John Mearsheimer: “Enormous Damage” of U.S.’s Iran War Loss
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这场讨论探讨了美国军事上的持续失败与其持久的全球霸权并存的明显悖论，最终聚焦于“伊朗战争”是否标志着一个转折点。
约翰提出了核心问题：尽管拥有巨大力量，美国却频繁输掉战争。他指出，过去的失败，比如越南战争，对美国的全球地位“几乎没有任何影响”，反而使其在冷战后变成了“哥斯拉”（意指庞然大物）。约翰称自己是“结构主义者”，关注国家实力，认为其来源于人口、财富和技术复杂性。他认为美国仍然“异常强大”。他主张，问题不在于缺乏力量，而在于政策制定者未能理解“军事力量所能达到的真正限制”。尽管伊朗战争严重损害了美国的“力量投射”、其在中东的军事基地结构以及盟友关系，约翰认为它并未从根本上改变“美国的基本实力”。
吉安尼斯提出了一个更深层次、更偏向经济的解读。他同意，美国的军事失败（越南、伊拉克、阿富汗、利比亚）“完全与霸权扩张相符”。他将这追溯到“1971年的尼克松冲击”，该冲击瓦解了布雷顿森林体系。他认为，这从根本上改变了美国，使其从循环利用自身的盈余转变为通过日益增长的预算赤字和贸易逆差，循环利用“其他国家的盈余”——来自日本、德国以及后来的中国等国。华尔街随后将这些外国利润回流到美国债务、股票和房地产中，有效地为美国的军事力量及其全球投射提供了资金。吉安尼斯大胆地提出，甚至“美国在越南的惨败”也发挥了作用，因为巨额开支导致了赤字，这使得货币体系必须进行改革，从而帮助美国“赢得了冷战”。
凯蒂插话，引用哥伦比亚广播公司新闻的民调数据，显示相当一部分MAGA选民和共和党人倾向于结束伊朗冲突，这表明公众对这场战争缺乏热情。约翰用其他民调和国会决议证实了这一点，强调了这场战争的不受欢迎程度。
回到他们的核心论点，约翰承认吉安尼斯的观点，即“军事力量有经济基础”，并同意越南战争的失败之所以无关紧要，是因为经济转变（如尼克松冲击）使美国变得更强大——吉安尼斯甚至补充道：“它实际上有所帮助。它是一个力量倍增器。”
然而，吉安尼斯坚称伊朗战争与众不同。与以往的战争不同，这场冲突直接威胁到全球资本回流美国这一至关重要的“循环机制”。他指出，由于中东地区出现的流动性问题，海湾国家的预期投资（例如向美国人工智能和军备领域投入3.7万亿美元）现在岌岌可危。这种潜在的外国资本流失——它为美国政府债务和军事开支提供资金——可能是一场“代价极其高昂的失败”，真正“削弱美国的霸权”。他暗示，像斯科特·维桑特（Scott Vesant）这样的财政部官员很可能正是因为这些严重的经济后果而建议特朗普结束战争。
吉安尼斯进一步阐述说，特朗普的经济团队旨在“维持自尼克松冲击以来赤字带给美国的优势”。他引用了“天才法案”（Genius Act）以及延长美元影响力的努力，作为防止“美元泡沫”破裂的尝试。他总结道，尽管这种策略在短期内有效地维持了霸权，但从“中期来看却是灾难性的”，通过不断吹大一个不可持续的金融泡沫，将世界推向气候灾难和战争。
The discussion explores the apparent paradox of consistent U.S. military defeats coexisting with its enduring global hegemonic power, eventually focusing on whether the "Iran war" marks a turning point.
John introduces the core issue: despite immense power, the U.S. frequently loses wars. He notes that past defeats, like Vietnam, had "hardly any effect at all" on the U.S.'s global standing, which became "Godzilla" post-Cold War. John describes himself as a "structuralist" focused on national power derived from population, wealth, and technological sophistication. He argues the U.S. remains "remarkably powerful." The problem, he contends, is not a lack of power, but a failure of policymakers to understand the "real limits to what you can do with military power." While the Iran war has severely damaged U.S. "power projection," its basing structure, and alliances in the Gulf, John believes it hasn't fundamentally altered the "basic power of the United States."
Giannis offers a deeper, more economic interpretation. He agrees that U.S. military failures (Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya) have been "utterly consistent with the expansion of the hegemonic power." He traces this back to the "Nixon shock in 1971," which dismantled the Bretton Woods system. This, he argues, fundamentally shifted the U.S. from recycling its own surpluses to recycling "other people's surpluses"—from nations like Japan, Germany, and later China—through its growing budget and trade deficits. Wall Street then recycled these foreign profits back into U.S. debt, equities, and real estate, effectively financing American military power and its global projection. Giannis provocatively suggests that even the "massive defeat of the United States in Vietnam" played a role, as the massive spending contributed to the deficits that necessitated the overhaul of the monetary system, thereby aiding the U.S. in "winning the Cold War."
Katie interjects with CBS news poll data, showing a significant portion of MAGA voters and Republicans favor ending the Iran conflict, indicating a lack of public enthusiasm for the war. John corroborates this with other polls and congressional resolutions, emphasizing the war's unpopularity.
Returning to their core arguments, John acknowledges Giannis's point that "military might has an economic foundation," and agrees that Vietnam's defeat didn't matter because economic shifts (like the Nixon shock) made the U.S. stronger—Giannis even adds, "It actually helped. It was a force multiplier."
