Leninism and “War and Peace” in the Twenty-First Century

I. The “Lenin German-Agent Case,” Cold War History, and the Roots of Historical Nihilism

一、“列宁德奸案”、冷战史与历史虚无主义的根源

The dissolution of the Soviet Union and the upheavals in Eastern Europe opened the post-Cold War era. In 1989, Francis Fukuyama, in the posture of a Cold War victor, delivered a lecture and in 1993 published *The End of History and the Last Man*, proclaiming the triumph of the liberal world and the end of history. In the period surrounding the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc, a frenzy of attacks on and denials of Marxism erupted, and currents of anti-Leninism and anti-socialism prevailed for a time, becoming a defining global spectacle of the post-Cold War era. In the Soviet Union and post-dissolution Russia, criticism of the “October Revolution” began between 1987 and 1991, peaked in August 1991, and later became the “official” narrative. From 1993 to 1995, as the “shock therapy” economic reforms under Yeltsin’s leadership in Russia teetered on the brink of failure, positive assessments of the “October Revolution” began to increase, but the controversy grew ever more intense. To achieve social “reconciliation,” in 2017 the organizing committee for the centenary of the October Revolution, through a series of activities and the publication of a series of teaching reference books, drew an analogy with the French Revolution and ultimately settled on a new name and definition for the “October Revolution”: the “Great Russian Revolution.”

苏联解体、东欧剧变开启了后冷战时代。1989年，弗朗西斯·福山以冷战胜利者的姿态发表演讲，并于1993年出版《历史的终结与最后之人》，宣称自由世界的胜利和历史的终结。解体前后的苏联和东欧阵营爆发了攻击与否定马克思主义的狂潮，反列宁主义、反社会主义思潮盛行一时，成为后冷战时代标志性的世界景观。在苏联和解体后的俄罗斯，对“十月革命”的批判始于1987年到1991年，在1991年8月达到顶峰，成为日后的“官方”叙事。1993年到1995年，叶利钦主导下的俄国“休克疗法”经济改革濒临惨败，对“十月革命”的肯定开始多起来，但争议愈加激烈。为实现社会“和解”，2017年，十月革命100周年纪念活动组委会通过一系列活动、出版一系列教学参考书，以法国大革命为类比，最终确定了“十月革命”的新名称和新定义：“俄国大革命”。

The echo in China of this current of “historical nihilism” [1]1 “Revisionist historiography” (翻案史学) refers to a trend in Chinese historical scholarship, particularly since the 1990s, that seeks to overturn established orthodox narratives, often by rehabilitating figures or events previously condemned by the Chinese Communist Party or by questioning the Party’s historical role. that negates the 20th-century revolutions in China and Russia (or rather, a large-scale “plagiarism” of foreign narratives) has been equally spectacular. Its main manifestation is that the intersection of history and mass media has become the main ideological battlefield in China, giving rise to a media phenomenon that the author calls “reversal historiography,” concentrated especially in research fields such as the history of the international communist movement and the history of the Chinese revolution.

否定20世纪中俄革命这一“历史虚无主义”思潮在中国之回响（或者说对国外叙事的大规模“抄袭”）同样极为壮观，主要表现就是历史与大众传媒的交合地带成为中国意识形态主战场，并催生出一种笔者称之为“翻案史学”的传媒现象，特别集中在国际共产主义运动史和中国革命史等研究领域。

“Reversal historiography” often manifests itself in the form of “Cold War history.” On the one hand, the topics it focuses on come mainly from the period of “hot war”; on the other hand, its basic narrative framework derives from the “official Cold War historiography” research of the American camp during the Cold War. The concept of the “Cold War” was originally proposed by George Orwell in 1945 to criticize the situation in a bipolar world after the advent of the atomic bomb, where the oppressed and exploited peoples had lost the possibility of resistance and were trapped in an undeclared state of war that could not be changed. Later, in the 1950s, this concept was appropriated by the United States to refer specifically to a state of undeclared, offensive containment directed against the Soviet Union. Before Gorbachev, the Soviet Union never formally used this term, because they believed that the Soviet Union adhered to world peace, while U.S. imperialism was aggressive.

“翻案史学”往往以“冷战史”方式表现出来。一方面，它关注的话题主要来自“热战”时期；另一方面，其基本叙述框架来自冷战期间美国阵营的冷战“官方史学”研究。“冷战”这一概念原本是乔治·奥威尔1945年提出，用来批判在原子弹出现后的两极世界中，被压迫和被剥削的人民丧失了反抗的可能，处于无法改变的非宣战的战争状态。后来，这一概念在20世纪50年代被美国用来专指针对苏联不宣战、进攻性遏制的状态。苏联在戈尔巴乔夫之前从不正式使用这个词，因为他们相信苏联坚持世界和平，而美帝国主义才是侵略性的。

The term “Cold War” appeared in Chinese-language academic circles only after the 1980s; previously, related topics were studied within the framework of “modern international relations history.” Especially from the late 1980s to the 1990s, Chinese scholars studying in the United States gradually introduced Western Cold War studies to China. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the end of the “Cold War,” a series of archives on the Soviet Union were briefly declassified in the mid-1990s, greatly stimulating the boom in “Cold War history” research. From 1998 to 2007, Chinese academic circles held a series of influential academic conferences, and “Cold War history” research thus entered the research system of Chinese universities and began cooperating with renowned overseas Cold War research centers, developing and expanding rapidly to become the vanguard of Chinese historiography’s integration with world academia.

“冷战”一词在中文学术世界出现是在20世纪80年代之后，相关议题之前是在“现代国际关系史”框架下进行研究。尤其在20世纪80年代末期到90年代，在美国学习的中国学者把西方冷战研究陆续介绍到中国。1991年苏联解体、“冷战”结束后，一系列关于苏联的档案在1990年代前中期短暂解禁，极大刺激了“冷战史”研究热。1998年至2007年，中国学界召开一系列有影响的学术研讨会，“冷战史”研究由此进入中国大学研究体制，并与海外著名冷战研究中心展开合作，迅速发展壮大，成为中国史学界与世界学术接轨的排头兵。

To a significant extent, after fermentation and incubation in the 1990s, the “ideological Cold War” carried by U.S. “official” Cold War history was continued and developed in post-Cold War Russia and China. This is the main origin of the “reversal historiography” manifested in mass media, especially during the period from 2010 to 2014, when the social media platform “Weibo” began to rise and become a source of Chinese political discourse. Its prominent manifestation is the use of a framework of the single nation-state or national interest to tailor and re-narrate the relationship between Soviet Russia (the Soviet Union), the Comintern, and the Chinese revolution, replacing the socialist/internationalist perspective with narrow nationalism/social chauvinism, ignoring or even negating the complex historical threads of socialism, democracy, and nationalism since the 20th century, as well as the internal and external line struggles and class struggles (and their manifestations in different historical contexts) within the international communist movement.

在很大意义上，经过20世纪90年代酝酿与发酵，美国“官方”冷战史承载的“意识形态冷战”，在后冷战时期的俄罗斯和中国得到延续和发展，这就是在大众传媒中表现出的“翻案史学”的主要渊源，特别是社交媒体“微博”开始崛起并成为中国政治话语策源地的2010年到2014年期间，突出表现就是用单一民族国家或国家利益的框架剪裁和重新叙述苏俄（联）、共产国际与中国革命的关系，用狭义民族主义/社会沙文主义取代社会主义/国际主义视野，无视乃至否定20世纪以来社会主义、民主主义与民族主义的复杂历史脉络，以及国际共产主义运动内与外的路线斗争和阶级斗争（及它们在不同历史语境下的事件）。

The 20th century was an era of intense class struggle of blood and fire, where different actions and hostile voices long existed as a norm, whether between the socialist and capitalist camps during World War II or between the Eastern and Western blocs during the Cold War. In fact, to this day, various fierce debates and struggles within the socialist and capitalist camps of East and West have never ceased. But the only conclusion that “reversal historiography” hopes to prove is that the Chinese revolution was the result of Soviet Russia’s (the Soviet Union’s) manipulation of China based on its own national interests, thereby “feeding”

20世纪是激烈的血与火的阶级斗争时代，不同的行动、敌对的声音长期存在是一种常态，无论是第二次世界大战期间的社会主义和资本主义阵营，还是在冷战期间的东西方两大阵营。事实上，迄今为止，东、西方社会主义和资本主义阵营中各种激辩与斗争从未停息。但“翻案史学”唯一希望证明的结论是：中国革命是苏俄（联）基于其国家利益操控中国的结果，以此“喂养”和塑造了20世纪90年代以来中国的（网络）右翼民粹主义思潮，目的是拆解20世纪中俄（苏）革命的正当性，以及与之血肉相连的新中国的合法性。这在很大程度上甚至是国民党史学观的“复活”。在20世纪90年代中国“民国热”潮流冲击下，“复活”国民党的观点毫不奇怪。

One major source of China’s “revisionist historiography” (翻案史学) is precisely the American Asian studies of the 1960s, around the time of the Cold War. The establishment of area studies and Asian studies in American universities was a product of the Cold War policy of “containment” of the Soviet Union pursued by the U.S. Office of Strategic Services after World War II. It is well known that this research in the United States received substantial funding from both government and private foundations. After the victory in the anti-fascist war, the growing hostility and containment toward the Soviet Union led by the Truman administration, along with the persecution and purge of academia by McCarthyism, shifted the dominant direction of China studies from topics such as the Chinese Communist Party and the peasantry, imperialism, and the War of Resistance against Japan, toward the intrigues of Tsarist Russia, the Soviet Union, and the Comintern in China and their manipulation of China. This was used to explain and respond to the question “Who lost China?” and to exonerate those responsible. According to Mark Selden, “The works published at that time mostly focused on the Comintern’s intrigues, emphasizing the Chinese Communist movement’s imitation of Soviet Russia, while ignoring the social and economic roots of the Chinese revolution. Echoing the U.S. government’s condemnation of a monolithic, Moscow-manipulated communist movement, American academia at the time also centered on the Soviet Union’s manipulation of the Chinese revolution. This view was reinforced by the Sino-Soviet alliance in the early 1950s and China’s one-sided foreign policy leaning toward the Soviet Union.”

中国“翻案史学”一大源头正是20世纪60年代冷战前后的美国亚洲研究。在美国大学中设置区域研究、亚洲研究，是第二次世界大战后美国战略情报局对苏联进行“遏制”之冷战政策的产物。众所周知，该研究在美国得到大量政府与私人基金会的资助。反法西斯战争胜利后，由美国杜鲁门政府主导、不断增强的对苏联的敌意与遏制，以及麦卡锡主义对学术界的迫害与清洗，中国研究的主导方向从中国共产党与农民、帝国主义、抗日战争等议题转向苏俄、苏联和共产国际在中国的阴谋及其对中国的操控，并以此来解释、回应“谁断送了中国”这一问题，为相关责任者开脱。按照马克·塞尔登的说法，“当时出版的著作大都着眼于共产国际的阴谋，强调中国共产主义运动对苏俄的模仿，而置中国革命的社会、经济根源于不顾。与美国政府对铁板一块的，由莫斯科操纵的共产主义运动的谴责相呼应，美国学术界在当时也将中心放在苏联对中国革命的操纵上。这种观点因为50年代初的中苏联盟以及中国对苏联的一边倒的外交政策所强化”。

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, these views from American Cold War studies “returned from the dead” (借尸还魂) and became the reheated leftovers that China’s “revisionist historiography” has eagerly rehashed since the 1990s. This creates a meaningful echo between the United States of the 1950s and 1960s and China around the turn of the twenty-first century, a highly ironic phenomenon. The “Lenin German Agent Case” (列宁德奸案) is precisely a typical example of revisionist historiography, or historical nihilism. In December 2007, the famous German current affairs magazine *Der Spiegel* re-sensationalized this rumor, using the 90th anniversary of the October Revolution as an opportunity to further deconstruct and stigmatize the significance of the Russian October Revolution. As expected, this wave of information warfare spread from Europe to China, causing reverberations that persist to this day. From 1917 to 2007, the specter of the Cold War returned from the dead alongside it. Regrettably, since the author published a study in 2014 tracing the century-long dissemination of the rumor of the “Lenin German Agent Case,” the rumor has not ceased.

苏联解体后，这些美国冷战研究的观点“借尸还魂”，成为20世纪90年代以来中国“翻案史学”热衷炒作的冷饭，使美国20世纪五六十年代与21世纪前后的中国构成了一个富有意味的回响，也是极富反讽的现象。“列宁德奸案”正是翻案史学或者说历史虚无主义的典型代表。2007年12月，德国著名时政杂志《明镜》周刊重新炒作此一谣言，是为了借十月革命90周年之际再行解构和污名俄国十月革命意义的举措。如其所期，这一波舆论战从欧洲播散到中国，震荡至今。从1917年到2007年，与其一起“借尸还魂”的正有冷战的幽灵。遗憾的是，自笔者2014年发表对“列宁德奸案”一个世纪谣言传播过程的考证以来，谣言并未停止。

At present, a so-called “new Cold War” is descending. In December 2018, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo delivered a speech once again proclaiming the role of the Cold War victor: “American leadership has given us the most prosperous period for human rights in modern history. We won the Cold War.” But after the Cold War ended, contrary to Fukuyama’s narrative, in Pompeo’s view the liberal order began to erode. He accused a series of countries and treaties that did not conform to US interests and threatened: “International institutions must help promote cooperation that strengthens the security and values of the free world, or they must be reformed or abolished.” In 2020, with the global outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States began to exert “maximum pressure” on China. On July 21, the US government suddenly demanded that China close its consulate general in Houston. On July 23, Pompeo delivered a speech at the Nixon Presidential Library titled “Communist China and the Free World’s Future,” declaring that the US-China relationship was a struggle between the free world and the authoritarian world — this was regarded as a public declaration of a “new Cold War” to contain China. In fact, the logic of Pompeo’s speech had its origins. Since the drastic changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, the ideological Cold War has never dissipated.

