In Mr. Lieven’s telling, the primary cause of the war was “the conflict of interests, fears, andambitions created by the decline of the Ottoman and Austrian empires. The crises thisgenerated could have been resolved only through the collaboration of the rising German andRussian states. But that was neither simple nor obvious at the time in St. Petersburg, tornamong the imperatives of ensuring access to Black Sea ports through the Straits; sustaining aSlavophile “mission to the Balkan Slavs; managing the costs of a vast land empire; andbalancing dynastic links to Germany against fears of its rising power.
在利芬的叙事中,这场战争的首要原因是“由奥斯曼帝国与奥匈帝国的衰落所引起的利益、恐惧与野心的冲突。这些冲突所诱发的危机只能靠着崛起的德国与俄罗斯的合作才有可能得到解决。但在当时,圣彼得堡要攫取黑海海峡,以此获得通往黑海港口的通路;要对巴尔干半岛的斯拉夫人维持亲斯拉夫的“使命;要维持庞大内陆帝国的开销;一方面恐惧德国崛起的势力,一方面又要与它保持动态平衡的关系,在这种情况下,与德国合作并不容易,形势并不清晰。
“The options open to Russia were difficult, and there were powerful and rational arguments tojustify the foreign policy adopted by Petersburg, Mr. Lieven writes. As someone who also hasRussian roots, I found his portraits of the men from the “nest of the aristocracy and gentrywho made or disputed that policy — like the foreign ministers Aleksandr Izvolsky and SergeySazonov, or the diplomat-journalist Prince Grigorii Troubetskoy — among the most interestingpassages of the book. Contrary to the notion of self-serving noblemen leading Russia todisaster, these men, as portrayed by Mr. Lieven, “were far from stupid and generally decent.They were also, as he makes clear, closely linked by class, rank and often marriage to thearistocratic elite that predominated in most European governments.
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