However, Giannis asserts that the Iran war is different. Unlike previous wars, this conflict directly threatens the vital "recycling mechanism" of global capital into the U.S. He points out that projected investments from Gulf States (e.g., $3.7 trillion for U.S. AI and armaments) are now in jeopardy due to liquidity issues in the Gulf. This potential loss of foreign capital, which finances U.S. government debt and military spending, could be a "very costly failure" that genuinely "undermines the hegemonic power of the United States." He suggests that Treasury officials like Scott Vesant likely advised Trump to end the war due to these severe economic consequences.
Giannis elaborates that Trump's economic team aims to "maintain the advantages that deficits have bestowed upon the United States ever since the Nixon shock." He cites the "Genius Act" and efforts to extend dollar power as attempts to keep the "dollar bubble" from bursting. He concludes that while effective in maintaining hegemony in the short term, this strategy is "catastrophic in the medium term," setting the world on a path towards climate disaster and war by continuously inflating an unsustainable financial bubble.
中英文字稿 
你可以拥有权力，但仅仅拥有权力并不会告诉你太多。这就是为什么我们会输掉这些战争。观众应该问的问题是，如果John说美国如此强大，那为什么会输掉这些战争？关键在于，权力的作用是有限的。这场战争或许会证明，与其他战争不同，它可能成为美国霸权的触不可及之处。关于伊朗战争，这次失败是否、以及在多大程度上挑战了美国的霸权地位？要知道，过去40到50年间，输掉战争与美国霸权势力的扩张始终如一地并存。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
You can have power, but power by itself doesn't tell you very much. This is why we lose all these wars. The question viewers should be asking is, if John says the United States is so powerful, why does it lose all these wars? And the point is that there are real limits to what you can do with all that power. This war may prove, unlike all the other wars, a bridge too far for the United States' hegemony. With the Iran war, how much does this defeat challenge the U.S. as a hegemon, if at all? Look, losing wars has been, over the last, you know, 40, 50 years, utterly consistent with the expansion of the hegemonic power of the United States.
美国在越南战争中失败了。在伊拉克和阿富汗的战争中也输了。由于希拉里·克林顿和贝拉克·奥巴马的干预，利比亚变得一团糟。看看今天的波斯尼亚，简直是个烂摊子。所以，有时候失败对提升美国霸权项目反而是有帮助的。我们不能忘记，自从1971年尼克松冲击以来，美国的金融霸权随着联邦政府和整个美国经济的赤字加深而不断扩大。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
The United States lost the Vietnam War. They lost the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Libya is a basket case as a result of the Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama intervention. Look at Bosnia today, for instance, it's a cesspit. So, you know, failure can be particularly useful to the project of enhancing American hegemony. Let's not forget that ever since the Nixon shock in 1971, the United States financial hegemony has been expanded the deeper into the red the federal government and the overall American economy is getting.
你知道，美国的霸权是一种非常奇怪的形式。它不像大英帝国、罗马帝国或者葡萄牙帝国。失败有时可以成为成功的基础。为了回答你的问题，这可能是一个过于激进的行为，一个过度的失败，一种在“让美国再次伟大”基础中产生回响的失败。支持特朗普的蓝领工人第二次投票给他却遭受了巨大的困苦。他们不明白为什么特朗普要这样做，就像我们也不明白一样。如果我们都不明白，他们怎么会明白呢？
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
You know, it's a very strange hegemony, the United States. And nothing like the British Empire, nothing like the Roman Empire, the Portuguese Empire. You know, failure can be the foundation for success. I think that, to answer your question, this may prove to be a bridge too far, a failure too far, a failure that reverberates within the base of MAGA. Blue-collar workers who have voted Trump in a second time are suffering massively. They don't understand why he had to go in there like we don't understand. If we don't understand, why would they?
关于继续在伊朗的战争或者支持曾经发生的战争，并没有爱国热情。除了二叠纪盆地以外，那里的页岩油开采者非常喜欢这场战争，因为它保持了油价在一个理想的范围内，既不太低以至于无法盈利，也不太高以至于整体需求和对他们石油的需求由于价格过高而下滑。除了二叠纪盆地以外，我认为特朗普的支持者群体、MAGA（让美国再次伟大）阵营，甚至是科技巨头、大型科技公司，都对此不满。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
There is no patriotic fervor about continuing the war in Iran or even supporting the war that did take place. And with the exception of the Permian Basin, where the frackers have really loved that war, because it has kept the price of oil in the sweet spot, neither too low, so that they can be profitable, nor too high, so that aggregate demand and demand for their oil doesn't tank as a result of too high a price. With the exception of the Permian Basin, I think that the MAGA constituency, Trump's support base, even the tech lords, big tech, have not been happy with this.
他们也许成功地继续了他们的消费热潮，大肆投资于人工智能等领域，而股市表现一直非常好，除了最近几天的例外，但那可能只是暂时的波动，谁知道呢。我总体上认为，失去海湾国家的支持和共识，尤其是认为没有其他选择只能依靠美国的安全庇护，以及没有其他选择只能依赖美元体系，这种损失将来可能会成为一个非常昂贵的错误。这次的失败，与之前所有的失败不同，正在削弱美国的霸权力量。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
They may have managed to continue their spending spree and splurge on AI and so on, and the stock exchange is doing really very well, with the exception of the last few days, but that could be a blip, who knows. I generally think that losing the Gulf states, losing that consensus amongst the Gulf states, that there was no alternative to being under the American security umbrella, and there was no alternative to being absolutely wedded to the dollar system. Losing that could prove in the future a very costly failure, a failure which, unlike all the previous failures, is undermining the hegemonic power of the United States.
