[2009.02.12] France and NATO法国与北约-集结号吹响了吗?

France and NATO法国与北约

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集结号吹响了吗?

Feb 12th 2009 | PARIS
From The Economist print edition

Nicolas Sarkozy faces domestic opposition to his decision to return France to NATO’s integrated military command in April
萨科奇决定法国四月份重返北约,国内遭遇反对

IT WAS in a short but scrupulously polite letter to Lyndon Johnson 43 years ago that Charles de Gaulle announced his decision to pull France out of NATO’s integrated military command. His country, the French president wrote to his American counterpart, needed “to recover the full exercise of her sovereignty across her entire territory.” He shut down NATO’s headquarters in Paris and expelled American military bases from France. Ever since, the French have seen their semi-detached status in NATO as a guarantor of their strategic autonomy and a totem of their refusal to accept American supremacy.

43年前, 夏尔•戴高乐发出了一封彬彬有礼的短信,通知时任美国总统林登•约翰逊,宣布法国退出北约军事一体化机构。戴高乐在信中写道,法国需要在其境内恢复行使全部主权。他关闭了北约在巴黎的总部,迫使美国撤出其在法国的军事基地。从那以后,法国人都把他们在北约中的特殊地位看作是保持其战略独立性的保证和拒绝美国霸权的一种标志。(注1)

President Nicolas Sarkozy’s plan to reverse de Gaulle’s decision and reintegrate France fully into NATO’s military command is, therefore, both bold and unsettling. On April 3rd and 4th Mr Sarkozy and Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel will jointly host a summit to mark NATO’s 60th anniversary. Mr Sarkozy is expected to use the occasion officially to announce France’s full return. But he needs to prepare the ground at home for a decision that is contested both by the opposition and by many in his own party. Next week he is expected to make the case in a speech in Paris. The French parliament plans to debate the issue shortly.

萨科齐总统打算改变戴高乐的政策,让法国重新完全加入北约的军事一体化机构。这一决定大胆,却令人不安。4月3日至4日,萨科齐将与德国总理默克尔共同主持纪念北约成立60周年的峰会。预计萨科齐将利用这一机会正式宣布法国完全重新回归北约。不过,他必须首先説服国内舆论。不仅反对党，就是在人民运动联盟内部也有许多人对他的决定提出质疑。预计下周他在巴黎发表讲话时将阐明加入北约的理由。法国议会计划不久将就此问题展开辩论。

For decades, in school textbooks and diplomatic lecture halls, the French have learnt that de Gaulle’s decision and the creation of the nuclear force de frappe form the cornerstone of France’s independent defence policy. NATO came to be regarded with instinctive distrust, as a place in which America and Britain stitched up deals. For their part, the Americans saw France’s plans to build an independent European defence capacity as an effort to undermine NATO and create a rival to what the French have termed American “hyperpower”. Such mutual mistrust reached its zenith under President Jacques Chirac, who repeatedly called for Europe to be a counterweight to America.

几十年来,法国无论是在小学的教科书中还是在堂皇的外交政策讲堂,都在向国民灌输——戴高乐退出北约的决定与建立法国独立的核力量构成了法国独立防务政策的基石。法国人逐渐对北约失去信任,把北约看成是美英两国联手操纵的工具。美国人则认为法国计划建立独立的欧洲防御能力,目的是削弱北约,抗衡法国所称的美国“超级强权”。在希拉克总统执政期间,这种互不信任达到了顶点。希拉克总统一再号召欧洲抗衡美国。

Mr Sarkozy, himself from the Gaullist family but keen to improve France’s ties with America, is trying to turn this logic on its head. In his first big foreign-policy speech, he argued that “progress on European defence is in no way part of a competition with NATO.” He has repeatedly stressed that the two can be complementary. There are European security concerns, such as in Africa, that NATO would not want to touch. He adds that east Europeans, keen on NATO’s security umbrella, will never trust joint European defence as long as they have lingering suspicions that it is a French scheme to weaken NATO.