当下，所谓“新冷战”正在降临。2018年12月，美国国务卿迈克·蓬佩奥发表讲话，再次宣称了冷战胜利者的角色：“美国的领导作用使我们享有现代历史上人权最繁荣的时期。我们赢得了冷战的胜利”。但是冷战结束后，与福山的叙述相反，在蓬佩奥看来，自由的秩序开始受到侵蚀。他指控一系列不符合美国利益的国家和条约，并威胁道：“国际机构必须帮助促进合作，从而加强安全和自由世界的价值观，否则它们就必须被改造或被取消。”2020年新冠疫情全球暴发，美国开始对中国“极限施压”。7月21日，美国政府突然要求中国关闭驻休斯敦总领事馆。23日，蓬佩奥在尼克松总统图书馆发表演讲《共产主义中国与自由世界的未来》，宣称美国与中国的关系是自由世界与专制世界的斗争——这被认为是遏制中国“新冷战”的公开宣言。其实，彭佩奥的演讲逻辑所来有自。自苏东剧变后，意识形态的冷战从没有消散。

In this sense, the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict marks the end of two major universalist discourses worldwide since the drastic changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. On the one hand, the internationalist united front of the Third World against imperialism and feudalism formed after World War II has completely collapsed. Today, the large-scale resurgence of imperialism and “feudalism” is becoming the main symptom of this world. As a response to the global Monroe Doctrine, the strong resurgence of beggar-thy-neighbor nationalism and fascism is striking at the world’s conscience. The “containment strategy” of the new Cold War that the United States is forging targets not only post-Cold War Russia but also “communist” China. As the only Third World socialist country to have “risen” from the hot wars and Cold War of the 20th century, China faces an increasingly severe situation of being besieged by a Cold War ideology that unites the left and the right. The “new Cold War” remains a continuation of 20th-century history.

在这个意义上，正在发生的俄乌冲突标志着苏东剧变后世界范围内两大普遍主义话语的终结。一方面，第二次世界大战后形成的第三世界反帝反封建的国际主义统一战线彻底失守，今天，帝国主义和“封建主义”大规模回潮正成为这个世界的主要症候。作为对全球门罗主义的回应，以邻为壑的民族主义和法西斯主义的强劲回潮正在冲击着世界良知。美国正在打造的新冷战“遏制战略”指向的不仅是后冷战的俄罗斯，更是“共产主义”的中国。作为唯一从20世纪热战和冷战中“崛起”的第三世界社会主义国家，中国面临左右合流的冷战意识形态围剿的态势越来越严重，“新冷战”依然是20世纪历史的延续。

On the other hand, US President William Clinton’s “democratic peace theory,” which took civilization as its boundary, began with NATO’s bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia bypassing the United Nations. From armed intervention in Afghanistan and Iraq to Syria, the “democratic peace theory” has become a manifesto for armed military intervention worldwide, while the claim that “human rights are above sovereignty” has received endorsement from European left-wing thought. The Western universalist values marked by freedom, democracy, and human rights have also burst and shaken the globe following the explosions of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, a point vividly expressed in Putin’s multiple speeches. Using the opponent’s own weapon against them, the West and Russia accuse each other of “genocide” — this is the latest wave of implosion within the Western capitalist world: the legitimacy that ethnic “nationalism” has gained in the name of “liberation” is the Pandora’s box opened by the “end of history” thesis after the drastic changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, only today its guise is “civilization.” Unsurprisingly, since the Russia-Ukraine conflict, “civilizational hierarchy theory” and so-called “Asiatic despotism” have been revived worldwide, reminding people that today’s “fight for freedom” leads not to and cannot lead to perpetual peace, but to World War III, to the末日 of humanity under a nuclear winter.

另一方面，美国总统威廉·克林顿以文明为边界的“民主和平论”，正是以北约绕过联合国轰炸南联盟为开端，从武装干涉阿富汗、伊拉克到叙利亚，“民主和平论”已成为世界范围内武装军事干涉的宣言书，而“人权高于主权”的主张则得到来自欧洲左翼思想的背书。以自由、民主、人权为标识的西方普世主义价值观，也追随着俄乌冲突的爆炸声而爆裂并震荡全球，这在普京多次讲话中获得淋漓尽致的表达。以子之矛攻子之盾，西方和俄罗斯彼此指控对方“种族灭绝”，正是西方资本主义世界内爆的最新一波——族裔“民族主义”以“解放”名义获得的合法性，是苏东剧变之后“历史终结论”打开的潘多拉盒子，只是它今天的马甲是“文明”。毫不奇怪，俄乌冲突以来，在世界范围内，“文明等级论”和所谓“亚细亚专制主义”死灰复燃，提示人们今天“为了自由而战”通向的不是也不可能是永久和平，而是第三次世界大战，是核冬天下的人类末日。

The achievements of the Soviet Red Army in completing the World Anti-Fascist War were marked by the establishment of the Yalta system. The collapse of the world pattern it laid down after the dissolution of the Soviet Union manifested as NATO’s eastward expansion, which is also the source of today’s new Cold War. When the greatest Russian October Revolution of the 20th century was negated, the law of the jungle of nationalism born in Europe before World War I followed in succession. The Soviet Union arose from the ruins and blood of World War I — the emergence of the political entity of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was itself an effort by human society to transcend the nation-state and explore world peace, signifying the struggle between Leninism and Wilsonianism over two lines of “war and peace.” On this, people should return to the source of the Soviet Union’s birth, not its end, and to the starting point of the Third World socialist movement.

苏联红军完成的世界反法西斯战争的成果是以雅尔塔体系建立为标志的，它所奠定的世界格局在苏联解体后的崩溃，就表现为北约东扩，也是今天新冷战的源头。当20世纪最伟大的俄国十月革命被否定，第一次世界大战之前诞生于欧洲的民族主义的丛林法则也接踵而至。苏联是从第一次世界大战的废墟和血泊中兴起的——苏维埃社会主义共和国联盟这个政体的出现，本身是人类社会寻求超越民族国家、探索世界和平的努力，意味着列宁主义和威尔逊主义就“战争与和平”展开的两条路线的斗争。对此，人们应当回到苏联诞生的源头，而不是终点，回到第三世界社会主义运动的起点。

Some argue that the United States continuously uses military force overseas but cannot achieve the original intent of wielding that force, instead causing conflict, crisis, and war. William Appleman Williams pointed out as early as the 1960s that “American diplomacy contains the most basic tragic element”: Williams focused on the Cuban issue from 1959 to 1961, but he had already sensed that the Cuban crisis was enough to symbolize the tragedy of US diplomacy throughout the 20th century. Williams’s view was considered left-wing and radical at the time, sparking considerable controversy; but from the perspective of half a century later, the United States frequently uses military force in East Asia, Central Asia, and the Middle East, almost always ending in tragedies that harm others without benefiting itself. Rereading his old works and reflecting on the current global situation, Williams indeed had keen foresight.

有观点认为，美国持续不断向海外动用武力，却无法达到施展武力的初衷，结果反而造成冲突、危机与战争，威廉·威廉姆斯早在1960年代就指出，“美国外交含有最基本的悲剧因素”：威廉斯关注的是1959年到1961年的古巴问题，但他已觉察到古巴危机足以象征美国在20世纪整个外交的悲剧。威廉斯之见在当年被认为是左翼的观点、过激的论调，颇引起争议；但从半世纪以后的今日看来，美国在东亚、中亚、中东不时动用武力，几乎都以损人不利己的悲剧收场。重读其旧作，反观当前世界大势，威廉斯确有敏锐的远见。

The Williams referred to here is the most important representative of the American New Left revisionist school of history, but not a single one of his books has been translated into China by the Chinese Cold War historiography community, including the most famous one mentioned here, *The Tragedy of American Diplomacy*. The Chinese Cold War history research community has translated a large number of books by Henry Kissinger, George Kennan, and other Cold War architects — works of “official historiography” — as well as writings of the “post-revisionist” school, such as those by the iconic figure John Lewis Gaddis, of whom no fewer than four books have been translated into Chinese, some even in multiple editions, enthusiastically received by both the market and academia. In these discussions, one can see a series of binary oppositions: democracy versus authoritarianism, freedom versus autocracy, state versus society, the West versus China — these oppositions are both the historical projection of realpolitik struggles in the 1990s and the projection of the Cold War dividing line, concealed deep within today’s theories of “globalization” and “modernity.” Today, this world remains imprisoned within a fence of binary cognitive oppositions. The basis and direction of the knowledge/ideological reproduction that gives rise to today’s so-called “new Cold War” is to “recover lost territory” from the standpoint of Western-centrism and the Cold War victor, to expel the specter of socialism worldwide. Only this time, it is directly aimed at China.

这里的威廉斯系美国新左翼修正史学最重要的代表人物，但是他的书一本也没有被中国冷战史学界翻译到中国，包括这里提到的最著名的《美国外交的悲剧》（The Tragedy of American Diplomacy）。中国冷战史研究学界翻译了大量的亨利·基辛格、乔治·凯南等冷战主导者们“官方史学”的书以及“后修正史学”派的论述，如标志性人物约翰·加迪斯的书不少于4部被翻译成中文，有些甚至不止一个版本，受到市场和学界热烈追捧。在这些论述中，可以看到民主与威权、自由与专制、国家与社会、西方与中国等一系列二元对立——这些对立既是20世纪90年代现实政治博弈的历史投影，也是冷战分割线的投影，它隐匿于今天“全球化”和“现代性”的理论深处。如今，这个世界依然被禁锢在一系列二元对立的认知藩篱中，今天所谓“新冷战”之所以发生的知识/意识形态再生产的基础和指向，是从西方中心主义和冷战胜利者的立场“收复失地”，在世界范围内驱除社会主义的幽灵。只是，这次它直接针对中国。

This is the root cause of all “historical nihilism.” [5]5 Historical nihilism (历史虚无主义) is a term used in Chinese political discourse to criticize the denial or distortion of the official historical narrative of the Communist Party of China, particularly regarding the revolutionary period and the history of the People’s Republic.

这就是所有“历史虚无主义”的总根源。

II. The Specter of “Leninism,” the Theory of Civilization, and Pandora’s Box

二、“列宁主义”幽灵、文明论与潘多拉的盒子

One may recall the contributions of George H. W. Bush and Boris Yeltsin to the creation of today’s Ukraine. George Bush recalled this period of history, saying: “The day before the referendum, I called Gorbachev and told him that as a democratic nation we would support Ukraine regardless of the outcome, but that we also wanted to do something for a peaceful transition to a new order. For me, recognizing Ukraine and then bringing it into a process of negotiation—concerning the transfer of its sovereignty—was the way forward…” Brent Scowcroft recalled: “Ukraine was the key to creating a viable union. Gorbachev somehow thought that Ukraine would vote for independence and still join the union. Yeltsin thought otherwise; his opinion in favor of recognizing independence as soon as possible showed that he was scheming to keep Ukraine out of the union and thereby cause the union to fail. Yeltsin was quite sensitive to the political divisions within the Soviet Union over recognizing Ukraine and its large ethnic Russian population; in any case, both Ukraine and Russia would stake this bet on the key parts of the new union… Like the fuse of the August events [n], the importance of the vote on the anticipated union treaty was confirmed by Yeltsin’s preoccupation with the question of Ukrainian independence; he seemed determined to prevent Ukraine from joining Gorbachev’s union. For the conspirators of that incident and for Yeltsin, the new union was seen as a step toward bringing the Soviet Union to a new starting point and a new course—so it could not be allowed to achieve its goal.” In fact, promoting Ukrainian independence was the key to Yeltsin’s use of the Commonwealth of Independent States political plan to defeat Gorbachev’s vision of forming a “de-communized” new union. In the 1990s, Yeltsin worked to dissolve the Soviet Union and “vigorously develop privatization” based on the belief that “Marxism may leave behind a few small traces. These dogmas are now outdated and can be abolished. Leninism as well.”

可回顾下老布什（即乔治·布什）和叶利钦对创造今日乌克兰的贡献。乔治·布什回忆这段历史时说：“在全民公决前一天，我打电话给戈尔巴乔夫，告诉他我们作为一个民主的国家，无论结果如何都要支持乌克兰，但我们也想为和平过渡到新秩序做点事。对我来说，承认乌克兰接下来就把它带入一个协议进程——关于它转移主权的问题……”布伦特·斯考克罗夫特回忆说：“乌克兰是创建一个可行性联盟的关键。戈尔巴乔夫不知何故认为乌克兰为独立投票却仍然会加入联盟。叶利钦不以为然，他关于尽快承认独立的意见表明他正在用计谋让乌克兰留在联盟之外，并因此导致联盟的失败。对于苏联国内俄罗斯在承认乌克兰和它广大的俄罗斯人种独立的政治分歧上叶利钦是相当敏感的，无论如何乌克兰或俄罗斯都会将这个赌注押到新联盟的关键部位……像8月事件的导火索一样，预期的联盟协议投票的重要性被叶利钦在乌克兰独立表决问题上的先入之见所证实，他似乎决心阻止乌克兰加入戈尔巴乔夫的联盟。对于那次事件的密谋集团和叶利钦，新联盟被看作把苏联带人新起点和新历程的一个步骤———所以不能让其达到目的。”事实上，促成乌克兰独立，是叶利钦以独联体政治方案击败戈尔巴乔夫组建“去共产化”新联盟构想的关键。1990年代叶利钦致力于苏联解体并“大力发展私有化”，是基于这样的理念，“马克思主义也许能留下一些小的痕迹。现在这些教条已经过时了，可以取消了。列宁主义也一样”。

If we briefly review three representative historical stages from the establishment of the Yalta system to the dissolution of the Soviet Union—the Stalin era, the Khrushchev and post-Khrushchev era, and the “new thinking” Gorbachev era—it can actually be discovered that the Soviet Union sought peace by various means to the greatest extent possible, but ultimately failed each time. This is the starting point for re-inventorying the “civilizational” balance sheet of East and West since the Second World War.

