰号。

This proximity to the seat of power was not without its disappointments. He was twice passed over for the vice-presidential nomination, by Nixon in 1972 and Gerald Ford in 1976. But in 1980 he determined to run for the White House on his own account and won the first Republican caucuses in Iowa.

虽然一直接近权力的核心，但老布什的从政道路并非没有遭遇过挫折。他曾两次与副总统候选人提名失之交臂，第一次是1972年，那次的总统候选人是尼克松，第二次是1976年，总统候选人是杰拉尔德•福特(Gerald Ford)。但在1980年，他决心自己竞选总统，并在爱荷华州举行的首次共和党党团会议中胜出。

He came to office promising a “kinder, gentler” America, yet his heart was always far more in foreign policy than domestic affairs, as was that of Mr Baker, whom he installed as secretary of state. An inveterate letter writer, he assembled a formidable array of personal contacts around the globe that was to prove helpful during his presidency.

他上台时承诺，要让美国变得“更仁慈、更温和”，然而他对外交政策的关注始终远远超过他对国内事务的关注，被他任命为国务卿的贝克也是一样。作为一个喜欢写信的人，老布什在全球织起了一张令人望而生畏的个人关系网，在他的总统任期期间，这种私交将被证明是有用的。

But the defining passage of his presidency appeared to have come in the seven months after Iraq invaded Kuwait in August 1990. Whatever his initial reservations, Bush methodically went about assembling a large multinational force, bolstered by UN resolutions, to evict Saddam Hussein. His “coalition of the willing”, encompassing moderate Arab states, the UK, France and Europe’s other military powers, and including hefty financial contributions from Japan, was a formidable diplomatic achievement, one his son failed to pull off 12 years later. He also stayed Israel’s hand, again no easy task as Iraqi missiles rained down on the Jewish nation.

但他总统任期内的标志性事件似乎发生在伊拉克入侵科威特（1990年8月）7个月后。尽管老布什一开始持保留意见，但他有条不紊地着手组织了一支庞大的国际部队，以推翻萨达姆•侯赛因，并得到了联合国决议的支持。他组建的“意愿联盟”是项令人惊叹的外交成就，参与国包括立场温和的阿拉伯国家、英国、法国和欧洲其他军事强国，并得到了日本的巨额捐助。12年后，他的儿子小布什试图复制这一做法，但没有成功。他还成功制止了以色列参战，这也并非易事，因为伊拉克向这个犹太国家发射了无数导弹。

Far less foreseeable, until deep into the 1992 campaign, was that he would be unceremoniously booted out after one term, and less than two years after he had directed such a great American-led military victory in the Gulf war that heavyweight Democrats all balked at daring to challenge him.

直到1992年竞选后期，人们都很难预料到，老布什会在一个任期后就突然被赶下台，更何况不到两年前，他还在海湾战争中执导了一场如此伟大的、由美国带头取得的军事胜利，这场胜利让所有民主党重要人物全都不敢挑战他。

Whatever the precise, and many, reasons for his defeat, George Bush was perceived as a man strangely out of touch not with the world but with his own country; and he left the White House with a record of achievement – foreign policy excepted – scant by the standards even of one-term presidents.

他连任失败的原因有很多，无论确切是什么，老布什生前都被视为一个奇特的人——了解世界，却不了解自己的祖国；即便以一届任期总统的标准来衡量，他离开白宫时留下的政绩也是寥寥无几的——外交政策除外。

It was an ignominious end to a political career worthy of note and marked by many acts of grace and kindness. These were evident in his retirement. Forming a surprisingly close relationship with Mr Clinton, he took on relief efforts around the world, in Haiti and after the Asian tsunami. But his greatest satisfaction surely came when his eldest son won the presidency in 2000.

老布什拥有过一段显赫、留下许多善举的政治生涯，这样的结局对他来说是不光彩的。他退休后也致力公益。他出人意料地与克林顿结成了亲密友谊，积极参与世界各地的救灾活动——在海地、在亚洲海啸发生后。但他最称心如意的时刻当数2000年他的长子当选总统的时候。

This was not entirely anticipated inside the Bush family, which thought another son, Jeb, the governor of Florida, was the most promising politician, but the patriarch nevertheless took pride in W’s rise. Over the next eight years, there were occasional indirect hints, notably from Brent Scowcroft, his former national security adviser, that the father did not entirely approve of his son’s unilateralist foreign policy, most obviously over the war in Iraq, which appeared so much the antithesis of his own collaborative approach. But they never came from his own lips.

这并非布什家族内部一向预料到的结果，他们一直认为小布什的弟弟、佛罗里达州州长杰布是最有前途的政治家，不过，小布什当选当然还是让老布什感到非常骄傲。之后的8年，偶尔会出现这样的传言——特别是从曾担任老布什的国家安全顾问的布伦特•斯考克罗夫特口中——即老布什并不十分赞同儿子的单边主义外交政策，特别是在伊拉克战争上，小布什在这个问题上的政策看上去跟老布什一贯的协作策略截然对立。但这样的话从未从老布什本人的口中说出。

He was, after all, a Yankee blue-blood gentleman, whatever his adopted Texas clothing – and that, perhaps, was his greatest flaw at the national level. He wanted most of all to be president, almost as an entitlement, but when he did inherit the White House he discovered that the country wished for something more than that, in which he was found wanting.

尽管老布什身上披了一层德克萨斯外衣，但说到底，他就是一位出身高贵的北方绅士，而这或许就是他作为一国元首最大的缺陷。他最渴望的就是成为总统，仿佛这是他天生的权利，但当他真的“接任”白宫宝座时，他却发现这个国家对总统的期待，是他满足不了的。