你知道，我只是想提一下，如果可以的话，当然接下来会把话筒交给你，约翰。这是一份非常有趣的CBS新闻民意调查，跟你刚才提到的MAGA基本盘有关，雅尼斯。调查发现，56%的自称MAGA选民表示，美国现在应该结束与伊朗的冲突。44%的人认为，美国应该继续战争，直到“伊朗做出更多让步”。在所有接受调查的自称共和党人中，60%认为冲突应该结束，而40%认为战争应该继续，以获取更多伊朗方面的让步。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
You know, I just wanted to bring up, if I may, and then I will hand you the mic, of course, John, but a fascinating CBS news poll, this speaks to what you just brought up, Giannis, about the MAGA base. So, found that 56% of self-identified MAGA voters said the U.S. should end the conflict with Iran now. 44% said that, sorry, I'm just trying to, 44% said the U.S. should continue the war until, quote, "Iran gives up more," end quote. For all self-identified Republicans surveyed, 60% believe the conflict should end, and 40% said war should continue to get more Iranian concessions.
另外，47%的MAGA支持者认为该协议对美国更有利，12%的人认为对伊朗更有利，41%的人认为对两国差不多。同样，在所有共和党人中，只有39%的人认为协议对美国更有利，19%的人认为对伊朗更有利，42%的人认为协议对两国都是平等的。这些数据挺有意思的。我想对此快速回应一下，然后我也想针对Giannis所说的做一些回应。我很好奇他会如何回应我所说的内容。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Also, 47% of MAGA supporters say the agreement is better for the U.S., while 12% believe it's better for Iran, and 41% say it's about equal. Among all Republicans, only 39% said the deal is better for the U.S., 19% see it as better for Iran, and 42% see the deal as equal for both the U.S. and Iran. So, just some interesting stats. If I could make a quick response on that, and then I want to make a number of points in response to what Giannis said, and I'm very curious what he will say about what I said.
首先，凯蒂，我看到一项民意调查显示，67%的美国人希望立即结束战争。67%。此外，正如你所知，参议院和众议院都通过了要求结束战争的决议。目前，这两院在国会中都由共和党主导，但它们都呼吁结束这场战争。所以，吉安尼斯指出，美国的国家安全体系内部有许多不同的因素，这一点完全正确。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
But first on you, Katie, I saw a poll that said that 67% of Americans want to end the war right away. 67%. Furthermore, both the Senate and the House, as you well know, have just passed resolutions calling for an end to the war. The last time I checked, these are two bodies of Congress that are dominated by Republicans, and both houses of Congress, again, called for ending this war. So, Giannis made the point that there are many different elements inside the national security state here in the United States, and he's absolutely correct.
但关键是，如果特朗普想要绕过他们，直接向美国公众呼吁，并与国家安全体系中那些希望结束这场战争的力量结盟，他是可以做到的。这是一场非常不得人心的战争，是一场愚蠢的战争，而且有各种各样的人都明白这一点。不过，我想回到Giannis说过的内容。我很好奇他如何看待我将要说的话。他提到美国输掉了所有这些战争，这一点是对的。我总是在思考这个问题。我在1965年至1975年期间曾在美国军队服役，这段时间与越南战争惊人地重合。我们在越南战争中遭遇了惨痛的失败。除了1991年的第一次海湾战争，我们几乎在每场战争中都遭受了重大失败。自那以来，我们的战绩真的很糟糕。然而，尽管输掉了这些战争，对我们在世界上的地位影响并不大。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
But the point is, if Trump wants to go over their head and appeal to the American public, and then ally himself with those interests inside the national security state who want to end this war, he can do it. This is a very unpopular war. It's a foolish war. And all sorts of people understand that. But I want to go back to what Giannis said. And I'm very curious how he thinks about what I'm going to say. His point that the United States has lost all these wars is correct. I think about this all the time. I was in the American military from 1965 to 1975, which amazingly was coterminous with the Vietnam War. And we suffered a devastating defeat in the Vietnam War. And we have suffered significant defeats in almost every war except the first Gulf War in 1991. Since then, it's really quite remarkable how bad our track record is. But nevertheless, losing those wars has not mattered very much for our position in the world.
我想，你刚才提到的这个观点，亚尼斯。回想越南战争，我们在1975年遭遇了惨痛的失败，北越赢得决定性胜利，美国蒙受屈辱。14年后，冷战结束，随后苏联解体，我们进入了美国主导的单极时刻。在此期间，美国如同哥斯拉般崛起，这是相当令人惊讶的。越南战争对美国全球地位几乎没有影响，其他失败基本上也没有对我们在世界上的地位产生很大影响。那么问题是，这是为什么呢？我对此的看法是，我认为我是一个结构主义者，我关注的是权力。我关心的是美国有多么强大，中国有多么强大，以及两者之间的相对力量平衡，等等。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And I think you were getting at this, Giannis. And if you just go back to the Vietnam War, we suffer this catastrophic defeat in 1975. The North Vietnamese win a decisive victory. The Americans are humiliated. 14 years later, the Cold War ends. And then the Soviet Union collapses. And we enter the unipolar moment, where the United States is Godzilla. It's quite remarkable. The Vietnam War had hardly any effect at all. And most of those other, if not all of those other defeats, hardly mattered at all for our position in the world. So the question is, what's going on here? And here's how I think about it. I think that I'm a structuralist. And what I care about is power. And I'm concerned with how powerful the United States is, how powerful China is, what the relative balance of power is between them, and so forth and so on.