如果简约回顾一下从雅尔塔体系建立到苏联解体三个代表性历史阶段：斯大林时代、赫鲁晓夫及其之后时代和“新思维”的戈巴乔夫时代，其实可以发现，苏联曾以不同方式最大限度寻求和平，但最后都以失败告终。这是重新盘点第二次世界大战以来东西方人类“文明”资产负债表的起点。

It was precisely during Ronald Reagan’s presidency of the United States that, in order to recover from Cold War defeats in the Third World, the United States inaugurated the “proxy war” model. The U.S. military defeat in Vietnam triggered an anti-war movement at home, forcing Henry Kissinger to devise a method of launching “low-intensity warfare” through proxies, which became the banner of the Reagan Doctrine. To strengthen its legitimacy, the Reagan Doctrine introduced the theological concept of “evil” from religious discourse, calling for a strike against the “evil empire” of the Soviet Union. When the United States launched a holy war against the Soviet military occupation in Afghanistan, it recruited, organized, and trained Muslim fighters from around the world to confront the Soviets, using religious schools to instill a narrow theology of jihadist Islam combined with military training. It was this late Cold War strategy of the United States co-opting radical Islamic forces that pushed them to the forefront of history, marked by the U.S. “9/11” incident.

正是在罗纳德·里根任美国总统期间，为挽回冷战期间在第三世界的失败，美国开启了“代理人战争”（Proxy War）模式。美国在越南的军事失败导致国内反战运动爆发，迫使基辛格设计出通过代理人方式开启“低烈度战争”方式，这成为里根主义的大旗。为强化合法性，里根主义从宗教话语中引入“邪恶”这一神学概念，呼吁打击“邪恶帝国”苏联。当美国以圣战的方式发动针对“邪恶帝国”在阿富汗的军事占领，招募、组织和培训了全球的穆斯林战士以对付苏联，用宗教学校灌输狭义的圣战伊斯兰教的神学与军事训练相配合。正是美国对激进的伊斯兰力量收编的冷战晚期战略，将其推到了历史前台，这以美国“911”事件为标识。

Thus, after the Cold War ended, Samuel Huntington declared the jihadist Islam cultivated by the United States to be the enemy of “civilization,” providing a theoretical cloak of “escaping by a clever stratagem” for the disorderly world order created by the United States, and the war on terrorism was called a new “holy war.” Huntington described the post-Cold War world’s “civilizational fault lines” as the famous “clash of civilizations,” because he believed the Cold War was a civil war within the Western world, while the post-Cold War era was a war between Western civilization and other “civilizations,” especially with Islam. “Civilization” became a way to define the other, to judge friend from foe, and also became the human rights yardstick of the Western world. Therefore, after the “9/11” incident, George W. Bush continued to invoke the rhetoric of “civilization”: to stand on America’s side was to stand on the side of civilization. When “ancient hatreds” were seen as forces threatening the world after the Cold War, what was sealed off was precisely the United States’ own contribution to creating enemies. The clash of civilizations has the boundary of democracy—the essence of the “clash of civilizations” theory is a new guise for Western imperialist hegemony.

由此，在冷战结束后，萨缪尔·亨廷顿把美国培养出来的圣战伊斯兰宣布为“文明”的敌人，为美国制造的世界失序格局提供一个“金蝉脱壳”的理论隐身衣，针对恐怖主义的战争就称为新的“圣战”。亨廷顿描述后冷战世界的“文明断层线”即为著名的“文明的冲突”，因为他认为冷战是西方世界的内战，而后冷战时代是西方文明与其他“文明”之间的战争，特别是与伊斯兰的战争。“文明”成为界定他者、判定敌我的方式，也成为西方世界的人权尺度。因此，小布什在“911”事件之后才会继续祭出“文明”的话术，站在美国一边，就是站在文明一边。当“古老的仇恨”被视为后冷战威胁世界的力量，被封存的正是美国自己在制造敌人上的贡献。文明的冲突，有着民主的边界——“文明冲突论”的本质是西方帝国主义霸权的新马甲。

From the cheering over the “end of history” that celebrated the victory over “communism,” to the seamlessly connected anti-“terrorism” stance of American civilizational discourse, the socialist intellectual resources that once inspired the national-democratic liberation movements of the Third World against imperialism and colonialism were suppressed within the negativity of a black/white, evil/not-evil binary. The structural perspective of class analysis on a world scale gave way to “identity” concerns of ethnicity, race, and minority groups, embodied in the Western left’s “cultural identity” theory and the right’s “clash of civilizations” theory. In this sense, the “end of history” proclaimed by Francis Fukuyama has its contemporary reality and truth—it announces that upon the ruins of Cold War ideology, a new era of hot war is about to begin!

从欢呼赢得“共产主义”胜利的“历史终结论”，到无缝衔接的反“恐怖主义”立场的美国文明论，曾鼓舞第三世界反帝反殖的民族民主解放的社会主义思想资源就被镇压在黑白/邪恶对立的负面性当中。世界范围内阶级分析的结构性视野让位给族裔、种族和少数群体的“认同”关切，体现为西方左翼的“文化认同”理论、右翼的“文明冲突”理论。在这个意义上，福山宣布的历史终结论在当下有其现实性和真实性——宣布了在冷战意识形态的废墟之上，开启的将是新的热战时代！

Here, it is quite meaningful to reread the American story told by former U.S. President George H. W. Bush and his National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft in *A World Transformed*. In their own account, “When Reagan took office, U.S. policy turned sharply toward confrontation. Initially, the Reagan administration portrayed the Soviet Union as an ‘evil empire’ in its propaganda offensive. Détente was replaced by the notion of wearing down the Soviet Union over a long historical process; then, by increasing economic and political pressure to accelerate its eventual collapse. Reagan’s strategy was to plan to negotiate with the Soviet Union from a position of advantage. His focus was on applying as much influence as possible through advanced armaments, rather than relying solely on negotiations.” Even George H. W. Bush felt that the Reagan administration’s propaganda about the “evil empire” was excessive, that it would frighten allies and make it difficult for the United States to lead the West. In Scowcroft’s view, “As long as Gorbachev’s actions served our interests—moving things in the direction we wanted—I agreed with George Bush’s cautious cooperation with him. … I firmly believed that it was time to change our thinking and transform the basic concepts at the core of our strategy toward the Soviet Union. … The first area of relations was Eastern Europe. The initial changes there toward reform would provide us with an opportunity to use the Soviet Union’s ‘new thinking’ to dismantle its control over its satellite states.”

这里，重读由美国老布什总统和他的国家安全顾问斯考克罗夫特在《重组的世界》中讲述的美国往事就颇有意味。在他们的自白中，“里根就职时，美国政策急遽转向对抗。最初，里根政府在其宣传攻势中将苏联视为‘邪恶的帝国’。缓和被这一观念所取代：在一个长的历史进程中，拖垮苏联；再通过加大经济和政治压力以加速其最终崩溃。里根的战略是计划在一个优势的位置上与苏联对话。他的中心是放在尽可能给他们施加影响的先进军备上，而并非一味依赖于谈判”。甚至老布什也觉得里根政府对“邪恶帝国”宣传过分了，会吓着盟友，并使美国对西方的领导产生困难。而在斯考克罗夫特看来，“只要戈尔巴乔夫所作所为符合我们的利益——使事情朝向我们期望的方向发展，我赞同乔治·布什谨慎地与之其合作。……我坚决相信，现在是改变思维和变革对苏联战略核心的基本理念的时候了。……第一个关系领域在东欧。那里朝向改革的最初变化，将会为我们提供一个机会，利用苏联的‘新思维’以瓦解苏联对其卫星国的控制”。

In the negotiations with Gorbachev over German reunification and whether a unified Germany would remain neutral or join NATO, George H. W. Bush described their complex calculations to convince the Soviet Union that NATO’s territory would not expand eastward. Scowcroft keenly realized that the reunification of East and West Germany actually meant the end of the Yalta system, the conclusion of the Second World War, and the end of the Cold War. From his perspective, “The strategic consequences of German reunification would, of course, cause panic in the Soviet Union. Although the Soviet Union acquiesced to changes in Poland, Hungary, and even the Baltic states, the disappearance of East Germany from under the Soviet Union’s nose was another matter entirely. Because East Germany was the cornerstone of the Warsaw Pact, losing East Germany, or worse, having East Germany become a member of NATO, would be a fatal threat to the Soviet Union’s post-Second World War military strategy and would be a devastating blow to the Warsaw Pact, like cutting the ground from under its feet. Socialist East Germany was the fruit of the Second World War and the Soviet Union’s most reliable military ally and important economic partner. If it were lost, if the fact of German reunification were accepted, that would mean the Soviet Union acknowledged the end of its hegemonic rule in Eastern Europe, and that Moscow acknowledged that the security net of satellite states it had constructed—the core of its security strategy—was completely torn apart.”

在就德国统一问题，以及统一后是保持中立还是加入“北约”与戈尔巴乔夫的谈判中，老布什描述了他们如何让苏联确信北约的领土不会向东扩张的复杂盘算。斯考克罗夫特敏锐地意识到，东西德统一其实意味着雅尔塔体系的终结，是第二次世界大战的结束，也是冷战的结束。从他的视角看，“德国重新统一的战略性后果,当然会引起苏联的惊慌。虽然苏联默认了波兰、匈牙利甚至还有波罗的海的变革，但东德从苏联眼皮子底下的消失，则是另一回事了。因为东德是‘华沙条约’集团的基石，失去东德，或者更坏的，东德成为北约组织的一个成员，对第二次世界大战后的苏联军事战略将是一个致命的威胁，对华约集团也不啻是种釜底抽薪的毁灭性打击。社会主义东德是第二次世界大战的果实,也是苏联最可靠的军事盟友和重要的经济合作伙伴。如果失去它，如果接受两德统一的事实，那也就意味着苏联承认其在东欧强权统治的结束，意味着莫斯科承认其构造的卫星国的安全网被完全撕破，而这种网是其安全战略的核心”。

A unified Germany had to become a member of NATO because the United States had military bases in West Germany; if Germany were neutral, “it would be difficult, if not impossible, for the United States to continue stationing troops in Europe. We needed Helmut Kohl to commit Germany to remaining in the alliance and to agree to the stationing of US troops on its territory. The achievement of German unification, apart from ending Europe’s division, was also closely tied to our vital interests.” [1]1 “Revisionist historiography” (翻案史学) refers to a trend in Chinese historical scholarship, particularly since the 1990s, that seeks to overturn established orthodox narratives, often by rehabilitating figures or events previously condemned by the Chinese Communist Party or by questioning the Party’s historical role. US Secretary of State James Baker, for his part, assured Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze that “NATO would become a more political and less military alliance,” and repeatedly gave Gorbachev and later Yeltsin assurances that NATO would not expand eastward, that it would undergo a non-military transformation, and that a mutual non-aggression declaration would be signed.

统一之后的德国必须成为“北约”一员，是因为美国在西德有军事基地，如果德国中立，“美国仍然在欧洲驻军即使不是不可能也会很困难。我们需要赫尔穆特·科尔承诺德国留在联盟以及同意美国在其领土驻军。德国统一的成果除结束欧洲分裂以外，还与我们的重大利益密切相关”。而美国国务卿詹姆斯·贝克则向苏联外长谢瓦尔德纳泽保证“北约将会成为一个更多政治色彩而更少军事色彩的联盟”，并多次向戈尔巴乔夫以及之后的叶利钦保证北约不东扩、北约非军事化转型以及签署互不侵犯声明等。

Gorbachev even believed that an agreement could be reached between the two opposing alliances, NATO and the Warsaw Pact: “Both alliances would be preserved, and any country could join either one. ‘NATO is an open organization,’ he said. ‘Maybe we will join too.’” [2]2 “Who lost China?” is a phrase used in U.S. political discourse after the Chinese Communist Party’s victory in the Chinese Civil War (1949), blaming the Truman administration for the “loss” of China to communism. This shows that Gorbachev’s political “naivety” was rooted in the Soviet Union’s “sincere” (and also illusory) peace initiatives. Today’s apologists claim that this oral promise was never formalized into an agreement and that the Soviet Union had already collapsed, so NATO’s eastward expansion does not violate international law; moreover, Putin himself once sought to join NATO, making him a driver of the expansion—these laughably absurd arguments still circulate on Chinese-language social media. Compare this with the 2015 Minsk Agreements, [3]3 “Returned from the dead” (借尸还魂) is a Chinese idiom literally meaning “to borrow a corpse to resurrect the soul,” used figuratively to describe something old or discredited reappearing in a new guise. designed to resolve the conflict in the Donbas. Of the four signatories—Russia, Ukraine, France, and Germany—only Putin was prepared to implement the agreements in earnest, while the other three later admitted they were merely buying time for Ukraine. In particular, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, in a December 2022 interview with *Die Zeit* after the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war, stated that the agreements were meant to give Ukraine time to grow stronger. This publicly acknowledged “deception” infuriated Putin, who had hoped for a peaceful resolution of the Donbas issue; his trust in the West has now fallen to zero. Such “deception” has in fact never ceased since the period surrounding the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Putin’s hope of resolving Russia’s security concerns through Ukrainian “neutrality,” like Gorbachev’s earlier hope of resolving Russia’s security concerns through German “neutrality,” has come to naught. The only difference is that back then the problem was thought to be “communism”; now it is clear that the problem is “the Anglo-Saxons.”