萨科齐出生于一个戴高乐主义者家庭，但现在却试图改变法国人的这种固有思维，热衷于改善法美关系。他竭力使人们接受这种想法。在首次发表对外政策的重要讲话时,他坚称,欧洲防务与北约并不矛盾（注2）。他反复强调两者可以互为补充。欧洲有自己的安全利益。像非洲这样北约不愿插手的地方，对欧洲却是利害攸关。他进一步补充说，那些急于躲进北约保护伞下的东欧国家，只要他们怀疑法国图谋削弱北约，就不会加入欧洲共同防务。

Mr Sarkozy set three conditions for rejoining NATO’s integrated military command: America should drop its suspicions of joint European defence; progress must be made on this (ie, the British have to get more involved); and France must be given a decent role within NATO. On the first point, he got most of what he needed at the recent Munich Security Conference. Vice-President Joe Biden declared that America would “warmly welcome” a full French return to NATO. He added that “we also support the further strengthening of European defence.”

萨科齐开出了法国重新加入北约军事一体化机构的3个交换条件:一是美国放弃对欧洲防务的怀疑政策；二是欧洲防务必须取得进展(譬如,英国必须积极参与其中)；三是法国在北约占有相当的位置。在最近召开的慕尼黑安全会议上,萨科齐的第一个条件基本得到了满足。美国副总统拜登表示,美国“热烈欢迎”法国全面重返北约。他补充说：“我们也支持进一步加强欧洲防务一体化”。

The second point is trickier. Mr Sarkozy will have trouble pointing to a tangible European defence capacity to show he has got his side of the bargain. Under one symbolic new agreement, a battalion of German soldiers will be based in eastern France. Officials also point to nearly 10,000 soldiers under the European Union flag who are on operations from Kosovo to Congo. But these are ad hoc arrangements. There is no autonomous operational European command headquarters, because the British do not want one, and no money for extravagant institution-building. In the medium term, NATO offers the only serious supranational security structure.

第二个条件比较棘手。萨科奇无法具体地说明什么样的欧洲防御能力能够满足他的要价。按照一项新的象征性的协议,一营德国军队将进驻法国东部的一个基地。一些官员还说,欧盟旗下有近1万军队参与从科索沃到刚果(金)的行动。但这些都是特派行动。由于缺乏需耗资庞大的经费，英国的态度也不积极,所以到目前还没有建立起独立的欧洲防务指挥系统。从中期看,北约是唯一能发挥作用的跨国安全架构。

That the French have won a fair deal on the third condition may, however, help to fend off charges that the country is gaining too little in return for rejoining NATO’s integrated command. France seems to have secured two senior NATO posts: one at the allied command in Norfolk, Virginia, and another at the regional command in Lisbon. Mr Sarkozy will stress that France has already commanded NATO missions in Kosovo and Afghanistan. Even when fully within NATO’s military structure, France will still retain its independent nuclear capability and defence autonomy. “My conviction”, Mr Sarkozy said at the Munich conference, “is that France can renovate its relations with NATO while remaining an independent ally, a free partner of the United States.”

然而,在第三点上法国赢得了还算公平的交易。这或许可以帮助萨科齐抵挡国内一些人关于法国重返北约并没有带来多少好处的指责。法国似乎已获得了北约的两个司令部的司令官位置。一个是在美国弗吉尼亚州的诺福克盟军司令部，另一个是在葡萄牙首都里斯本的地区司令部。萨科奇也会搬出这样的事实为自己辩护：是法国指挥了北约在科索沃和阿富汗的行动。而且,即便法国完全重归北约的军事架构,它仍将可以保留独立的核能力和防务自主权。萨科齐在慕尼黑安全会议上说,他确信法国作为“独立的盟友”可以修复与北约的关系，成为美国的一个“自主伙伴”。

All the same, the French president faces broad political resistance. François Bayrou, a centrist, has accused Mr Sarkozy of “abandoning an element of our identity”, and called for a referendum. Dominique de Villepin, a centre-right former prime minister, claims that France will “find itself shrunk on the diplomatic scene”. The Socialist Party has demanded a parliamentary vote as well as a debate, and insists that by fully returning to NATO, France “will lose joint European defence”. Public opinion, however, may be less hostile than the political elite. NATO seems to be little known and little understood. Asked in a poll last year whether France should fully rejoin, 38% said yes, 34% said no and 28% said they were not sure.