我要强调的是，当我们谈论国家实力时，需要关注的是这个国家的人口规模和财力。而说到财力，实际指的是该国在开发先进技术方面的水平。美国长期以来一直是并且仍然是一个极其强大的国家，它在未来也很有可能继续保持这种实力，因为它既富有又有人口基数。当然，中国也是如此，我并不是要贬低中国在这方面的成就。但在海湾地区的失利不会影响美国的实力大小。这里发生的事情更多与我们投射实力的能力有关。一个国家可以拥有实力，但仅仅拥有实力并不能说明太多问题。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And the point I would make is that when you think about power, what you want to look at is the population size of a country, and how much wealth it has. And when you talk about wealth, what's embedded in that is where it is in terms of developing sophisticated technologies. Excuse me. And the United States has been for a long time, and still is a remarkably powerful country. And it promises to be a remarkably powerful country for the future, because it is so wealthy, and it has such a large population. Of course, the same is true of China as well. I don't want to take away from the Chinese on this front. But losing in the Gulf is not going to affect how powerful the United States is. What has happened here has much more to do with our ability to project power. You can have power, but power by itself doesn't tell you very much.
这就是为什么我们输掉所有这些战争的原因。观众应该问的问题是，如果约翰说美国如此强大，为什么会输掉所有这些战争？关键在于，即使拥有强大的力量，也有其真正的限制。美国政策制定者的问题之一就是他们不了解军事力量的局限性。他们认为我们有巨大的武力，所以可以在全球范围内威逼或强迫他人屈服。而事实是，你无法做到这一点。我们在无数次事件中发现，军事力量有其真正的限制。因此，当我回顾海湾战争，不，是伊朗战争时，我认为贾尼斯完全正确，这场战争从根本上改变了我们向波斯湾投射力量的能力。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
This is why we lose all these wars. The question viewers should be asking is, if John says the United States is so powerful, why does it lose all these wars? And the point is that there are real limits to what you can do with all that power. And one of the problems with American policymakers is they have no sense of the limits of military power. They think because we have this giant hammer, we can run around the world and either coerce people or beat them into submission. And the truth is you can't do that. There are real limits to what you can do with military power, as we have found out on countless occasions. So when I look at the Gulf War, excuse me, when I look at the Iran war, I think Giannis is exactly right that this has fundamentally altered our ability to project power into the Persian Gulf.
这场战争摧毁了我们在该地区的军事基地结构，并对我们在海湾地区的联盟结构造成了巨大的损害。因此，战争带来了巨大的后果。但美国的基本实力并没有改变，我们依然强大，因此也依然具有威胁性。我讲到这里，接下来交给Giannis。Giannis，我会在你的基础上再深入一步。你提到并对比了美国在越南的惨败，这也是你服役期间的经历。然后你说，在不久后的几年里，美国赢得了冷战，所以这并不重要。不，我认为这很重要。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
It's destroyed our basing structure in the region, and it's done enormous damage to our alliance structure in the Gulf region. So the war has had huge consequences. But the basic power of the United States has not changed at all. We are as powerful as ever, and therefore as dangerous as ever. So I'll stop there and turn it over to Giannis. Giannis, I will take what you said, and go one step beyond. You mentioned, you juxtaposed the massive defeat of the United States in Vietnam, which you experienced when you were in the military. And then you said, a few short years after that, the United States won the Cold War. So it didn't matter. No, I think it did matter.
我认为越南战争本身并不是美国赢得冷战的唯一因素，而是美国获胜机制的一部分。在你觉得我完全疯狂之前，让我尝试解释一下。在1971年，我提到了尼克松冲击，对我来说，1971年8月15日与2008年秋季是理解美国、理解世界的两个关键时刻。因此，1971年尼克松摧毁了布雷顿森林体系，这个体系是二战后美国霸权第一阶段的基础。它是一个固定汇率的系统，一种计划体系，几乎是没有公共所有制的经济计划。这是一个非同寻常的系统。让我们进一步理解一下布什的相关问题。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
I think that the Vietnam War, not on its own, was part of the mechanics by which America, the United States won the Cold War. Now, before you think that I'm utterly crazy, let me try to explain this. In the end, after I mentioned the Nixon shock in 1971, for me, 15th of August 1971, alongside the fall of 2008, these are two pivotal moments for us to understand the United States, to understand the world. So 1971, Nixon destroys the bread and wood system, which was the foundation for the first phase of American hegemony after the Second World War, a system of fixed exchange rates, a planned system. It was almost economic planning without public ownership of the means of production. It was a remarkable system. Let's note a bit about the Bush.
