特朗普接蔡英文電話 無心還是有意
The conversation between Donald Trump and the president of Taiwan was just a “courtesy call”, vice-president elect Mike Pence said on Sunday as he attempted to damp down a diplomatic firestorm that has the potential to upend US-China relations.
美國候任副總統邁克.彭斯(Mike Pence)上週日表示，唐納德.特朗普(Donald Trump)與臺灣總統的對話只是一次“禮節性的通話”。彭斯試圖以此化解一起可能造成美中關係大變天的外交風暴。
The call between Mr Trump and Tsai Ing-wen was the first such contact since US diplomatic relations were cut in 1979 and has left the world guessing whether the president-elect ignored diplomatic protocol by accident or whether he was signalling that the status of Taiwan would be a central part of his administration’s China strategy.
特朗普與蔡英文(Tsai Ing-wen)之間的通話，是1979年美國與臺灣斷絕外交關係以來雙方領導人首次進行此類接觸。世界各地的人們因此紛紛猜測，這位候任美國總統究竟是無意間忽視了外交禮節，還是在釋放一種信號，表明臺灣地位問題在他的對華戰略中將是一個核心元素。
The phone conversation, which stunned many China-watchers and diplomats in Washington, follows a series of calls with world leaders since the election where Mr Trump has appeared to improvise foreign policy positions, with little input from the government bureaucracy that handles such interactions.
華盛頓許多中國問題觀察家和外交官對這通電話大爲震驚。自美國大選結果揭曉以來，世界各地的許多領導人都曾打來電話，在負責處理此類往來事務的政府部門幾乎沒有提供什麼建議的情況下，特朗普展現出一種即興發揮的外交政策立場。
While some of Mr Trump’s supporters have welcomed his style as a refreshing break from establishment niceties, critics fear that the president-elect could blunder into a crisis through a mixture of lack of preparation and unwillingness to take advice.
特朗普的部分支持者對他這種風格表示歡迎，認爲這是令人耳目一新的與建制派禮儀的切割，批評人士卻擔心這位候任總統會由於缺乏準備和不願聽取意見，稀裏糊塗地引發危機。
“What we need to realise is that we are entering into an era of shoot-from-the-lip foreign policy,” said David Rothkopf, chief executive and editor-in-chief of Foreign Policy magazine. “All of these calls have demonstrated a combination of ignorance and some sort of nascent policy position.”
《外交政策》雜誌(Foreign Policy)首席執行官兼總編輯戴維.羅特科普夫(David Rothkopf)表示：“我們需要認識到的是，我們正在進入一個口無遮攔的外交政策的時代。所有這些電話都顯示了無知和某種不成熟政策立場的結合。”
He added that Mr Trump “fails to realise that everything he does has a foreign policy consequence”, so that tweets about the New York Times are “seen by [president] Erdogan in Turkey as a sign that the US is less concerned about press freedom”.
他還表示，特朗普“沒有認識到他做的每件事都具有外交政策含義”，因此他在Twitter上發的有關《紐約時報》(New York Times)的言論會“被土耳其的（總統）埃爾多安(Erdogan)視爲美國如今不那麼重視新聞自由的證明”。
Speaking with the Taiwanese president is such a sensitive issue as China regards the island as a renegade province. For four decades, the US has enacted an uneasy compromise to help keep the peace, selling Taiwan arms to boost its defences, but refusing to have formal diplomatic relations that would anger Beijing.
與臺灣總統通電話就是這樣一個敏感問題，因爲中國將臺灣視爲一個叛離省份。40年來，美國採取一種不太安穩的折中路線來幫助維持和平局面：向臺灣出售武器以增強其防務能力，但拒絕與臺灣建立正式外交關係，因爲那會激怒北京。
With speculation mounting about the motives behind the call, Mr Pence said that the Taiwanese leader had called to offer her congratulations. “It’s a little mystifying to me that President Obama can reach out to a murdering dictator in Cuba in the last year and be hailed as a hero for doing it and President-elect Donald Trump takes a courtesy call from a democratically elected leader in Taiwan and it’s become something of a controversy,” he said.
在外界對這通電話背後的動機產生諸多猜測之際，彭斯聲稱，臺灣領導人打來這個電話是想表示祝賀。他說：“去年奧巴馬總統可以主動向古巴一個手上沾着鮮血的獨裁者示好，還因此被譽爲英雄，如今候任總統唐納德.特朗普接了臺灣民選領導人一個禮節性的電話，卻成了一件有爭議的事，這讓我感到有點困惑。”
However, there is a group of conservative foreign policy specialists, some of whom are being considered for senior positions in the Trump administration, who have long pushed for the US to provide a more vocal defence of Taiwan and its democracy.
