As Ramos rose through the ranks of the Philippine military, he knew better than most the excesses of the Marcos regime. He had frequently thought of quitting, but had stayed out of loyalty to his men. “I have so many thousands of people to whom I am responsible,” Ramos told his friends. “I cannot just quit.” Besides, Marcos himself had promoted his savvy younger cousin to head the militaryled national police force.
拉莫斯成长在菲律宾军营,他非常清楚马科斯政权的暴行。他常常想到离开军队,但出于对部下的忠诚,他留下来了。“我要对成百上千万的人民负责,”拉莫斯对他的朋友们说,“我不能就这样离开。”马科斯还变本加厉地亲自提升他诡计多端的堂弟统领军事化的国家警察部队。
Eventually, the break came. At 4 p.m. on February 21, 1986, MajorGeneral Fidel Ramos was preparing to face a gathering of angry neighbors. Juan Ponce Enrile, the defense minister, was asking him to join an uprising against Marcos.
终于,决裂开始了。1986年2月21日下午4点,费德尔·拉莫斯少将将要面对一群愤怒的同僚。国防部长胡安·庞斯·恩瑞尔请求他加入反抗马科斯的起义。
Moments later, Amelita Ramos ushered the neighbors into their living room. The Philippines,s secondranking military officer sat patiently as his friends pleaded. “Please, sir,” one of his neighbors implored, “for the good of the country, resign. Leave Marcos.” Like most Filipinos, they believed the recent elections had been arranged by Marcos, denying Cory Aquino her rightful place as the new president of the Philippines.
过了一会儿,阿米利特·拉莫斯陪同众弟兄进入他们的客厅。当他的朋友们发出恳求时这位菲律宾军方第二号人物冷静地端坐。一名弟兄哀叹道:“阁下,为了国家,请你辞职,离开马科斯吧。”和大多数菲律宾人一样,他们认为近期的选举早已由马科斯刻意安排,不会让科丽·阿基诺取得成为菲律宾新总统的应得位置。
As his neighbors left his house, Ramos was ready to join Enrile. Together they hoped to rally the philipine military to Aquino,s side, praying that enough popular support could be generated to keep themselves from being slaughtered by Marcos loyalists.
当弟兄们离开拉莫斯的房子,他就决意加入到恩瑞尔的行动中去他们希望能够合力将菲律宾军队团结在阿基诺周围,祈祷能得到足够的支持以使他们自己免遭保马科斯分子的杀戮。
Four days later, the massive demonstrations fueled by the defections of Ramos and Enrile had triumphed. Marcos and his notorious freespending wife, Imelda, were forced to flee the country. Cory Aquino became the new president, and the People Power revolution quickly became a worldwide symbol of democracy.
四天后,拉莫斯和恩瑞尔的倒戈激起了大规模的示威游行并取得了胜利。马科斯和他声名狼藉、挥霍无度的妻子伊梅尔达,被迫逃离菲律宾。科丽·阿基诺成为新总统,人民主权革命迅速成为全世界民主精神的象征。
Ramos, Aquino,s first military chief of staff and later her defense secretary, was at one point urged by officers to join an attempted coup. But he held firm to his belief in the democratic process. In 1992, Aquino endorsed Ramos in the sixcandidate race to succeed her.
拉莫斯当上了阿基诺的第一位总参谋长以及后来的国防部长,期间曾经有官员要求他参与一次未遂的政变。但他对于自己走的民主道路没有动摇。1992年,阿基诺在有六名竞选人的总统竞选中授权他接任总统。
Standing for Freedom:Madeleine Albright
为了自由的玛德琳·奥尔布赖特
President Clinton,s key advisers could hardly believe their ears when Madeleine K. Albright put it straight to tough guy Russian Foreign Minister Primakov.
当玛德林直截了当地向强硬的俄罗斯外长普利马科夫申明利害时,克林顿总统的高参们几乎无法相信他们的耳朵。
Tense negotiations were under way in the State Department conference room. Primakov was insisting that Moscow could not accept a NATO committed to the defense of Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic - the very states forced into the Soviet empire 50 years ago.
在国务院会议厅里,正进行着激烈的协商。普利马科夫坚持莫斯科不能接受北约组织承担对波兰、匈牙利和捷克共和国的防御义务——正是这几个国家五十年前被强行纳入苏维埃帝国。
Fixing her eyes on his, Albright said firmly, “Neither the President nor I will allow the security or the rights of the Eastern European states to be bargained away.”
奥尔布赖特两眼盯住对方坚定地说,“无论总统还是我都不会让东欧国家的安全或利益有半点丧失。”
Primakov, the former chief of the Russian foreign intelligence service, had no answer for such simple yet resolute words that left no diplomatic wiggle room.
普利马科夫,这位前俄国情报组织的首脑,对这样简单而毫无外交斡旋余地的坚定话语无言以对。
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright may look like a pleasantly rumbled housewife, eyes round and bright as full moons. But being an aide and security agent, she tools across the globe with the zeal of a supersaleswoman.
国务卿玛德林·奥尔布赖特看上去像是个和蔼可亲,爱唠叨的家庭主妇,圆又明亮的眼睛如同满月。而作为助理和安全代表,她怀着超级推销员的热情足迹遍及全球。
Her consuming wok is to explain to Americans the puzzles of postCold War foreign policy when, as she told Reader,s Digest, we confront “not an enemy with a face,” but huge problems such as international terrorism and nuclear proliferation.
她日理万机的工作是为了告诉美国人民冷战后对外政策的难题。正如同她在《读者文摘》里说的,我们面对的“不是直接的敌人,”而是诸如国际恐怖主义与核扩散这样的巨大问题。
Albright is particularly wellsuited to the job., Certainly on American Secretary of State in history could approach her personal experiences: a family run out of Prague, Czechoslovakia, first by Adolf Hitler, then by Joseph Stalin. Those dreadful events set her far apart from the rest of Clinton,s national security staffers - many of them postwar baby boomers whose views of the world were formed during the counterculture protests of the Vietnam War. Albright,s own life has taught her the meaning of freedom, the importance of national security - and the vital role the United States plays in restoring the world to order.
奥尔布赖特与她的工作非常相称。当然历史上没有哪位美国国务卿有着类似于她的个人经历:一个逃出捷克斯洛伐克布拉格的家庭,先是由于阿道夫·希特勒,而后是由于约瑟夫·斯大林。那些可怕的事件使她与其他克林顿的国家安全官员迥然不同——他们中很多人是战后人口出生高峰期出生的,他们对世界的看法是在反对越南战争的反主流文化中形成的。奥尔布赖特的亲身经历教给了她自由的含义,国家安全的重要性,以及美国在恢复世界秩序中所担当的重要角色。
She was born on May 15, 1937, in Prague to Jewish parents. Shortly after Hitler arrived in Prague in March 1939, her father, Josef Korbel, a Czech diplomat, escaped with his wife and twoyearold daughter to a basement apartment in London, The city was soon in the middle of the Nazi blitz. “I spent huge portions of my life in airraid shelters, singing A Hundred Green Bottles Hanging on the Wall,” Albright said.