戈尔巴乔夫甚至相信北约和华约这两个对抗的联盟之间可以形成协议，“两个联盟都保留，任何国家都可以加入其中一个。‘北约是一个开放的组织’，他说，‘也许我们也会加入’”。可见，戈尔巴乔夫的政治“天真”建立在苏联“真诚”（也是幻想的）和平倡议上。今天辩护者说，这一口头承诺并没有落实为协议且苏联已经垮台，所以北约东扩不违背国际法，何况普京自己也要求加入北约，是北约东扩的推动者——这些可笑至荒诞的说辞，至今还在汉语社交媒体上出现。那么，对比一下2015年旨在解决顿巴斯地区冲突的明斯克协议，签约的俄、乌、法、德四国中只有普京是准备认真履行该协议，但是其他三方事后都表示这只是为乌克兰争取时间。特别是时任德国总理的默克尔在俄乌战争爆发之后2022年12月接受德国《时代周报》采访时表示，协议是为争取时间让乌克兰变得更强大。这一公开承认的“欺骗”让普京很愤怒，他原本希望顿巴斯地区问题和平解决，但现在他对西方的信任已经降为零。而这样的“欺骗”自苏东剧变前后其实就一直没有停止。普京希望以乌克兰“中立”的方式解决俄罗斯的安全问题，与当年戈尔巴乔夫希望以“德国”中立的方式解决俄罗斯的安全问题一样，都已经化为泡影，区别只在于：当时以为问题是“共产主义”，现在才知道问题是“盎格鲁—撒克逊人”。

The nineteenth-century nationalism that the twentieth-century socialist revolution sought to bury—originating in Europe, the cradle of two world wars—now dominates the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The Orthodox cross replacing the hammer and sickle is itself a product of the twentieth-century Cold War, and today’s standoff under the cross indeed makes the Russia-Ukraine conflict resemble a European “civil war.” Both world wars erupted from European civil wars, but their outcome was a complete transformation of the global order. From the Nord Stream 2 pipeline incident and the bombing of the Crimean Bridge to the present, apart from Ukraine itself in the throes of war, the greatest losses have been borne by the European Union and Russia, at opposite ends of Europe: one must cope with war-exacerbated economic recession and an energy crisis, while the other is trapped under the ever-escalating, US-led extreme sanctions—with no opportunity for peace negotiations. The Israel-Palestine war and its tendency toward prolongation have further intensified the ideological civil war within the global North.

被20世纪社会主义革命力求埋葬的19世纪民族主义——源起两次世界大战策源地的欧洲，正在主宰今天的俄乌冲突。东正教的十字架取代镰刀斧头，本身正是20世纪冷战的成果，而今天十字架下的东西对垒的确使俄乌冲突更像一场欧洲的“内战”。两次世界大战的爆发都源于欧洲内战，但结果是世界格局彻底改变。从北溪2号输气管事件和克里米亚大桥被炸事件至今，除战火中的乌克兰，损耗最大的正是处于欧洲两端的欧盟和俄罗斯，一个需要应对战争加剧的经济衰退和能源危机，一个则困守于美国主导并不断加码的极限制裁——无法找到和平谈判的契机。而巴以战争及其长期化的趋势更使全球北方世界的意识形态内战加剧爆发。

“Pandora’s box” has been opened—from the moment of the Soviet Union’s dissolution. Ukraine has been systematically dismantling over five thousand Lenin statues on its territory, and after the 2014 Euromaidan regime change, it legislated to ban both communism and Nazism while simultaneously legally recognizing the contributions of “nationalists,” including the Bandera faction, [4]4 The “Lenin German Agent Case” (列宁德奸案) is a long-standing conspiracy theory alleging that Vladimir Lenin was a German agent during World War I, used to discredit the Bolshevik Revolution. to “national independence.” The “decommunized” polar bear [5]5 Historical nihilism (历史虚无主义) is a term used in Chinese political discourse to criticize the denial or distortion of the official historical narrative of the Communist Party of China, particularly regarding the revolutionary period and the history of the People’s Republic. remains the national enemy of “Western civilization,” even though it was once so willing to transform itself into a harmless, marmalade-loving “Paddington Bear”—sipping afternoon tea with the Queen at Buckingham Palace during her Platinum Jubilee celebrations, showcasing how the “other” (immigrants) from “darkest Peru” shares in the peaceful and prosperous era of Western civilization. But having been rejected four times in its applications to join NATO, no matter how it transforms, the “sword of Damocles” forged by NATO has always hung over its vital point. The “polar bear” from the “white continent” has finally understood that the “Arctic” is its original sin; the spell of the “evil empire” does not vanish with “decommunization.” The “polar bear” that has integrated with capitalism will never reach the Paddington Station of imperialism.

“潘多拉的盒子”已经打开——从苏联解体那一刻开始。乌克兰持续拆除境内五千多座列宁塑像，并在2014年广场运动政权更迭之后，立法禁止境内共产主义和纳粹主义的同时，立法认可包括班德拉分子在内的“民族主义者”为“国家独立”作出的贡献。“去共产化”的“北极熊”依然是“西方文明”的民族之敌，虽然曾经那么心甘情愿想把自己变成人畜无害、只爱橘子酱的“帕丁顿熊”——在英帝国女王登基70周年的“白金禧年”庆典时，到白金汉宫和女王一起喝下午茶，展示来自“黑暗秘鲁”的“他者”（移民）是如何共享西方文明的太平盛世。但四次要求加入北约被拒绝，无论如何变形，北约铸造的“达摩克利斯之剑”一直高悬命门，来自“白色大陆”的“北极熊”终于明白，“北极”就是它的原罪，“邪恶帝国”的符咒并不因“去共产化”而乌有，与资本主义接轨的“北极熊”永远抵达不了帝国主义的帕丁顿车站。

During the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Putin, in a conversation with visiting UN Secretary-General António Guterres, cited the International Court of Justice’s ruling on Kosovo to support his position—this is what is called the advent of the “new Cold War” era. From the Kosovo War to the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the Israel-Palestine war, what is the underlying mechanism driving these wars?

俄乌冲突期间，普京与到访的联合国秘书长古特雷斯谈话，援引联合国国际法院对科索沃判决案例支持自己——这就是所谓“新冷战”时代的降临。从科索沃战争到俄乌冲突、巴以战争，这中间战争动力机制究竟何在？

The main ideas of Dugin’s “Neo-Eurasianism” [6]6 The “August events” refer to the August 1991 coup attempt by hardliners in the Soviet Union against Mikhail Gorbachev, which accelerated the dissolution of the USSR. are linked in a meaningful way to two intellectual resources. First, it strongly echoes Huntington’s “clash of civilizations” thesis; in this sense, it does not end but rather develops that thesis—only from the opposite standpoint of an “independent Russian civilization.” “Samuel Huntington’s correctness has been confirmed in practice; he foresaw the return of civilizations, while Fukuyama’s thesis about the global hegemony of liberal democracy has been proven wrong. Therefore, Fukuyama can only helplessly instruct Ukrainian neo-Nazis, who are the globalists’ last hope of preventing the arrival of multipolarity. In fact, Russia in Ukraine is fighting for multipolarity.” [7]7 The reference is to the 1990 negotiations on German reunification, in which the US and its allies sought to ensure a unified Germany remained in NATO. Helmut Kohl was Chancellor of West Germany (1982–1990) and then of unified Germany (1990–1998). What Dugin fails to recognize is that Huntington’s and Fukuyama’s worldviews are merely the realist and idealist versions, respectively, of the same lineage. Second, it echoes the Weimar era in Germany. “Neo-Eurasianism” is merely a variant of the old European balance-of-power theory—which was destroyed after World War II by the Marshall Plan and NATO under US hegemony. This is precisely why the right-wing perspective of Carl Schmitt, the sovereignty theorist of the Weimar period in defeated Germany, could be resurrected in Moscow, becoming the focus of attention as a representative of the so-called “Neo-Schmittianism.” The reason is that Russia’s predicament in the post-Cold War era can be seen as a replay of the suppressed Weimar era in the twenty-first century. This explains why Schmitt’s assertion of sovereignty for the German Empire, based on Western principles of power equilibrium, has been so vigorously revived in today’s Russia. The only difference is that Dugin expands Schmitt’s perspective from Eurocentrism to a global “civilizational equilibrium,” and the civilizational blocs he delineates also hint at the shadows of old traditional empires—in this sense, “civilization” is precisely the specter of war.

杜金“新亚欧主义”的主要观点在两个思想资源上有意味深长的联结：一是与亨廷顿文明冲突论强烈呼应，在这个意义上不是终结而是发展了文明冲突论——只是从相反的“俄罗斯独立文明”的立场出发。“塞缪尔·亨廷顿的正确性在实践中得到了证实，他看到了文明回归的未来，而福山有关自由西方的全球霸权的论点是错误的也已得到证明。因此，福山只能无奈地教导乌克兰新纳粹，这是全球主义者阻止多极化到来的最后希望，而事实上，俄罗斯在乌克兰正在为多极化而战斗。”杜金不能辨识的正是，亨廷顿与福山的世界观不过是同一个脉络的现实版与理想版而已。二是对德国魏玛时代的回响。“新欧亚主义”不过是古老的欧洲势力均衡理论的变体——在第二次世界大战后被美国霸权下的马歇尔计划和北约摧毁，这也正是为什么作为战败国之德国魏玛时期的主权理论家施密特的右翼视角能够在莫斯科复活，成为引人关注的所谓“新施密特主义”的代表。原因在于，后冷战时代俄罗斯的境遇可以视为21世纪被压制的魏玛时代的重演，这才是为什么施密特基于西方权力均衡原理为德意志帝国进行的主权伸张在今天的俄罗斯强劲复活，不同只在于杜金把施密特的视角从欧洲中心主义扩张成世界范围内“文明均衡”，而他所划分的世界范围内的文明板块，也提示着旧日传统帝国的阴影——这个意义上的“文明”其实就是战争的幽灵。

Invoking the old world map of civilizations to replace the postwar Yalta system results in conjuring the specter of a third world war. The shaking and negation of the Yalta system is precisely the greatest achievement of the Cold War, and the Russia-Ukraine conflict is its consequence. In this sense, the rise of the “Neo-Eurasian system” as a “nostalgic utopia,” returning to the embrace of an Orthodox imperial civilization, is inevitably bloody. This is precisely why Huntington’s civilizational dividing lines overlap with Neo-Eurasianism, and the clash of civilizations and nationalism have become the two dominant narratives for explaining war in the post-Cold War era, behind which civilization, “holy war,” and so-called “democracy” advance together.

乞灵于以旧日文明的世界版图取代战后雅尔塔体系，结果就是制造出第三次世界大战阴影。对雅尔塔体系的动摇和否定，正是冷战最大的胜利成果，而俄乌冲突正是它的后果。在这个意义上，作为“怀旧的乌托邦”而崛起的“新欧亚体系”回归东正教的帝国文明怀抱的过程，必然是血腥的。这正是为什么亨廷顿的文明分割线与新欧亚主义相互重合，文明的冲突与民族主义成为后冷战时代之阐述战争的两种主导叙述，其背后是文明、“圣战”与所谓“民主”的共同推进。

When American liberal scholars condemn Schmittianism, they cannot explain why right-wing conservatism is also reviving in Europe and the United States. What needs to be questioned is precisely the historical conditions that have produced this situation—this is the meaningful intellectual genealogy worthy of attention. Only by linking the global intellectual genealogy of right-wing conservatism can we penetrate the historical mystery behind it: it is the vortex effect of the historical black hole created by the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.

当美国的自由主义学者对施密特主义进行谴责的时候，他们不能解释的正是右翼保守主义为什么同样在欧洲和美国复活？需要追问的正是造成这种局面的历史条件，这才是值得重视的意味深长的思想谱系，只有把右翼保守主义的全球思想谱系联系在一起，才能够洞穿其背后的历史奥秘：那是苏东剧变造成的历史黑洞的旋涡效应。

III. “Decommunization,” Equilibrium Theory, and a War Foretold

三、“去共产化”、均衡论与一场事先张扬的战争

On April 12, 1945, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt died. On May 9, Stalin issued his “Address to the People,” announcing the unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany. At that time, he was still planning with Roosevelt to reach agreements and a vision for world peace: “The great banner of the freedom of all peoples and of peace among all peoples will fly over Europe.” But only three months later, the United States dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan — the Cold War had in fact already begun, its purpose being to prevent the Soviet Union from gaining a foothold in Japan, since Japan’s defeat was already a foregone conclusion and did not require the “blessing” of the atomic bomb.