不過，美國還有一羣持保守立場的對外政策專家，他們長期支持美國更多地爲臺灣和臺灣民主制度發聲。他們中有一些人是可能在特朗普政府中擔任高級職位的人選。
John Bolton, former US ambassador to the UN, who visited Mr Trump in New York on Friday, told Fox News at the weekend: “Honestly, I think we should shake the relationship up [with China] . . . Nobody in Beijing gets to dictate who we talk to. It’s ridiculous to think that the phone call upsets decades of anything.”
前美國駐聯合國大使約翰.博爾頓(John Bolton)上週五在紐約拜會了特朗普，他上週末向福克斯新聞(Fox News)表示：“說實話，我認爲我們應該好好調整（與中國的）關係……北京方面沒人可以指定我們的談話對象。那種認爲這次電話顛覆了延續幾十年的某種東西的看法很荒唐。”
With diplomats from the region calling nervously to find out if the US is on the verge of a major policy shift, it was left to the Obama White House to make a clear statement that there was “no change” in the so-called “One China” policy. “Our fundamental interest is in peaceful and stable cross-Strait relations,” said Ned Price, a White House spokesman.
由於亞洲地區的外交官紛紛緊張地致電詢問，希望瞭解美國是否即將進行重大政策轉變，奧巴馬政府不得不明確聲明，“一箇中國”政策“不會改變”。“和平穩定的臺海關係符合我們的根本利益，”白宮發言人內德.普賴斯(Ned Price)說。
The potential for influential aides to nudge the president-elect into making sharp shifts in policy has been aggravated by the fact that Mr Trump has only received a small number of intelligence briefings since the election — something that most president-elects received daily. At the same time, the state department has had little involvement in providing support for the president-elect ahead of his calls with world leaders.
在當選後，特朗普接收的情報簡報較少（大多數候任總統每天都會接收到情報簡報），這使重要助手推動特朗普採取重大政策轉變的可能性變大。同時，在特朗普與世界各國領袖通電話前，美國國務院爲這位候任總統提供的支持很少。
Instead, what has emerged from the readouts provided by other governments is an improvised, conversational style of engagement that at the minimum runs the risk of causing offence and at the extreme of creating new obligations for the US.
相反，其他國家政府提供的通話記錄反映出一種即興式的、談話風格的交往，這種交往在最低程度上有引起反感的風險，在極端情況下可能會導致美國承擔新的義務。
In a call with UK prime minister Theresa May, he said that “if you travel to the US, you should let me know” and in a call with Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan he said: “I am ready and willing to play any role that you want me to play”, which some in the region interpreted as a willingness to mediate between Pakistan and India.
在與英國首相特里薩.梅(Theresa May)通話時，他說“如果你來美國，要告訴我一聲”。在與巴基斯坦總理納瓦茲.謝里夫(Nawaz Sharif)通話時，他說：“我十分樂意扮演任何你希望我扮演的角色。”該地區的一些人士將這解讀爲他願意在巴基斯坦和印度之間居中調解。
“The White House and the state department are terrified about what this guy is going to do over the next six weeks,” said a former senior official in the Obama administration. “That is one reason why Obama has tried to offer so much help to Trump for the transition, because he is worried that the president-elect is flying blind.”
“這傢伙在接下來6個星期會做什麼讓白宮和國務院提心吊膽，”一位曾在奧巴馬政府中擔任高級職位的人士說：“這就是奧巴馬試圖爲特朗普的過渡提供如此之多的幫助的一個原因，因爲他擔心這位候任總統現在兩眼一摸黑、只能憑感覺行事。”
Even if Mr Trump decides not to make Taiwan a central issue, the mistrust that the call is likely to have generated in Beijing could become more important if the new administration adopts some of the tough trade measures on China that were promised on the campaign trail.
即使特朗普決定不把臺灣當做一個核心議題，如果他領導的政府對中國採取他在競選階段承諾的一些強硬貿易措施，這通電話在北京催生的不信任感也可能會升級。
The Chinese foreign ministry issued a protest about the call, however experts said Beijing’s reaction has been comparatively restrained, reflecting a desire to “educate” Mr Trump, rather than humiliate him, according to academic Shi Yinhong, an expert on US-China relations at Beijing’s Renmin University.
中國外交部對這通電話提出了抗議，但專家表示，北京方面的反應較爲剋制。中國人民大學中美關係專家、學者時殷弘認爲，中方的迴應反映出一種“教育”特朗普、而不是羞辱他的意思。
Mr Shi added that the call would increase the anxiety in Beijing about the new administration. “The Chinese government is not assuming that Trump is ignorant of the Taiwan issues,” he said.
時殷弘補充說，這通電話會讓北京方面對美國下屆政府感到更加不安。他表示：“中國政府並不認爲特朗普對臺灣問題一無所知。