美国最终还是终结了这个体系。如果不是尼克松终结它，一些民主党人也会这样做。你知道，约翰逊总统在这之前就想要结束它。为什么？因为整个体系是基于美国作为一个盈余国家而运作的，美国通过在欧洲和日本循环其盈余来创造对美国净出口的需求，以维持美国的盈余。然而，到1968年、1969年、1970年代，美国已经变成了一个赤字国家。因此，这种体系的崩溃是不可避免的。这一崩溃导致了你提到的美国强大的力量，让美国赢得了冷战，而越南战争对此也起到了重要作用。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And yet the United States blew it up. And had Nixon not blown it up, some Democrats would have blown it up. You know, LBJ wanted to blow it up before that. Why? Because that whole system was predicated upon America being the surplus nation, the surplus political economy, recycling its own surpluses in Europe and in Japan, so as to create the aggregate demand for American net exports and to maintain American surplus. Well, that could no longer continue because by 1968, 1960, 1970, America was a deficit country. And therefore the breakdown of the system had to be blown up. That blown up is what gave rise to the immense power that you are referring, that you're talking about, John, that led to the United States winning the Cold War. And the Vietnam War played an important part.
美国联邦政府有两次主要的大规模支出，这导致了美国的财政赤字和贸易账户赤字。其中一次是越南战争，当时的大量支出有很大的流失，这些需求很多流向了海外。这些流向东南亚的军事项目支出实际上推动了东南亚的发展。另一个是林登·约翰逊时期的“大社会”计划，该计划也与越南战争引发的社会紧张局势有关，特别是在南部的一些地方，如德克萨斯州等等。我想说的就是这些。如果你一直在听我讲，我是在将越南的失败与柏林墙体系被推翻、颠覆、削弱和瓦解联系起来，那么这种联系带来了什么呢？
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
There were two main spending sprees by the federal government in the United States, which led to the budget deficits and the deficits in the trade accounts of the United States. One was the Vietnam War, massive spending with a lot of leakage. A lot of that demand went overseas. And that's how Southeast Asia was effectively built up through expenditures that went in the direction of the military project in Southeast Asia. And the Great Society program of LBJ, which was also related to the tensions, the social tensions that were unleashed by the Vietnam War, especially in the South, in places like Texas and so on. And so that's what I'm trying to do. If you're following me, I'm connecting the defeat in Vietnam with the overthrowing, overturning, undermining, blowing up of the Berlin Wall system, which did what?
答案来自一位你们都记得的先生，保罗·沃尔克。在1970年，当时亨利·基辛格在国家安全委员会工作，他向他的团队提出了一个问题，这是一个典型的基辛格式问题：既然我们是一个赤字国家，我们如何保持我们的霸权？保罗·沃尔克是基辛格团队中的一员，他给出的答案是，我们不实行紧缩政策，不变得像德国那样，不紧缩货币，而是扩大我们的赤字，让世界其他国家的资本家为此买单。实际上，在战后的头二十年里，美国将自己的盈余循环到欧洲、亚洲和日本。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
The answer comes from a certain gentleman that you all remember, Paul Volcker, because it was 1970 when Henry Kissinger put a question to the people working for him in back then at the National Security Council. And the question was, typical Kissinger question, how do we maintain our hegemony now that we're a deficit country? And Paul Volcker was the guy amongst his minions, Kissinger's minions, who said, well, the answer is we don't do austerity, we don't go German, we don't tighten our belt, we boost our deficits and we make the capitalists of the rest of the world pay for it. So essentially, in the first two decades after the war, America was recycling its own surpluses to Europe and Asia and Japan.
在1971年之后，美国开始“回收”其他国家的过剩产能。基本上，美国的贸易逆差就像一个巨型吸尘器，把日本、德国，后来中国的净出口商品吸入美国。而日本、法国、德国等国家的工业家、资本家用美元赚取的利润又如何呢？这些利润通过华尔街以美国债务、公共债务、一些股票以及大量房地产的形式被“回收”。因此，像特朗普这样的人就得到了他们现在的地位。与此同时，保罗·沃尔克在担任美联储主席期间，大幅提高利率以压制通货膨胀，这对于像罗马尼亚、波兰这样的国家来说，实际上是一个非常致命的打击。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
After 1971, it was recycling other people's surpluses. So essentially, the trade deficit of the United States became something like a gigantic vacuum cleaner that was sucking into the territory of the United States, the net exports of Japan, of Germany, later China. And what was happening with the dollar profits of the Japanese, the French, the German industrialists, capitalists? Well, they were being recycled through Wall Street in the form of American debt, public debt, some equity and a lot of real estate. Therefore, people like Trump got to be what they are. And it was this, together with what Paul Volcker did once he was at the Fed, which he boosted massively interest rates in order to arrest inflation, which was a really, really lethal blow at countries like Romania, like Poland.
团结工会的出现是因为波兰共产主义政治经济对美国的巨大负债。当时利率从3%飙升到21%，对华沙条约组织是一个重大的打击。尽管这不是唯一的因素，还有其他原因，比如阿富汗战争以及苏联经济的衰退。但是，我想在这里强调的，约翰，根据你所说的，最重要的是权力，而我也同意你的看法。问题是，这种权力来源于哪里？从我的角度来看，它源于美国在粮食体系崩溃后，能够回收他人的资金、利润和资本的能力，当然，还包括来自中国的经济力量。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
The Solidarnosc emerged because of the great indebtedness of the Polish communist political economy to the United States. And, you know, when interest rates rose from 3% to 21%, that was a major blow at the Warsaw Pact. It played a significant role, not the only role. There were other things as well, of course, Afghanistan and so on, and the decrepitude of the Soviet economy. But so what I'm trying to connect here, in the context of what you're saying, John, matters above all else, which is power, and I agree with you, is where is this power coming from? For me, from my perspective, it's coming from the ability of the United States after the demise of the bread and the food system to recycle other people's money, profits, capital, and then, of course, China.