尽管如此，萨科奇仍将面对广泛的政治上的反对。持中间路线的弗朗索瓦-贝鲁（注3）谴责萨科奇“放弃了法国特征的基本元素”，呼吁进行一次全民公决。中右翼的法国前总理德维尔潘（注4）抨击道：“法国将面临外交地位的萎缩”。而社会党要求进行一次国会辩论与表决。党内多数人持有的观点是：一旦法国全部重返北约，欧洲共同防务政策就将归于失败。然而公众对北约知之甚少，其反对声自然没有政治精英们那么强烈。对于法国是否应该全部重返北约的问题，去年进行了一次民意测验。38%的人赞成；34%的人反对；28%的人说他们不知道。

In the months ahead, Mr Sarkozy’s greatest political difficulty may be not so much persuading the French of the case of a full return to NATO as dealing with American requests for more help in Afghanistan. The Americans want to double their own presence there, and at the NATO summit President Barack Obama will ask the Europeans to do more too.

萨科奇目前最大的政治困难是说服国内同意法国重返北约。数月后，他将面临美国要求法国在阿富汗增兵的问题。与目前处境相比，那时可能要好过一些。美国想要在阿富汗增加一倍兵力。在即将召开的北约峰会上，奥巴马总统将会要求欧洲盟国也同样增加在阿富汗的兵力。

France sent an extra 700 soldiers last year. Hervé Morin, the defence minister, says he has no plans to do more. In the past, the French have argued that they are overstretched by commitments elsewhere, notably in Africa. Yet last month they announced that 1,000 French soldiers from Chad and the Central African Republic, and 1,100 from Côte d’Ivoire, would be recalled to France. “We may have put ourselves in a difficult situation because we do actually have some room for manoeuvre now,” comments François Heisbourg, director of the Foundation for Strategic Research. The first test of France’s new commitment to NATO may come quite soon.

法国去年在阿富汗额外增加了700名士兵。法国国防部长埃尔韦-莫兰说他没有进一步增兵的计划。过去法国经常抱怨由于在非洲等地驻军而使兵力捉襟见肘。上个月法国宣布从乍得和中非共和国撤兵1000人；从科特迪瓦撤兵1100人。法国战略研究基金会主任弗朗索瓦-海斯伯格评论道：“过去法国插手太多，真是自找麻烦。现在要用兵了却无兵可调”。法国能否兑现其对北约新的承诺马上就要面临首次检验了。

注1. NATO:北大西洋公约组织（North Atlantic Treaty Organization ），简称北约。1949年4月4日美国与加拿大、英国、法国、比利时、荷兰、卢森堡、丹麦、挪威、冰岛、葡萄牙、意大利共12国在华盛顿签订了《北大西洋公约》。公约于1949年8月24日生效。法国于１９６６年７月退出北约军事一体化机构，但仍作为北约的政治成员，与北约军事机构保持密切合作。
注2. 共同防务是欧洲一体化的最后目标。欧盟军队是独立的，不属于北约，但与北约有着复杂的联系。
注3. Francois Bayrou弗朗索瓦-贝鲁: 法国政治家，右翼小党法兰西民主联盟主席。2007年法总统选举候选人，但未进第二轮。
注4. Dominique de Villepin 多米尼克-德维尔潘:  
１９９５年在希拉克竞选总统的过程中参与了所有关键性的竞选工作。他同年５月协助希拉克竞选总统成功后任总统府秘书长。２００２年５月他被任命为外交部长，２００４年３月任内政和国内治安部长。２００５年５月出任总理 。

 

 

译者：dqzxf    http://www.ecocn.org/bbs/viewthread.php?tid=17240&highlight=