1945年4月12日，美国总统罗斯福去世，5月9日斯大林发表《告人民书》，宣布德国法西斯无条件投降，这时他依然在筹划与罗斯福达成世界和平的协议与愿景，“各国人民的自由和各国人民之间的和平的伟大旗帜，将飘扬在欧洲上空”。但仅三个月后，美国就在日本广岛投下人类第一颗原子弹——冷战其实就已拉开序幕，目的是阻遏苏联染指日本，因为日本战败已是定局，并不需要原子弹的“加持”。

On March 5, 1946, Churchill traveled to Westminster College, the alma mater of U.S. President Harry S. Truman, to deliver the Fulton “Iron Curtain” speech — merely a public ratification of this Western-dominated action. The speech was given the bitterly ironic title “The Sinews of Peace.” In it, he regarded the alliance of the English-speaking world as the “sinews of peace” after the war: “We cannot afford to fail to proclaim the great principles of freedom and the rights of man which are the joint inheritance of the English-speaking world and which through Magna Carta, the Bill of Rights, habeas corpus, trial by jury, and the English common law find their most famous expression in the American Declaration of Independence. … the prevention of war and the continued development of world organization will not be possible without what I have called the fraternal association of the English-speaking peoples. This means a special relationship between the British Commonwealth and Empire and the United States.” By dividing the world into two sides of the Iron Curtain according to “English,” the “de-communizing” Western imperialist civilizational racial theory, which styled itself as liberal democracy, was thus inaugurated — inaugurated by the Cold War.

1946年3月5日，丘吉尔赴美国总统杜鲁门的母校威斯敏斯特学院发表富尔顿铁幕演讲，不过是对这一西方主导行动的公开追认。这一演讲被冠以极具讽刺的“和平砥柱”的题目。演讲中，他把英语世界的联盟视为战后“和平砥柱”：“我们绝不能放弃以大无畏的声调宣扬自由的伟大原则和基本人权。这些英语世界的共同遗产，继大宪章、人权法案、人身保护法、陪审团审讯制以及英国习惯法之后，它们又在美国独立宣言中得到举世闻名的表现。没有我所称之为各英语民族同胞手足一样的联合，有效地防止战争和继续发展世界组织都是办不到的。这种联合就是以英联邦与帝国为一方和以美利坚合众国为另一方建立特殊的关系。”按照“英语”把世界划分为铁幕两端，以自由民主自居的“去共产化”的西方帝国主义文明种族论由此开启——由冷战开启。

On March 13, 1946, Stalin, in the form of a reply to a Pravda correspondent’s question, sternly condemned this speech as a dangerous act, a “racial theory” that incited war, and as standing together with Hitler. Given that even in today’s Chinese-speaking world, people are more familiar with Churchill’s speech, the following passage is especially worth revisiting: “Mr. Churchill is now standing in the position of a war-monger. And Mr. Churchill is not alone here; he has friends not only in Britain but also in the United States. It should be noted that Mr. Churchill and his friends are in this respect remarkably like Hitler and his associates. Hitler began the business of unleashing war by proclaiming the racial theory, declaring that only people speaking German are a fully-fledged nation. Mr. Churchill begins the business of unleashing war also with a racial theory, maintaining that only nations speaking English are fully-fledged nations, called upon to decide the destinies of the entire world. … In substance, Mr. Churchill and his friends in Britain and the United States are presenting something like an ultimatum to the non-English-speaking nations: ‘Accept our domination voluntarily, and then all will be well — otherwise war is inevitable.’”

1946年3月13日，斯大林通过答《真理报》记者问的方式严厉谴责这一演讲是危险行为，是挑唆战争的“种族论”，是与希特勒站在一起。鉴于即便在今天的中文世界，人们更熟知的也是丘吉尔的演讲，因此以下这段话更值得重温：“丘吉尔先生现在是站在战争挑拨者的立场上，而且丘吉尔先生在这里并不是孤独的，他不仅在英国有朋友，而且在美国也有朋友。应当指出，丘吉尔先生和他的朋友在这方面非常像希特勒及其同伴。希特勒干他的发动战争的勾当，是从散布种族论开始的，他宣布只有讲德语的人才是最优秀的民族。丘吉尔先生干他的发动战争的勾当，也是从散布种族论开始的，他硬说只有讲英语的民族才是最优秀的民族，负有决定世界命运的使命……实际上，丘吉尔先生和他在英国和美国的朋友，向不讲英语的民族提出了类似最后通牒的东西：自愿承认我们的统治吧，只有这样才能万事大吉，否则战争是不可避免的。”

Within the United States, the line of Democratic Vice President Henry Wallace, who advocated cooperation with the Soviet Union rather than with Britain, was rejected. In September 1946, a 50-page report on U.S.-Soviet relations, written by Clark Clifford, Special Counsel to the President, at Truman’s order, was sealed as top-secret material for 20 years. The report declared that “the United States must possess sufficient military strength to restrain the Soviet Union.” This tone is familiar — it has been the policy of Israel toward Palestine since the 1970s.

美国国内，主张与苏联而不是英国合作的民主党副总统亨利·华莱士的路线被否决。1946年9月，由杜鲁门下令、美国总统特别顾问克拉克·克利福德撰写的美苏关系长达50页的报告，曾被作为绝密材料封存20年，报告宣称“美国必须拥有强大的军事力量，强大到足以抑制苏联”，这一口吻很熟悉——20世纪70年代以来以色列对巴勒斯坦也是这样的政策。

Today, the “glory” of the Soviet Red Army’s victory over fascism has become a thing of the past. The “delusion” that Hitler failed to complete has been perfectly realized by the U.S. strategy of containment. The “era of peaceful development” that Stalin once eagerly hoped for never materialized; an imposed Cold War descended instead. His name, together with that of his mortal enemy Hitler, became an incarnation of “Satan” — when this narrative completed its Cold War mission in Western mass media, the crimes against humanity of the two world wars, which were dominated by Europe, escaped the historical judgment of morality. Germany and Japan, the sources of the Second World War, were transformed under U.S. protection into democratic/Cold War frontiers, while the contribution of the Soviet Red Army to the world anti-fascist war was continuously eroded and denied by the victors of the Cold War. History is written by the victors. The essence of “containment” was to destroy the legitimacy of the Soviet Union and the entire socialist camp, so it was inevitably a life-and-death struggle over culture and ideology. There are many reasons for the dissolution of the Soviet Union, but the key factor was its failure to break through the unfair strategic position imposed by the U.S.-led containment policy and its inability to escape the wartime economic model oriented toward heavy (military) industry.

今天，苏联红军反法西斯胜利的“光荣”已成为过去，希特勒没有完成的“妄想”已经被美国的遏制战略完美实现。斯大林曾经热切期望的“和平发展时代”并没有发生，强加的冷战降临了。他的名字与其死敌希特勒一起成为“撒旦”的化身——当这一叙述在西方大众传媒中完成其冷战使命的时候，欧洲主导的两次世界大战的反人类罪就逃脱了历史的道义审判。第二次世界大战的策源地德国和日本在美国的庇护下摇变为民主/冷战前沿，而苏联红军在世界反法西斯战争中的贡献则不断遭到冷战胜利者的侵蚀和否决，历史是由胜利者书写的。“遏制”的本质是摧毁苏联和整个社会主义阵营的合法性，所以它必然同时是文化和意识形态的生死之战。苏联解体有诸多原因，而没能突破美国主导的遏制政策强加的不公平战略地位，无法走出重（军事）工业为导向的战时经济模式，则是关键因素。

Reducing the hot wars and Cold War of the 20th century to demonic individuals has not and cannot bring lasting peace to this world. Hitler died; the Cold War inherited and completed his “life’s work.” Stalin died; the Soviet Union dissolved. Yet the far-right forces of racism and fascism are now being resurrected across Europe in all their dimensions, and far-right political parties are continuously breaking through in Europe’s political landscape. New “Hitlers” are returning — this is no longer an alarmist statement. Genocide — this is precisely the result of a century of “de-communization.” Because the core of imperialism is the racial question of civilizational superiority, when imperialist wars are waged through genocide, they compel the resisters to resist through national liberation. After the Second World War, after the wave of national-democratic liberation, after the “post-Cold War,” this logic remains valid.

把20世纪的热战和冷战归结为作为恶魔的个人，没有也不可能给这个世界带来永久和平。希特勒死了，冷战继承并完成了他的“志业”。斯大林死了，苏联解体了，种族主义和法西斯主义的极右翼势力却在今天的欧洲全方位复活，而极右翼政党势力在欧洲的政治版图中不断突围。新的“希特勒”们正在回归，已不是危言耸听，种族屠杀——这正是一个世纪以来“去共产化”的结果。正因为帝国主义的核心是文明优越论的种族问题，当帝国主义战争以种族灭绝的方式进行，就会迫使反抗者以民族解放的方式进行反抗。在第二次世界大战之后，在民族民主解放浪潮之后，在“后冷战”之后，这一逻辑依然有效。

In 1937, on the eve of the outbreak of the Second World War, Edward Hallett Carr wrote a preface to his book *The Twenty Years’ Crisis, 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations*. He cautioned: “When the war fever is rising, it is easy and dangerous to attribute the calamity of war entirely to the ambition and arrogance of a few individuals and to refrain from further probing into the roots of war. Even in the midst of war, it remains of practical significance to investigate the deep-seated causes and important reasons for war, rather than merely considering the personal causes and immediate occasions. Only twenty years and two months after the signing of the Treaty of Versailles, peace collapsed, and the European powers were drawn into a second major war. If peace is to return to the world, then the lessons of the breakdown of peace should be seriously considered. If the arrangements for ending the war destroy only the rulers of German National Socialism, without eliminating the conditions that gave rise to the phenomenon of National Socialism, then such arrangements will certainly be unsustainable, and the tragedy of the arrangements that ended the war in 1919 will repeat itself.” This book is considered the foundational work of the “realist school” in international relations, but Carr’s realist warning has not been heeded by the post-Cold War world, nor has it been heeded by the “offensive realism” of today’s famous American strategist John Mearsheimer. Since 2022, the great wings of the god of war have once again swept over Europe, which Zbigniew Brzezinski called the American “democratic bridgehead.” Will history repeat itself?

1937年，爱德华·卡尔在第二次世界大战即将爆发的危机状态下，为他的《二十年危机1919—1939：国际关系研究导论》写了一份序言，他告诫道：“战争气焰上升的时候，将战争灾难全然归罪于少数人的野心和傲慢，不求进一步探查战争的根源，这实在是容易的事情，但却也十分危险。即便是战火纷飞的时候，探究战争的深层原因和重要缘由，而不是仅仅考量战争的个人原因和直接缘由，仍然是具有实际意义的。《凡尔赛和约》签署之后仅20年又两个月，和平即告破裂，欧洲诸国从而卷入第二次重大的战争。如若和平重返世界，其时，应当认真思考和平破裂的教训。如若结束战争的安排摧毁的仅仅是德国国家社会主义的统治者，而没有消除滋生国家社会主义现象的条件，那么，这样的安排必然无以持续，1919年结束战争安排的悲剧就会重演。”此书被认为是国际关系学中“现实主义学派”的奠基之作，但是卡尔的现实主义告诫并没有被冷战后的世界所记取，也没有被今天美国著名的战略学家约翰·米尔斯海默所谓“进攻式现实主义”所记取。2022年以来，巨大的战神翅膀再一次掠过被布热津斯基称为美国“民主桥头堡”的欧洲，历史会重演吗？

In the final analysis, both Russia and Ukraine are products of the “de-communization” that followed the Soviet Union’s defeat in the Cold War. Therefore, what is even more significant is precisely the question of the relationship between “de-communization” and “Western hegemonic ideology” — this is a history that needs to be investigated. And Israel’s acquisition of its current powerful position is also related to the upheaval in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. The Russia-Ukraine conflict lies on the extension line of the 20th century Cold War “de-communization”; it is the latest result. This is also why it reveals, in a regressive manner, the old face of the new century — the face of the 19th century.

说到底，俄罗斯和乌克兰都是苏联冷战失败“去共产化”的产物，因此，更具有意味的正是，“去共产化”与“西方霸权主义意识形态”之间究竟是什么样的关系，这是需要追问的历史。而以色列获得今天的强势地位也与苏东剧变有关。俄乌冲突就处于20世纪冷战“去共产化”的延长线上，是最新的结果。这也是为什么它会以倒退的方式显露出新世纪的旧面目——19世纪的面目。

The American version of the “balance of power” theory after the Second World War was precisely an intervention in the world situation with American interests as its axis, embodied in the “containment” of the Soviet Union after the Second World War and the “containment” of China today. When John Mearsheimer comments on George Kennan, he interprets Kennan’s “containment theory” as an American theory of equilibrium, while Mearsheimer himself negates it with “offensive realism” — the rise of the United States was the result of breaking the European balance-of-power theory. As a contemporary interpreter of American conduct, he criticizes the “liberal hegemony” behind “containment theory” as mere rhetoric; liberalism often uses liberal rhetoric to package its shrewd and pragmatic actions — they speak in liberal terms but act in realist ones. If they adopt liberal policies inconsistent with realist logic, they always end up regretting it. In his view, after the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, liberal hegemony existed in a unipolar world; with no adversary, liberalism and realism would combine to become the reality of America’s global military intervention. Only under these circumstances could the “universalist” ideology play a role in reshaping the world, and precisely for this reason, liberal states would fall into endless wars: “A state’s militaristic behavior will almost certainly end up threatening its own liberal values. Liberalism abroad leads to illiberalism at home. Finally, even if liberal internationalism achieves its goals — spreading democracy everywhere, promoting economic exchange, and building international institutions — it will not bring peace.” Therefore, the problem Mearsheimer must address is precisely its actual consequences: after the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, America’s global intervention was concentrated mainly in the Soviet region and the Middle East, which was the Soviet sphere of influence — precisely the places where today’s Russia-Ukraine conflict and the Israel-Palestine war have broken out. The unending low-intensity proxy wars have caused the liberal ideology to continuously go bankrupt and implode — this is the brutal reality under the so-called “realist” perspective.