一旦开始循环利用中国的利润，那么在1990年代和2000年代，就出现了全球化，华尔街的银行家们变得非常疯狂，等等。一直到现在，美国将他国盈余进行循环利用的能力一直与其投射军事力量的能力密切相关，不仅仅是在海湾地区，而是在全球各地。而这里是我认为我们的路径交汇的地方，因为几周前，在伊朗的战争中，你听到了Scott Besant宣布他向海湾国家提供200亿美元的互换额度，这听起来简直是疯狂，荒谬。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So once it started recycling Chinese profits, then you had, in the 1990s and the noughties, you had the globalization, you had the Wall Street bankers going absolutely berserk, and so on. So up until now, the capacity of the United States to recycle other people's surpluses has been going hand in hand with its capacity to project military power, not just in the Gulf, but everywhere, all over the world. And here is where I think our paths converge, because you heard a few weeks ago, during this war in Iran, Scott Besant announced that he was giving a 20 billion swap line to the Gulf states, which is, it sounds absolutely crazy, ridiculous.
我想说的是，你知道，海湾国家之间拥有大约六万五千亿到七万亿美元的资产、储备和流动资金。他们为什么需要从斯科特·贝桑特那里借200亿美元呢？在我看来，约翰，斯科特·贝桑特并不是在援救阿联酋、沙特阿拉伯或巴林。他是在向市场发出信号：各位，我知道你们担心未来18个月内，海湾国家将损失大约两万亿到两万五千亿美元的资金盈余，不会流向华尔街。我准备介入并弥补这个差额。但我认为他做不到，因为美联储已经在2008-2009年证明了自己能够无限提供这种互换额度。而斯科特·贝桑特和财政部没有这样的能力，他的预算非常紧张。就是这么回事。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
I mean, you know, the Gulf states, between them, they have around six and a half, seven trillion dollars of dollars of assets, of reserves, of liquidity. Why do they need 20 billion from Scott Besant? My interpretation, John, is that Scott Besant was not bailing out the UAE or Saudi Arabia or Bahrain. No, he was signaling to the markets that, guys, I know that you're worried that we are going to lose around two, two and a half trillion in the last eight, next 18 months of money surpluses from the Gulf states that would be coming towards Wall Street. It's not coming. I am prepared to step in and to make up the difference. And I don't think he can, because, you know, the Fed has the capacity as it's proved in 2008-2009 to provide these swap lines ad infinitum. Scott Besant, the Treasury, cannot. He has a very, very tight budget. So there you are.
因此，我希望这能引起你的兴趣，作为一个增强你权力分析的方法，以及为什么这场战争可能会成为美国霸权难以跨越的一座桥梁，这与其他战争有所不同。接下来我会简单说一点，然后把时间交给凯蒂。我认为你和我完全同意，军事力量以经济为基础，而真正最重要的是这个经济基础。我听到你说的是，尽管在越南战争中遭遇了军事失败，美国在经济层面上所做的事情反而使其更加强大。这就是为什么军事失败并不重要的原因。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So I hope that this intrigues you as an idea of how to enhance your power analysis and the reasons why this war may prove, unlike all the other wars, a bridge too far from the United States hegemony. Just one very quick point, then I'll turn it over to Katie. I think that you and I agree completely that military might has an economic foundation, and it's really the economic foundation that matters the most. And what you're saying, I hear, is that despite the military defeat in Vietnam, the United States was doing things at the economic level that, if anything, made it stronger. And that's why military defeat did not matter.
我完全同意这一点。这确实有帮助，确实有帮助。这是一个力量倍增器。那是你的论点。没错，我同意这一点。但你似乎也在说，现在的情况可能有所不同。换句话说，由于伊拉克战争，我们对美国经济的健康状况做出了一些影响，这些影响将会损害我们未来的地位。确实如此。这正是我想说的。我要说的是，看，在特朗普上任的第一年，也就是现在的特朗普2.0时期，他从海湾国家那里获得了约3.7万亿美元的承诺，在未来18个月中，这笔资金将被用于美国国内的投资，其中两万亿用于人工智能投资、数据中心等，而不是在海湾地区，还有1.7万亿用于军备。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
I agree completely with that. It actually helped. It helped. It actually helped. It was a force multiplier. That's your argument. That's right. And I agree with that. But it also seems that what you're saying is that the situation may be different now. In other words, as a result of the Iraq war, we have done things to the health of the American economy that are going to damage our position moving forward. Indeed. That's exactly what I'm saying. I'm saying that, look, Donald Trump, in his first year in office now, during Trump 2.0, he secured commitments from the Gulf States of about 3.7 trillion over the next 18 months. Two trillion would go to AI investments, data centers and all that in the United States, not in the Gulf, and 1.7 trillion armaments.
