1862: The Superpower, the United States, and the War that Didn’t Happen (Why America and China Are Not Destined To Fight — Unless They Forget Everything) 超级大国、美国和没有爆发的战争

From 1861-1865 (and less so until 1868, when the Alabama Claims dispute was settled) the nation acknowledged by all as the only true world power — Great Britain — was directly threatened by the fast-rising navy of the United States of America (US). Moreover the very strategic depth of its empire — Canada and its source of Atlantic power — was at risk, and thus the entire calculus of Britain’s world position was for a time in some danger. Yet this window of vulnerability passed without conflict, let alone war. Although the US was engaged in ‘a great civil war’, this time of intense strategic competition in many ways reminds us of, and speaks to, the current US-China strategic competition, especially in its overriding naval dimensions. In many ways it was a more dangerous tussle, with periods of crisis (especially December 1861-April 1862) when war could have come at any moment. Yet both the US and Great Britain sought paths of restraint and an implicit strategic demarche that ultimately not only lowered the possibility of war, but also encouraged eventual strategic modus vivendi — without formal elaboration or contentious negotiations. Why was there no conflict at sea? How did both parties come upon a working understanding that reframed a fast-fuse face-off into a stable strategic posture — that met both nations’ larger military needs? This excursis will compare the US-British relationship along a range of criteria in strategic competition, and contrast it to the China-US relationship today. Its wider objective is to isolate and identify those elements in the mix that helped things turn out as they did positively, for both the US and the United Kingdom. Then, more elusively, it seeks to find similar elements in today’s US-China strategic competition — that we might especially take advantage to defuse a proclivity on both sides toward war as our mutual, on-demand [because we can!] solution. 摘要：1861年至1865年之间（到1868年阿拉巴马索赔纠纷结束时，情况已有所缓和），英国—唯一被公认的世界强国，面临着美国飞速上升海军力量的威胁 。此外，英国的战略纵深—加拿大及其大西洋动力的源泉—也岌岌可危，因此英国在世界上的地位一度不稳。但在这个敏感脆弱的时期，却没有任何冲突爆发，更不要说战争了。 尽管美国当时正在进行“一场伟大的内战”，但这一时期激烈的战略竞争，在许多方面都使我们联想到了目前美中之间的战略竞争，尤其是在最为重要的海上力量方面的竞争。从许多方面来看，当时的情况更危险，发生过数次危机（尤其是从1861年12月到1862年4月之间），随时可能爆发战争。 但美英两国通过寻求保持克制的方法和比较模糊的战略方针，不仅降低了爆发战争的风险，也促成了最终双方的战略妥协—两国并没有进行任何正式阐述或举行具有争议的谈判。两国之间为什么没有爆发海上冲突？双方是如何达成谅解，扭转紧张和对峙态势来实现战略稳定状态，从而满足了两国更重要的军事需求的？ 本文将按照一系列标准来研究美英两国在战略竞争中的关系，并将其与当前的中美关系进行对比。研究更广泛的目的，是剖析并指出在当时各种情况中，哪些因素最终促成了美英两国最终实现积极的结果。另外，本文试图寻找当前中美竞争中存在的相似因素—我们应该好好加以利用，得到一个共同且必要的[因为我们可以！]办法，来化解双方可能爆发战争的可能性。

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