第二次世界大战后的美国版“权力均衡”理论正是以美国利益为轴心对世界局势的干涉，它体现为第二次世界大战后对苏联的“遏制”以及今天对中国的“遏制”。约翰·米尔斯海默评述乔治·凯南的时候，把他的“遏制理论”解释为美国的均衡理论，而米尔斯海默则用“进攻式现实主义”否定它——美国的崛起就是打破欧洲均衡论的结果。作为美国行为的当代阐释者，他批评“遏制理论”背后的“自由主义霸权“只是一种言辞，自由主义经常用自由主义言辞来包装他们精明务实的行为，它们说话是自由主义的，行事则是现实主义的。如果采取与现实主义逻辑不一致的自由主义政策，它们总是会懊悔不已。在他看来，苏东剧变后，自由主义霸权处于单极世界，在没有对手的情况下，自由主义和现实主义会叠加成为美国在全球进行军事干涉的现实。也只有在这种情况下，“普遍主义”意识形态才能在重塑世界才会起作用，也正因此，自由主义国家会陷入无休止的战争：“一个国家的军国主义行为几乎肯定会最终威胁到自己的自由主义价值观。对外自由主义导致对内非自由主义。最后，即使自由主义国际可以实现目标——到处传播民主、促进经济交往和建立国际制度，它们也不会带来和平。”因此，米尔斯海默要处理的问题正是它的实际后果：苏东剧变后美国全球干涉主要在苏联地区以及苏联势力范围的中东地区——正是今日俄乌冲突和以巴战争爆发地，连绵不断的低烈度代理人战争使自由主义意识形态不断破产和内爆，这就是所谓“现实主义”视角下的残酷现实。

What Mearsheimer actually reconstructs is the international politics of nation-states from the perspective of Darwinian survival competition; the primary subject of “offensive realism” is war. It is precisely on the basis of naked American national interests that he opposes the hijacking of the state by the Israel lobby, because it overdraws liberal ideology; he opposes the Russia-Ukraine conflict, because it hinders America’s ultimate great war with China, and doing everything possible to “contain” China is the fundamental interest of the United States in the twenty-first century, among which “defending Taiwan” with all effort is the inevitable path of American “offensive realism.” In this sense, “offensive realism” is merely an upgraded version of the containment strategy of twenty-first-century American imperialism.

米尔斯海默重建的其实是达尔文生存竞争视角下民族国家的国际政治，“进攻现实主义”的首要课题就是战争。正是基于赤裸裸的美国国家利益，他反对以色列游说集团对国家的绑架，因为透支了自由主义意识形态；反对俄乌冲突，因为妨碍了美国与中国的终极大战，而竭尽全力“遏制”中国，才是美国21世纪根本利益所在，其中竭力“保卫台湾”是美国“进攻式现实主义”的必由之路。在这个意义上，“进攻式现实主义”不过是21世纪美帝国主义遏制战略的升级版。

Whether old or new, the balance-of-power theory requires arms races and even war as means of containment; its essence is the military “guarding” of the unequal world order by power politics. The former is embodied in the two world wars under the “imbalance” of the European colonial imperialist system; the latter is embodied in military intervention under American neocolonial hegemony, as well as the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the Israel-Palestine war under the shadow of a third world war. Whether in theory or practice, the balance of power is essentially a source of war, because balance is precisely the result of military force, and also the source of state terrorism. The Cold War and “holy war” launched by the United States, as well as the Palestinian crisis created by Israel, are all classic cases of “offensive realism.” This is also why Mearsheimer wants to tear off the liberal packaging and, from a “depoliticized” political stance, insists that containing China must be the first priority. In an interview on July 23, 2023, with the independent news website The Grayzone, Mearsheimer continued to insist on his thesis of the end of peace: “From the perspective of containing a dangerous Russia, NATO expansion before 2014 was unjustified. In fact, it was Russia’s weakness that allowed the West to force the first two phases of NATO expansion on Moscow in 1999 and 2004, and then led the George W. Bush administration in 2008 to believe that Russia could be forced to accept Georgia and Ukraine joining the organization. But that assumption proved wrong, and when the Ukraine crisis broke out in 2014, the West suddenly began to portray Russia as a dangerous enemy that must be contained, even weakened.” As an “apocalyptic war against Western authoritarianism and aggression that cannot afford to lose,” Ukraine has become a Western fortress on Russia’s border. He predicts that today’s three-way “existential war” makes peace, especially lasting peace, no longer possible.

无论新老权力均衡理论，都需要以军备竞赛乃至战争为遏制手段，实质是强权政治对世界不平等格局的军事“看守”。前者体现为欧洲殖民帝国主义体系“失衡”下的两次世界大战；后者体现为美国新殖民主义霸权下的军事干涉，以及第三次世界大战阴影下的俄乌冲突和巴以战争。无论是权力均衡理论还是实践，实质上都是战争的策源地，因为均衡恰恰是军事的结果，也是国家恐怖主义的来源。美国发动的冷战、“圣战”以及以色列制造的巴勒斯坦危机，都是“进攻式现实主义”的经典案例。这也是米尔斯海默要扯掉自由主义包装，以“去政治化”的政治立场，坚持必须把遏制中国作为第一要义的原因。米尔斯海默2023年7月23日接受独立新闻网站“灰色地带”（The Grayzone）采访时继续坚持他的和平终结论，“从遏制危险的俄罗斯的角度来看，北约在2014年之前的扩张是不合理的。事实上，正是俄罗斯的软弱让西方在1999年和2004年将北约东扩的前两个阶段硬塞给莫斯科，然后让乔治·W·布什政府在2008年认为俄罗斯可以被迫接受格鲁吉亚和乌克兰加入该组织。但这一假设被证明是错误的，当2014年乌克兰危机爆发时，西方突然开始将俄罗斯描绘成一个危险的敌人，必须加以遏制，甚至削弱。”作为一场“反对西方输不起的专制和侵略”的“末日之战”，乌克兰成为俄罗斯边境的西方堡垒，他预测今天三方的“生存大战”使得和平，特别是持久和平已经不再可能。

If we reread the works of American right-wing strategic researchers after the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, we will find that the Russia-Ukraine conflict was actually a war foretold and proclaimed repeatedly in advance. Clearly, the hegemonic forces in today’s world political格局 [n18] do not want to avoid it, so it was bound to break out. Its motives and decisions were not only planted at the time of the Soviet Union’s dissolution but were also warned of by Stalin at the moment the Iron Curtain descended — this is the root of the Russia-Ukraine conflict as a war repeatedly foretold in advance, and also the root of today’s “new Cold War.” It only needs to be opened up and brought to light.

如果重读一下苏东剧变之后美国右翼战略研究家们的著作就会发现，俄乌冲突其实是一个事先反复被预告和张扬的战争。显然，今天世界政治格局的霸权势力并不想避免它，所以一定会爆发。其动机和决策不仅在苏联解体时就被种下，在铁幕降临的时刻被斯大林所警告——这是俄乌冲突作为一场事先反复被张扬的战争，也是今日“新冷战”的根源，只是需要把它打开，重见天日。

To understand the world pattern of today’s “new Cold War,” there are two issues that urgently need reinterpretation:

要理解今天“新冷战”的世界格局，有两个迫切需要重新阐释的问题：

First, because the Western camp, as the victor of the Cold War, has unilaterally propagated and controlled the narrative of “Cold War history,” the impact of the Soviet Union’s birth and collapse on today’s world pattern has not been effectively assessed, and its positive and negative historical experiences have not been treated fairly. This also means that people’s understanding of the twenty-first century is still confined within the Cold War framework, which is premised on the stigmatization of the century through “de-communization.” Without eliminating this stigma, world peace is impossible. The so-called “post-Cold War” is merely the victory celebration of the Cold War victors within the world pattern shaped by the Cold War; the “new Cold War” is precisely the third stage of the Cold War. To oppose the “new Cold War,” we must re-examine the entire historical process of the Cold War, transcend the one-sided hegemonic narrative of the “victors,” and open up a path for new historical possibilities.

第一，由于西方阵营作为冷战胜利者的单方面宣扬以及对“冷战史”叙述的掌控，苏联的诞生与瓦解对于当今世界格局的影响并没有得到真正有效评估，其正反两方面历史经验并没有被公正对待，这也使人们对21世纪的理解依然被限制于冷战框架，它正是以“去共产化”的世纪污名化为前提的。不消除这样的污名，就不可能有世界和平。所谓“后冷战”，不过是冷战形塑下世界格局中冷战胜利者的庆祝日，“新冷战”正是冷战的第三阶段。反对“新冷战”，就必须重新检讨整个冷战的历史进程，超越“胜利者”单向的霸权叙述，为新的历史可能性开辟道路。

The Russia-Ukraine conflict is not a burial of the Soviet Union; rather, it reminds us that the “specter” of Leninism has not gone away. To conduct a holy crusade against this “specter,” all forces of the old and new Europe and old and new imperialism have united. It has been recognized by all forces in Europe as a force, even if this “force” has lost its political entity. The failure of the Soviet Union does not prove the failure of socialism and peace; on the contrary, the containment and suppression of socialism is the grave of world peace. The October Revolution itself was precisely based on the demands of “peace, land, and bread”; its essence was to win peace and development for the workers and peasants through “revolution” — this was the starting point of Russian socialism.

俄乌冲突不是对苏联的埋葬，而是提示我们列宁主义的“幽灵”并未远去，为了对这个“幽灵”进行神圣围剿，新旧欧洲和新老帝国主义的一切势力，都联合起来了。它已经被欧洲的一切势力公认为一种势力，哪怕这个“势力”已经失去了它的政治实体。苏联的失败，并不证明社会主义与和平的失败，而是相反，对社会主义的遏制与镇压，才是世界和平的坟墓。十月革命本身正是以“和平、土地、面包”为诉求，实质是以“革命”为工农大众赢得和平与发展，这是俄国社会主义的起点。

On August 30, 2022, Gorbachev passed away. Western media thanked and remembered him for bringing a “bloodless” “end to the Cold War” to the world, but this narrative ignores the two Middle East wars, the Kosovo War, the Afghanistan War, the Iraq War before and after the Soviet Union’s dissolution, and the Russia-Ukraine conflict today — the “bloodshed” brought by the end of the Cold War has never ceased. “Bloodless” is a judgment based on the Western standpoint; the blood of the Soviet Union has been flowing all along, and it seems it has not yet been drained. At the end of the First World War, the Allies forced Germany to accept the Treaty of Versailles, and the product of the “enforced peace” it brought — the short-lived Weimar Republic and the rise of fascist Germany — where did its origins truly lie? This has not been genuinely investigated, and the rise of Zionist Israel is also a link in this historical chain. Today, the “de-communized” Cold War is over, but from the Kosovo War to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, wars in the post-Cold War era have never ceased. How exactly has this long chain of war dynamics been transmitted? From the Cold War to the post-Cold War and then to the “new Cold War,” what exactly is the consistent cyclical logic in the U.S.-Soviet/Russia relationship? It is time to look back and explore the “dark side” of Cold War history.

2022年8月30日戈尔巴乔夫谢世，西方媒体感谢和缅怀他为世界带来“不流血”的“冷战终结”，但这一叙述忽略了苏联解体前后两次中东战争、科索沃战争、阿富汗战争、伊拉克战争，一直到今天的俄乌冲突——冷战终结带来的“流血”其实从未终止。“不流血”是基于西方立场的判断，苏联的血一直在流，今天看来还没流尽。第一次世界大战结束时，协约国迫使德国接受“凡尔赛合约”，其所带来的“强制和平”的产物：短命的魏玛共和国、法西斯主义兴起的德国，渊薮究竟何在？并没有真正被追究，以色列复国主义的兴起也是这一历史链条中的一环。今天，“去共产化”的冷战结束了，但是从科索沃战争到俄乌冲突，后冷战时代的战争从未停歇，这一长串的战争动力链条究竟是如何传导的？从冷战、后冷战再到“新冷战”，美国与苏/俄关系中一以贯之的循环逻辑究竟何在？是时候回头打探冷战史的“暗面”了。

It is precisely for the above reasons that the “containment strategy” being forged by the United States and its allies targets not only post-Cold War Russia but also “communist” China. In this sense, the so-called “new Cold War” remains a continuation of the twentieth century’s “old debates.” The dissolution of the Soviet Union signified the end of what John Gaddis called the “long peace” after the Second World War, and it also means that the United States and its Western camp are restarting the “new Cold War” definition for China, just as after the Second World War the Truman Doctrine, through Kennan’s “Long Telegram,” re-“defined” the containment of the Soviet Union. Whether socialist China can break through the descending iron cage of the “new Cold War” and continue to serve as the ballast stone of world peace is the key to the world political structure of the twenty-first century.

正是由于上述原因，美国及其盟国正在打造的“遏制战略”指向的不仅是后冷战的俄罗斯，更是“共产主义”的中国。在这个意义上，所谓“新冷战”依然是20世纪“古老论争”的延续。苏联的解体，意味着约翰·加迪斯所谓第二次世界大战之后“长和平”的终结，也意味着美国及其西方阵营正在重启对于中国的“新冷战”定义，犹如第二次世界大战后杜鲁门主义通过凯南的“长电报”对苏联启动遏制的重新“定义”。社会主义中国能否冲出正在降临的“新冷战”铁笼，并持续成为世界和平压舱石，是21世纪世界政治格局的关键。

Second, from Stalin, Khrushchev, Gorbachev to Putin, the door to peaceful development for the Soviet Union and Russia has been forcibly shut again and again. This is the obscured history of the Cold War (and post-Cold War). It is precisely this “de-communization” process that has given rise to today’s right-wing “Eurasianism.” Merely criticizing Nazi fascism without examining the hegemony of the “Treaty of Versailles” imposed by the great powers cannot stop war. This is the lesson of twentieth-century Europe and the lesson of all humanity.