现在，斯科特·巴塞特知道，由于海湾国家的流动性问题，这笔资金暂时不会到位。你知道，迪拜的酒店几乎空无一人，自然气和石油的流动不像以前那样。关于那3.7万亿美元的预期，现在一切都变得不确定。这笔资金本来要到华尔街，以在美国市场上循环使用其他人的资金，特别是海湾国家的资本，并为其融资。重要的是，这笔钱很大一部分将用于购买国债，资助美国军队和政府，还包括股票和房地产的投资。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Now, Scott Bassett knows that this money is not coming now because of the liquidity problems that the Gulf States have. You know, Dubai hotels are almost empty. The, you know, natural gas and oil doesn't flow like it, like it did. You know, all bets are off regarding that 3.7 trillion that was going to arrive in Wall Street to keep recycling other people's money, other people's Gulf state capital through the markets of the United States and to finance. Importantly, much of that money would be purchasing treasuries would be financing the American military and the American government, as well as equities, as well as real estate.
所以，与其他所有战争不同，过去的战争都没有破坏这种循环机制。这就是我的观点。但是，如果有人提出这样的观点，即实际上看看特朗普今天所做的事情，他是被经济因素驱动的，你怎么看？他明白必须结束这场战争，因为如果战争继续下去，将会对美国在全球的经济地位以及全球经济造成巨大损害。从某种重要的角度来看，他在总体上接受了你的逻辑。他正在拼命地做一切可能的努力来恢复原有的状态。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So, unlike all the other wars, none of the previous wars did anything to damage that recycling mechanism. That is my point. But what would you say to the argument that actually, if you look at what Trump is doing today, he's being motivated or he is motivated by economic considerations, right? That he knows he has to put an end to this war because it's going to do enormous damage if it continues to America's economic position in the world, to the world economy. And he's in a very important way, sort of accepting your logic at a very general level. And he's backpedaling like crazy to do everything he can to restore the status quo ante.
你是在说特朗普是个Janist吗？你能再说一遍吗？：我只是开玩笑。我是在问你是说特朗普是个Janist还是Varoufakisian？：当然不是。我想说的是，你知道，Scott Vesant是个聪明人。他和乔治·索罗斯一起没有因为愚蠢而搞垮英格兰银行，对吧？如果他说和总统聊过，我一点也不会惊讶，他可能对总统说：“唐纳德，我们在市场上面临非常严重的风险，因为在接下来的18个月内，我们将损失2万亿美元，这些钱不会通过华尔街回流。所以，赶快停止这场战争。”
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
: Are you saying Trump is a Janist? Can you repeat that, please? : I was joking. I was saying, are you saying Trump is a Janist or a Varoufakisian? : Not in the slightest. What I'm saying is that, you know, Scott Vesant is a smart man. He didn't break the Bank of England together with George Soros because he was a Dumkoff, right? And I would not be at all surprised if he had a word with the president and said to him, "Donald, we are running a very serious risk in the markets because we're going to lose $2 trillion in the next 18 months that will not be recycled through Wall Street. So stop this war now."
所以，基本上约翰所说的和我所说的是完全一致的。对吧？你在一开始就说，Janist，你认为特朗普有很多好的直觉，他不完全是个笨蛋。这就是为什么你说你不相信他会仅仅靠空军力量来推翻内塔尼亚胡的政权的言论。嗯，我很喜欢特朗普，但我并没有患上“特朗普错乱症”。你知道，我读过斯蒂芬·米兰的文章，我也非常关注斯科特·韦森特和他的经济团队，他们是有计划的。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So essentially what John is saying is exactly what I'm saying. Right. And you said at the beginning, Janist, that you thought that Trump had a lot of good intuitions, that he was not completely a Dumkoff. That's why you were saying you thought that you didn't believe that he bought Netanyahu's rhetoric about toppling the regime with air power alone. Well, I love the man, but I do not suffer from Trump derangement syndrome. And, you know, I read what Stephen Miran says. I pay very close attention to Scott Vesant, to his economic team, and they have a plan.
你们知道吗，约翰和凯蒂？他们的计划一直很奏效，直到遇到伊朗为止。他们赢得了一切。关税战争是一个彻底的成功故事。不要去听那些经济学家的话，他们的模型在遇到关税时会崩溃。特朗普赢得了对欧盟的关税战争。他在苏格兰的高尔夫俱乐部里让欧盟委员会主席冯德莱恩屈服，在那里冯德莱恩接受了对美国或欧洲制造业出口到美国的新关税，而欧洲联盟则取消了对美国产品出口的所有小关税，还向特朗普提出了一些她无法做出的承诺。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And you know what, John and Katie? Their plan has been working until Iran. They won everything. The tariff war was a complete, utter success story. Don't listen to economists whose models, you know, have a spasm when they, when you throw tariffs at them. The tariff war against the European Union was won by Trump. He had Ursula von der Leyen on her knees in his golf club in Scotland, accepting new tariffs being slapped on American or European manufacturing exports to the United States, while the European Union was taking down every single little tariff that they had on American exports, and offering him something that was not in her gift to offer.
记住，乌尔苏拉·冯·德莱恩曾承诺，到2028年底，欧洲将向美国投资7000亿。然而，你知道的，乌尔苏拉·冯·德莱恩并没有这些钱，她也无法指挥巴斯夫、莱茵金属公司或者其他公司将这些钱投资到美国。所以他赢了那场战斗。与中国的贸易战，他没赢，但很快地，他退缩了，与习近平建立了良好的关系，他们还会再见面的。关于关税战，他们达成了缓和协议。但你知道，他每年从关税中赚取3000亿。他所做的一切都在奏效，直到遇到伊朗。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Remember, Ursula von der Leyen promised him that by the end of 2028, Europe would invest 700 billion in the United States. You know, Ursula von der Leyen doesn't have that money. She can't direct, you know, Basf and Rheinmetall or whoever to invest this money in, in the United States. So he was winning. With China, he didn't win that war, but very, very quickly, he, he stepped back, he retreated, he had a bromance with President Xi, they're going to meet again. And there's going to be a detente, there is a detente when it comes to the tariff war. But, you know, he is earning 300 billion every year from his tariffs. Everything he's been doing has been working until Iran.