第二，从斯大林、赫鲁晓夫、戈尔巴乔夫到普京，苏联和俄罗斯寻求和平发展的大门一再被强制关闭，这正是冷战（后冷战）被遮蔽的历史，正是这一“去共产化”事态催生了今天右翼“欧亚主义”的崛起。仅批判纳粹法西斯主义，而不检讨列强主导的“凡尔赛条约”的霸权，并不能阻止战争，这正是20世纪欧洲的教训，也是整个人类的教训。

Today the shadow of “Versailles” has not disappeared; it has merely shifted from Germany, the defeated nation of the hot war, to Russia, the defeated nation of the Cold War. History is repeating itself: with George H. W. Bush’s promise that NATO would not expand eastward as a negotiating premise, starting from Gorbachev’s promise of German reunification and the Soviet withdrawal from Eastern Europe, all the way to the Soviet Union’s disintegration, what was exchanged was color revolutions and NATO’s eastward expansion. The way to extort peace is always war, because it is premised on inequality. History has entered a new cycle, but it remains a tragedy—it has not ended, only become an extended version, an extended version of the Cold War. On September 13, 2023, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivered a speech at Johns Hopkins University titled “The Power and Purpose of American Diplomacy in a New Era,” declaring that the “post-Cold War order” had ended: “The People’s Republic of China poses the most serious long-term challenge, not only because it wants to reshape the international order, but because it increasingly has the economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to do so. And Beijing and Moscow are joining forces, through their ‘no-limits partnership,’ to give the world’s authoritarian regimes a sense of security.” His speech expressed the arrogance and anxiety from the perspective of the Cold War victor—the post-Cold War era moving toward world disorder needs a new “hot war” and “Cold War”!

今天“凡尔赛”阴影没有消失，只是从热战的战败国德国转移到冷战的战败国俄罗斯。历史正在重演：以老布什承诺北约不东扩为谈判前提，从戈尔巴乔夫承诺东西德国统一、苏联撤出东欧开始，直到走向解体，换来的却是颜色革命和北约一路东扩，勒索和平的方式一定是战争，因为它以不平等为前提。历史进入新一轮循环，但依然是悲剧——它并没有结束，只是加长版，冷战的加长版。2023年9月13日，美国国务卿安东尼·布林肯在约翰·霍普金斯大学发表演讲《新时代美国外交的实力与目标》，宣布“后冷战秩序”已经终结：“中华人民共和国构成了最严峻的长期挑战，因为它不仅想要重塑国际秩序，而且越来越具备达到这一目的所需要的经济、外交、军事和技术实力。而且北京和莫斯科正在联手，通过他们的‘关系合作无上限’使世界上的专制政权高枕无忧。”他的演讲表达了冷战胜利者视角下的傲慢与焦虑——走向世界失序的后冷战时代需要新的“热战”与“冷战”！

At the end of 2015 (precisely during the signing of the Minsk agreements), Bruno Maçães, who had served as Portugal’s European affairs minister, decided to travel across the Eurasian continent for six months. He found that bookstores were filled with books about Russia’s danger, China’s rise, and the EU’s crisis, but they treated these three topics in isolation. Therefore, he wanted to use on-the-ground exploration to investigate the interactions among them, and in this way wrote a book, *The Dawn of Eurasia: On the Trail of the New World Order*, representing the then-rising interest in the discourse on “Eurasia.” In the author’s view at the time, the axis of world political economy was shifting eastward, and affairs in Asia, the Middle East, and Russia were suddenly beginning to affect every European and American, “to a degree deeper than they could imagine.” This was the second era after the era of globalization, the “Eurasian era,” characterized by “a permanent unstable combination of heterogeneous elements.” It was regarded by a *Financial Times* review at the time as a pioneering work embodying the idea that “the concept of Eurasia is leaping off the pages of history books and once again becoming a central concern of contemporary politics.”

2015年底（正是明斯克协议签订期间），担任过葡萄牙欧洲事务部部长的布鲁诺·玛萨艾斯决定沿着欧亚大陆进行六个月旅行。他发现书店里充斥着关于俄罗斯的危险、中国崛起和欧盟危机的书籍，但是却孤立地分别对待这三者。因此，他要用实地勘探的方式探索三者之间的互动关系，并以这种方式写了一本书《欧亚大陆的黎明：探寻世界新秩序》，代表了当时正在兴起的对于“欧亚大陆”论述的兴趣。在当时作者看来，世界政治经济的轴心正在东移，亚洲、中东和俄罗斯事务突然开始影响每个欧洲人和美国人，“影响的深刻程度超出他们的想象”。这是全球化时代之后的第二个时代，即“欧亚时代”，其特性是“异质元素的永久不稳定组合”。它被当时《金融时报》的书评认为体现了“欧亚大陆的概念正跳离史书，重新成为当代政治关注的中心问题”的开拓之作。

In this author’s view, this book is in fact a prophecy of the Russia-Ukraine conflict that shocked the world in early 2022. After closing the book, what lingers long in the mind is a story told in the book, set in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, as recounted firsthand by the author’s neighbor:

在笔者看来，这本书其实正是2022年初震惊世界的俄乌冲突之预言。掩卷之余，久久不能忘怀的是书中讲述的发生在阿塞拜疆首都巴库的故事，这是作者寓所邻居的亲身讲述：

He slowly recalled the terrifying details of close-quarters combat on beautiful but dangerous hills, and then he told me a story that he must have thought summed up all the horror. At that time, three Armenian soldiers were captured on the mountain—a father and two sons. The commander said he could do whatever he wanted with them. He offered to let one of the soldiers go, provided all three agreed on which one. The two brothers chose their father, but the father could not choose either son, let alone save himself.

他慢慢地回忆起在美丽但危险的山丘上进行的近距离战斗的恐怖细节，然后他给我讲了一个故事，他一定认为这个故事概括了所有的恐怖。当时在山上逮捕了三名亚美尼亚士兵——一位父亲和两个儿子。指挥官说他可以对他们随心所欲做任何事情。他主动提出可以让其中一名士兵走，只要他们三个都同意让那一名士兵走。两兄弟选择了他们的父亲，但父亲无法选择任何一个儿子，更不用说拯救自己了。

“What do you think I did?”

“你觉得我做了什么？”

I thought Rustam wanted me to understand that even in the worst of times, humanity can survive, so I replied that he must have decided to release all three.

我想，鲁斯塔姆是想让我明白，即使在最糟糕的时候，人类也能生存下来，所以我回答说，他一定是决定释放这三个人。

Rustam looked at me for a moment and laughed.

鲁斯塔姆看了我一会儿，笑了。

“My friend, after your travels you need to see a doctor. The Armenians killed my brother and my friends—would I let them go?”

“我的朋友，旅行之后你得去看医生。亚美尼亚人杀了我的兄弟和朋友，我会让他们离开吗？”

…

……

“You released the two sons?”

“你释放了两个儿子？”

“No, I killed all three. I gave them a chance to choose, but they didn’t seize it.”

“不，我杀了他们三个。我给了他们一个选择的机会，但他们没有抓住机会。”

“This is Azerbaijan. A place full of chilling war stories and memories of massacres of the Armenian minority. Conversely, Azerbaijani refugees fleeing from Armenia also tell tragic tales of their compatriots being murdered and raped. In Azerbaijan, terror has been sublimated into songs and poetry, widely sung by all social strata.”

“这就是阿塞拜疆。这个地方充满了令人不寒而栗的战争故事，及屠杀亚美尼亚少数民族的记忆。反过来，从亚美尼亚逃亡出来的阿塞拜疆难民也讲述了同胞被谋杀和强奸的悲惨故事。在阿塞拜疆，恐怖已经升华为歌曲和诗歌，被社会各阶层广泛传唱。”

This story, which “summed up all the horror,” chillingly announces the arrival of the “Eurasian era” defined by the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The story from Armenia/Azerbaijan to Russia/Ukraine also marks the nature of violence in the post-Cold War world: ethnic hatred met with retaliatory violence—as the desperate situation of human existence. And its starting point is precisely the drastic changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, [19]19 The drastic changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe (苏东剧变) refers to the collapse of communist regimes in Eastern Europe in 1989 and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. that historical starting point hailed as the “end of ideology,” the time when the “boomerang” of U.S. imperialism harvesting the world took flight. From the moment it was thrown, it has never stopped its spin, relentlessly pushing the world toward the desperate situation of war, forcing every person on this planet to listen to the echo of its whistling in the wind—this is the sound of death beating its wings, and also the emotional melody danced together by ancient oral communication and social media: the source of media violence.

这个“概括了所有的恐怖”的故事令人战栗地宣告了俄乌冲突所界定的“欧亚时代”的降临，从亚美尼亚/阿塞拜疆到俄罗斯/乌克兰的故事，也标志出后冷战时代世界暴力的性质：以暴易暴的种族仇恨——作为人类生存的绝境。而它的起点正是苏东剧变，这一被欢呼为“意识形态终结”的历史起点，是美帝国主义收割世界的“回旋镖”起飞的时间。从它被扔出去的那一刻，就一直没有停止它的飞旋，不断把世界推向战争的绝境，迫使这个星球上的每一个人都必须侧耳聆听它迎风呼啸的回响——这是死神扑打羽翼的声音，也是古老的口语传播与社交媒体共同起舞的情感旋律：媒体暴力的来源。

IV. Returning to Leninism: The National Question and World Peace

四、重返列宁主义：民族问题与世界和平

Around the time of the First World War, Lenin extensively pondered and debated the national question within the international socialist camp, and severely criticized social chauvinism, i.e., bourgeois nationalism. In 1913, Lenin published *Critical Remarks on the National Question*, a summative document, emphasizing the use of class concepts to critique, analyze, and transcend the national question, focusing his criticism on the Jewish nationalist “Bund” (the General Jewish Labour Bund in Lithuania, Poland and Russia) and the “national cultural autonomy” theory of the Austrian Social Democratic Party. “The national principle is historically inevitable in bourgeois society, and, considering this society, the Marxist fully recognizes the historical legitimacy of national movements. But to prevent this recognition from becoming a defense of nationalism, it must be strictly limited to recognizing only what is progressive in these movements, so that this recognition does not lead to bourgeois ideology blurring the proletarian consciousness.”

第一次世界大战前后，列宁大量思考并在国际社会主义阵营中辩论和阐发民族问题，对社会沙文主义即资产阶级民族主义予以严厉批判。1913年，列宁发表的《关于民族问题的批评意见》是一份总结性文献，强调用阶级观念批判、分析和超越民族问题，集中批评犹太民族主义“崩得”派（立陶宛、波兰和俄罗斯犹太工人总联盟）和奥地利社会民主党的“民族文化自治”理论，“民族原则在资产阶级社会中有其历史的必然性，因此，马克思主义者重视这个社会，完全承认民族运动的历史合理性。然而，不要把这种承认变成替民族主义辩护，因此应该极严格地仅限于承认这些运动中的进步东西，因此不能因为这种承认而让资产阶级思想模糊了无产阶级意识”。

For Lenin, wars waged by the peoples of colonies and semi-colonies to resist oppression by the imperialist powers, as national wars of independence and liberation for “defending the fatherland,” were wars for democracy. Socialists should support them; otherwise they would be not socialists but chauvinists. National independence in this sense cannot be replaced by “cultural-national autonomy”; national self-determination must be linked to the era of imperialism brought about by the development of capitalism. However, this does not mean that the socialist movement supports the phenomenon of dividing humanity into numerous small states. On the contrary, the goal of the socialist movement is to eliminate the state of national isolation and promote the fusion of nations. Social democrats of the oppressed nations should place the unity of the workers of the oppressed nations with the workers of the oppressor nations above all else; the purpose of national self-determination is not separation but national fusion. But only by recognizing the right to national self-determination can the proletariat ensure the full unity of the workers of all nations and promote genuine democratic rapprochement among nations. In this sense, the overall interests of socialism are superior to national self-determination; this is the fundamental principle of internationalism and socialism. One must be vigilant against the bourgeoisie of the oppressed nations turning the slogan of national liberation into a means of deceiving the workers and reaching reactionary agreements with the bourgeoisie of the ruling classes.

对于列宁来说，殖民地、半殖民地人民为反抗帝国主义列强压迫而进行的战争，作为“保卫祖国”的独立、解放的民族战争，是争取民主的战争，社会主义者应该支持，否则就不是社会主义者，而是沙文主义者。这个意义上的国家独立不能用“文化民族自治”来代替，民族自决必须同资本主义发展导致的帝国主义时代联系起来。但是，这并不意味着社会主义运动支持把人类分成诸多小国的现象。恰好相反，社会主义运动的目标是要消灭民族隔绝状态，促使各民族融合。被压迫民族的社会民主党人应当把被压迫民族的工人与压迫民族的工人团结一致摆到首位，民族自决的目的不是分离而是民族融合。但无产阶级只有承认民族自决权，才能保证各民族的工人充分团结，才能促进各民族真正的民主接近。在这个意义上，社会主义整体利益高于民族自决，这是国际主义和社会主义的根本原则。要警惕被压迫民族的资产阶级把民族解放的口号变成欺骗工人的手段，与统治阶级的资产阶级达成反动的协议。

After the “July Days” in Russia, Lenin, wanted by the Provisional Government on charges of being a “German spy,” began writing *The State and Revolution* during his arduous exile in Finland, under conditions where he could be arrested or killed at any moment. He sought to answer the urgent questions about the state that the revolution demanded, and used this work as his political testament in the event of unforeseen circumstances. In the preface to the first edition, Lenin pointed out that the imperialist war had intensified the merger of monopoly capitalism with the state, that the trend of social-chauvinism was gaining dominance within the world’s social democratic parties, and that “socialist leaders” were adopting a fawning attitude not only toward the interests of “their own” national bourgeoisie but also toward the interests of “their own” state. It is in this sense that the question of the “state” had acquired political and practical urgency. Therefore, on the one hand, it was necessary to draw a clear line with imperialism and social-chauvinism on the question of the state. In Lenin’s view, the democratic republic is the best possible political shell for capitalism; once capital seizes this best shell, it can consolidate and establish its power, and no change of personnel, institutions, or political parties can shake this power. In the imperialist stage, the state machine and the institutions of officialdom and the military become unprecedentedly powerful and expanded. On the other hand, it was also necessary to draw a clear line with anarchism. Socialist democracy must presuppose the state machine of the dictatorship of the proletariat; in this sense, democracy is a form of state. This is because, in the historical stage of socialist development, bourgeois right will inevitably exist (especially in the sphere of distribution), and this is the material basis for the state’s inability to wither away. The state is needed to protect public ownership of the means of production and to protect equality in labor and equality in distribution. What Lenin demonstrated was the political character of the socialist state, that is, the process of protecting the democratic participation of the working people from formal equality to substantive equality. This is the significance of the dictatorship of the proletariat as distinct from the bourgeois democratic republic. To protect and perfect socialist democracy, it is necessary to uphold the political character of the state.