我坚持认为，他是被逼到这一步的，并不是主动选择的。扬尼斯，我用不同的措辞来转述凯蒂的问题，难道您的意思不是说您和特朗普总统在对世界运作的看法上基本没有太大不同吗？您看，这里有一个众所周知的区别，即世界是如何运作的（描述的）和我认为世界应该如何运作（规范的）。我认为，我们生活的这个世界，以及所谓的全球化、所谓的基于规则的秩序，天哪，每当我听到这种说法时，我都觉得无法忍受。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And I insist that, you know, he was pushed into this, he didn't choose to dive into it. Giannis, just to put Katie's question to you in slightly different words, aren't you basically saying that there's not much daylight between you and President Trump, in terms of thinking about how the world operates? Well, you see, there is a very well known distinction between how the world operates and how I think it should operate, the normative and the descriptive. I think that the world we live in, the world that shaped the so-called globalization, the so-called rules-based order, you know, my goodness, you know, I lose the will to live when I hear that expression.
你知道，1971年，理查德·尼克松创造了一个新的世界。在我看来，特朗普的团队，他的知识、想法以及聪明程度，我并不清楚，他看起来并不是特别聪明。不过，理查德·尼克松当年也是一个疯狂的人。然而，他通过“尼克松冲击”与约翰·康诺利、保罗·沃尔克、基辛格以及其他人一起塑造了我们现在生活的世界。我是从这个背景来理解世界的。从特朗普的角度看，他和他的团队试图保持自尼克松冲击以来，财政赤字给予美国的各种优势。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
But, you know, that's the world that Richard Nixon created in 1971. And it is clear to me that Trump's people, I don't know what he knows and what he thinks and how smart he is, he doesn't look particularly smart to me. But then again, Richard Nixon was a madman. And yet he shaped through a Nixon shock, with John Connolly, with Paul Volcker, with Kissinger, with all these people, they shaped the world that we live in. And this is how I understand the world and understand the world in that context. So, from his perspective, what he's trying to do, what his team is trying to do, is trying to maintain the advantages that deficits have bestowed upon the United States ever since the Nixon shock.
斯蒂芬·米兰大约一年前或一年半前发表了一次讲话，他表示担心的是美元泡沫已经变得如此庞大，以至于相比之下，美国经济的实际能力显得相对微不足道。这种巨大的差距可能导致美元泡沫破裂。因此，他们正竭尽全力确保泡沫不会破裂，因为他们认为这也是他们地缘政治力量的来源。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And, you know, Stephen Miran gave a speech a year, a year and a half ago, in which he was saying that his worry is that, you know, the dollar bubble, the dollar world has become so huge compared to the capacity of the United States economy to do stuff. And, you know, when there is this huge difference, you know, the dollar bubble may burst. And they're doing whatever it takes to make sure that it doesn't burst because this is where they see their power coming from, geopolitically as well.
所以，《天才法案》，你知道的，当我阅读这份法案时，在我看来，斯蒂芬·梅兰和那些人非常明确地试图利用稳定币，以扩大美元的巨大影响力，从而维持他们循环利用他国资金并增强军事力量的能力。所以，我认为他们正在做的事情在中期是灾难性的，而不仅仅是在长期。他们的行为不仅对美国有影响，还对全世界造成影响，导致气候灾难和战争。他们实际上在构建一个很久以前就开始的泡沫，而且还在继续膨胀，因为他们知道这几乎是美国维持霸权的唯一途径。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So, the Genius Act, you know, when I read the Genius Act, to me it was a very clear attempt by Stephen Miran and those people to use stable coins in order to extend the exorbitant power of the dollar in order to maintain their capacity to recycle other people's money and to build up their military. So, yeah, I think that what they are doing is catastrophic in the medium term, not even in the long term. What they are doing is they are setting course, not just for the United States of America, but for the rest of the world, towards climate disaster, towards war, towards, you know, effectively, they're building up a bubble that started a very long time ago and they keep building it up because they know it's the only way that the United States can maintain its hegemony.
在某个时候，那个泡沫要么会迅速缩小，要么会破裂，到那时我们所有人都会陷入非常严重的麻烦。我的意思是，看看欧洲。欧洲就像一个烂摊子。从地缘战略、金融、投资角度以及道德上来看，我们已经衰败了，几乎不存在。我们没有发挥出曾经的西德在苏联和美国之间扮演的那种角色。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
At some point, that bubble either will deflate quickly or will burst and we are all going to be in very serious trouble. I mean, look at Europe. Europe is a basket case. We are simply geostrategically, financially, in terms of investment, ethically, we are decrepit, we are non-existent. We don't play the role that we, you know, that West Germany once played in between the Soviet Union and the United States.
我觉得，一方面，他们很清楚自己在做什么，但另一方面，我坚决反对他们正在做的事情，直到我最后一口气。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
I think that, you know, on the one hand, they know what they're doing and on the other hand, I am a firm opponent to the last breath in my chest of what they're doing.