俄国“七月事变”之后，被临时政府以“德奸案”通缉的列宁在芬兰艰苦的流亡生活中，在随时可能被捕和牺牲的情况下，开始写作《国家与革命》，解答革命中迫切需要面对的国家问题，并以此作为自己在不测情况下的政治遗言。在初版序言中，列宁指出，帝国主义战争加剧了垄断资本主义与国家的结合，社会沙文主义流派正在世界上的社会党内取得统治地位，“社会主义领袖”不仅对于“自己”民族的资产阶级利益，而且正在对“自己”国家的利益，采取卑躬屈膝的迎合态度。正是在这个意义上，“国家”问题具有了政治实践上的急迫性。因此，一方面必须在国家问题上划清与帝国主义、社会沙文主义的界限。在列宁看来，民主共和国是资本主义所能采用的最好的政治外壳，资本一旦掌握这个最好的外壳，就可以巩固和确立自己的权力，无论人员、机构或政党的任何更换，都不会使这个权力动摇。在帝国主义阶段，国家机器和官吏与军事机构都会空前强大和扩张。另一方面，也必须与无政府主义划清界限。社会主义民主必须是以无产阶级专政的国家机器为前提，在这个意义上，民主是一种国家形式。这是因为，在社会主义发展的历史阶段，资产阶级法权还会（特别在分配阶段）不可避免存在，这是国家无法消亡的物质基础，需要国家来保护生产资料公有制，保护劳动的平等和分配的平等。列宁论证的是社会主义国家具有的政治性质，即保护劳动者的民主参与从形式平等到实质平等的推进过程，这就是无产阶级专政区别于资产阶级民主共和的意义。为保护和完善社会主义民主，就必须坚持国家的政治性。

After the October Revolution, Lenin’s above reflections became the basic content of the “Decree on Peace” promulgated by the nascent Soviet regime. By making the “Decree on Peace” a weapon against social-chauvinism and an inheritance and development of the history and tradition of European socialism, Lenin and the Soviet regime he led, on the ruins of an unprecedented world war, presented a new cosmopolitan vision of anti-war peace. It is in this sense that, on the ruins of the Second International as the failure of European democratic socialism, Leninism was born! It is a critique of and adherence to the history and current situation of European socialism after the First World War, a continuation of the European socialist tradition, and, moreover, an inheritance and development of Marxism as the culmination of European socialism.

十月革命后，列宁的上述思考成为新生的苏维埃政权颁布的“和平法令”的基本内容。通过把“和平法令”作为抗击社会沙文主义、对欧洲社会主义历史与传统的继承与发展，列宁及其领导的苏维埃在史无前例的世界大战的废墟上，给出了一条新的世界主义的反战和平图景。正是在这个意义上，在第二国际作为欧洲民主社会主义失败的废墟上，列宁主义诞生了！它是对第一次世界大战后欧洲社会主义历史与现状的批判与坚守，也是对欧洲社会主义传统的接续，更是对马克思主义作为欧洲社会主义集大成者的继承与发展。

The First World War was an era of the full alliance between capitalism and nationalism. It not only caused capitalism to appear in the guise of state capitalism and imperialism but also caused the European socialist tradition to degenerate into social-chauvinism, merging with imperialism. The imperialism of old Europe, rooted in colonialism, was losing its moral legitimacy. The United States, under the banner of opposing colonialism, sought to seize the global hegemony of the British Empire. At a time when freedom, democracy, and human rights were becoming new universal values, the first challenge it had to face was precisely the challenge of socialist internationalism raised by Lenin. In fact, US President Thomas Woodrow Wilson’s introduction of the theory of national self-determination in his Fourteen Points was primarily intended to secure political and cultural leadership for the United States, which had gained enormous benefits from the First World War, in the post-war world hegemonic system.

第一次世界大战是资本主义与民族主义全面结盟的时代，不仅使资本主义以国家资本主义和帝国主义的面目出现，而且使欧洲社会主义传统蜕变为社会沙文主义，与帝国主义合流。旧欧洲以殖民主义为源头的帝国主义正在丧失道义性，美国以反对殖民主义为旗帜，牟取大英帝国的全球霸权，在自由、民主、人权成为新的普世价值之际，首先需要直面的正是列宁提出的社会主义国际主义的挑战。事实上，美国总统托马斯·伍德罗·威尔逊关于十四条民族自决理论的出台，主要是为了让第一次世界大战中获得巨大利益的美国在战后的世界霸权体系中取得政治和文化的领导权。

To counter the global influence of the Soviet “Decree on Peace,” on January 8, 1918, Wilson announced in a speech to the US Congress the “Fourteen Points” peace program, which included national self-determination. As Geoffrey Barraclough recognized when discussing the turning points of twentieth-century world history, “Although Wilson had apparently posed as the Western anti-Bolshevik champion two years earlier, he and Lenin recognized from the start that they were competing for the votes of humanity. It was precisely to prevent Lenin from monopolizing the blueprint for the post-war world that Wilson proposed the famous Fourteen Points in January 1918. The French socialist Albert Thomas wrote: ‘Either Wilson or Lenin, either democracy or Bolshevism… People must choose between the two.’”

为针对苏俄《和平法令》的世界影响，1918年1月8日，威尔逊在美国国会演讲中宣布推出包含民族自决在内的“十四点和平原则”。正如杰弗里·巴勒克拉夫在论述20世纪世界历史转折点时所意识到的，“尽管似乎在两年前威尔逊总统就以西方反布尔什维克的斗士自居，但他和列宁从一开始就认识到他们正在争取人类的投票，正是为了要阻止列宁获得对战后世界蓝图的垄断，威尔逊于1918年1月提出著名的《十四点和平纲领》。法国社会主义者阿尔贝·托马写道：‘要么是威尔逊，要么是列宁，要么是民主制度，要么是布尔什维主义……人们必须在两者之中作出一个选择’。”

After the First World War, the struggle over the political program for world peace unfolded between Leninism and Wilsonianism, between the United States, which was about to become imperialist, and Russia, which was about to become the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. This is the great history that urgently needs to be revisited today, and it is the great divergence that determined world history. The Russia-Ukraine conflict in the twenty-first century lies on the extended line of the confrontation between Wilsonianism and Leninism, that is, between two different theories of national self-determination: one bounded by ethnic nationalism, the other premised on the independence, liberation, and fusion of oppressed nations.

第一次世界大战之后，对世界和平主义政治方案的争夺发生在列宁主义与威尔逊主义之间，在即将走向帝国主义的美国，与即将走向苏维埃社会主义共和国联盟的俄国之间，这是今天迫切需要重访的大历史，也是决定世界历史的大分流。21世纪俄乌冲突就处于威尔逊主义和列宁主义交战的延长线上，即两种不同的民族自决理论之间，一是以族裔民族主义为边界，二是以被压迫的民族独立、解放和融合为前提。

Today’s socialism with Chinese characteristics is the greatest historical achievement of the magnificent national-democratic liberation movements of the peoples of colonies and semi-colonies under the leadership of the Third International founded by Lenin. It is the embodiment of the deepening of the world historical path opened up by Leninism, the most important victory of the integration of Marxism-Leninism with China’s concrete reality, and the most important victory of world socialism. In this sense, China’s “patriotism,” based on the system of regional ethnic autonomy, cannot be equated with Western ethnic “nationalism”; its socialist nature must not be denied. This is the institutional guarantee and economic base for today’s discussion of the civilizational roots of the Chinese path. The discussion of civilization issues must be incorporated into the path of world socialism. The founding of New China and China’s socialist practice are the institutional guarantee and economic base for discussing the Chinese path and its civilizational roots. In this sense, Chinese civilization is the result of the fusion of Chinese and Western histories, and it is also the prerequisite for exchanges between China and the world today. It is an equal subject for mutual learning among civilizations — socialist values themselves are the result of integrating ancient and modern, domestic and foreign human civilizations. On this basis, it is necessary to draw a clear line with Western theories of civilizational hierarchy and clash of civilizations, to establish a global South united front and people’s front against hegemonism/neo-colonialism and for world peace, and to reshape the historical logic and strategic map from internationalism to a community with a shared future for mankind. This is the key to building China’s international communication capacity, and it is also the historical vista that the “new form of human civilization” must unfold. The three major initiatives proposed by the Communist Party of China — the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security (Peace) Initiative, and the Global Civilization Initiative — are in fact (and must be) a “trinity.”

今天的中国特色社会主义是列宁创立的第三国际领导下殖民地、半殖民地人民波澜壮阔的民族民主解放运动最大的历史成果，是列宁主义开拓的世界历史走向纵深的体现，是马克思列宁主义与中国具体实际相结合的最重要胜利，是世界社会主义的最重要胜利。在此意义上，中国基于民族区域自治制度基础上的“爱国主义”不能被等同于西方族裔“民族主义”，它的社会主义性质不容否定，这是今天讨论中国道路之文明根源的制度保证和经济基础。文明问题的讨论需要纳入世界社会主义道路之中，新中国的建立和中国社会主义实践是讨论中国道路、文明根源的制度保证和经济基础。在这个意义上，中华文明是中西历史交融的结果，也是当今中国与世界交流的前提，是文明互鉴的平等主体——社会主义价值观本身正是融通古今、内外人类文明的结果。需要以此为基础，划清与西方文明等级论与冲突论的界限，建立全球南方反对霸权主义/新殖民主义、争取世界和平的国际统一战线和人民战线，重塑从国际主义到人类命运共同体的历史逻辑和战略地图，这是中国国际传播能力建设的关键，也是“人类文明新形态”必然展开的历史图景。中国共产党提出的全球发展、安全（和平）与文明三大倡议，其实（也必须）是“三位一体”。

Only by clarifying this new contemporary global strategic picture can we understand (or rather, connect) the historical logic from socialism/internationalism to a community with a shared future for mankind. After the First World War, the October Revolution’s single cannon shot brought us Marxism. The Communist Party of China is a Marxist-Leninist party; its history of more than a century has proven that only socialism can save the nation and its people. This is manifested in the tortuous forging process of social equality and the broadest popular participation in the political system, and it is also the source of China’s comprehensive national strength and international status today. Socialism, which originated in Europe, has “become flesh through the Way” [25]25 “Become flesh through the Way” (道成肉身) is a Chinese translation of the Christian theological concept of the Incarnation (the Word becoming flesh, John 1:14). Here it is used metaphorically to describe how socialism, originally a European theory, has been realized in the concrete historical and institutional form of China. in China. How can today’s China stand firm and defend the achievements of socialist revolution and construction, break the hegemonic logic of the Cold War/post-Cold War/new Cold War, and rebuild the leadership of socialist ideology on a world scale? How can it become the ballast stone for peace and development in the twenty-first century amid the world’s crisis-ridden geopolitical conflicts? How can the socialist connotation of Chinese-path modernization provide the Global South with development opportunities and choices based on joint construction, joint governance, and shared benefits, and rebuild the foundation of an academic/political united front based on socialist principles on a world scale?

只有厘清这一新的当代世界战略图景，才能理解（或者说打通）从社会主义/国际主义到人类命运共同体的历史逻辑。第一次世界大战后，十月革命一声炮响，为我们送来了马克思主义。中国共产党是马克思列宁主义政党，它的百余年历史证明只有社会主义才能够救国救民，它表现为社会平等与最广泛的人民参与政治制度的曲折锻造过程，也是今天中国综合国力与国际地位的来源。从欧洲出发的社会主义，在中国“道成肉身”，今天的中国如何立足和捍卫社会主义革命和建设的成就，打破冷战/后冷战/新冷战的霸权逻辑，重建世界范围内社会主义意识形态的领导权？如何在危机四伏的世界地缘政治冲突中成为21世纪和平与发展的压舱石？中国式现代化的社会主义内涵如何为全球南方提供共建、共治、共享的发展机会和选择，并在世界范围内重建基于社会主义理念的学术/政治统一战线的基础？

Returning to Leninism is the only path.

重返列宁主义是必由之路。

(Author’s bio: Lü Xinyu, Dean and Professor of the Institute of International Communication at East China Normal University, Distinguished Professor of the Changjiang Scholars Program of the Ministry of Education [26]26 The Changjiang Scholars Program is a prestigious Chinese government talent recruitment and support scheme administered by the Ministry of Education, designed to attract leading scholars to Chinese universities.)

（作者简介：吕新雨，华东师范大学国际传播研究院院长、教授，教育部长江学者特聘教授）

Online editor: Tongxin

网络编辑：同心