2024考研英语同源外刊1月:美国是怎么把中国当成假想敌的
Since the early days of the Cold War, the United States has led the world in technology.冷战早期以来，美国一直在技术方面处于世界领先地位。
Over the course of the so-called American century, the country conquered space, spearheaded the Internet, and brought the world the iPhone.
在所谓的美国世纪的过程中，该国征服了太空，引领了互联网，并为世界带来了iPhone。
In recent years, however, China has undertaken an impressive effort to claim the mantle of technological leadership, investing hundreds of billions of dollars in robotics, artificial intelligence, microelectronics, green energy, and much more.
然而，近年来，中国已经展开了令人印象深刻的努力，以夺取技术领导地位，投资数千亿美元用于机器人技术、人工智能、微电子学、绿色能源等等。
Washington has tended to view Beijing’s massive technology investments primarily in military terms, but defense capabilities are merely one aspect of great-power competition today—little more than table stakes.
华盛顿倾向于主要将北京的大规模技术投资视为军事方面的，但是防御能力仅仅是当今大国竞争的一个方面，不过是一个小小的筹码而已。
Beijing is playing a more sophisticated game, using technological innovation as a way of advancing its goals without having to resort to war.
北京正在进行一场更为复杂的游戏，利用技术创新来推进其目标，而无需诉诸战争。
Chinese companies are selling 5G wireless infrastructure around the world, harnessing synthetic biology to bolster food supplies, and racing to build smaller and faster microchips, all in a bid to grow China’s power.
中国公司正在全球销售5G无线基础设施，利用合成生物学来增强粮食供应，并竞相建造更小更快的微芯片，所有这些都是为了增强中国的实力。
In the face of China’s technological drive, U.S. policymakers have called for greater government action to protect the United States’ lead.
在面对中国的技术推动时，美国决策者呼吁采取更大的政府行动以保护美国的领先地位。
Much of the conventional wisdom is sensible: boost R & D spending, ease visa restrictions and develop more domestic talent, and build new partnerships with industry at home and with friends and allies abroad.
大部分传统智慧是明智的：增加研发支出，放宽签证限制并培养更多本国人才，并在国内与工业建立新的合作伙伴关系，并在国外与朋友和盟友建立新的合作伙伴关系。
But the real problem for the United States is much deeper: a flawed understanding of which technologies matter and of how to foster their development.
但是美国真正的问题更为深刻：对哪些技术重要以及如何促进它们的发展存在缺陷。
As national security assumes new dimensions and great-power competition moves into different domains, the government’s thinking and policies have not kept pace.
随着国家安全呈现新的层面和大国竞争进入不同领域，政府的思维和政策没有跟上步伐。
Nor is the private sector on its own likely to meet every technological need that bears on the country’s security.
私营部门自己也不太可能满足涉及国家安全的每一个技术需求。
In such an environment, Washington needs to broaden its horizons and support a wider range of technologies.
在这样的环境中，华盛顿需要拓宽视野，支持更广泛的技术。
It needs to back not only those technologies that have obvious military applications, such as hypersonic flight, quantum computing, and artificial intelligence, but also those traditionally thought of as civilian in nature, such as microelectronics and biotechnology.
它不仅需要支持那些具有明显军事应用的技术，如高超声速飞行、量子计算和人工智能，还需要支持那些传统上被认为是民用性质的技术，如微电子学和生物技术。
Washington also needs to help vital nonmilitary technologies make the transition to commercial success, stepping in with financing where the private sector will not.
华盛顿还需要帮助至关重要的非军事技术实现向商业成功的过渡，在私营部门不愿涉足的领域提供资金。
In the early decades of the Cold War, the United States spent billions of dollars dramatically expanding its scientific infrastructure.
在冷战早期的几十年里，美国投入数十亿美元，大规模扩建其科学基础设施。
The Atomic Energy Commission, formed in 1946, assumed responsibility for the wartime labs that had pioneered nuclear weapons, such as the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the headquarters of the Manhattan Project, and went on to fund academic research centers, such as the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
原子能委员会成立于1946年，负责对开创核武器的战时实验室，如奥克里奇国家实验室（曼哈顿计划总部），并继续资助学术研究中心，如劳伦斯利物浦国家实验室。
The Department of Defense, founded in 1947, was given its own massive research budget, as was the National Science Foundation, established in 1950.
国防部于1947年成立，获得了自己的庞大研究预算，国家科学基金会于1950年成立。
The research proved astonishingly successful.
政府的投资取得了令人惊讶的成功。
Government investment spawned cutting-edge capabilities that undergirded the United States’ military superiority, from supersonic jets to nuclear-powered submarines to guided missiles.
政府的投资孕育了支持美国军事优势的尖端能力，从超音速喷气式飞机到核动力潜艇再到制导导弹。
The private sector, for its part, got to capitalize on the underlying intellectual property, turning capabilities into products and products into companies.
私营部门则得以利用底层的知识产权，将能力转化为产品，将产品转化为公司。
GPS-enabled technologies, airbags, lithium batteries, touchscreens, voice recognition—all got their start thanks to government investment.
GPS技术、安全气囊、锂电池、触摸屏、语音识别等等，都得益于政府的投资。
Increasingly, the most innovative R & D was taking place not in the labs of large corporations but at nimbler, privately funded startups, where venture capital investors were willing to tolerate more risk.
越来越多的创新研发不再发生在大公司的实验室中，而是在更为灵活、由私人资金支持的初创公司中进行，风险投资者愿意承担更多的风险。
Modern venture capital partnerships that invest in early-stage companies—arose in the 1970s, leading to early successes such as Apple and Microsoft, but it wasn’t until the dot-com bubble of the 1990s that this style of investment really took off.
投资于初创公司的现代风险投资合作伙伴关系在1970年代出现，导致了像苹果和微软这样的早期成功案例，但直到1990年代的互联网泡沫时期，这种投资方式才真正蓬勃发展。
If the first phase of R & D outsourcing was from government labs to corporate America, this was the second phase: away from big businesses and toward small startups.
如果研发外包的第一阶段是从政府实验室到美国企业，那么这就是第二阶段：从大公司转向小型初创企业。
Large companies began to spend less on internal R & D and more on what they called “corporate development,” or acquiring smaller, venture-backed companies with promising technologies.
大公司开始减少对内部研发的支出，而更多地投资于他们所谓的“公司发展”，或者收购那些拥有有前途技术的小型、风险投资支持的公司。
The rise of venture capitalism created a great deal of wealth, but it didn’t necessarily further U.S. interests.
风险投资的崛起创造了大量财富，但未必进一步促进了美国的利益。
Venture capital firms were judged by their ability to generate outsize returns within a ten-year window.
风险投资公司是根据它们在十年内产生巨大回报的能力来评判的。
That made them less interested in things such as microelectronics, a capital-intensive sector where profitability arrives in decades more so than years, and more interested in software companies, which need less capital to get going.
这使得它们对微电子等资本密集型行业的兴趣减弱，这些行业的盈利周期更多是几十年而不是几年，而对软件公司等需要较少资本启动的公司更感兴趣。
Key Vocabulary:
Conquer (verb):征服
Example: The United States conquered space during the Cold War with the Apollo moon missions.
Mantle (noun):地位，地位的象征
Example: China is making efforts to claim the mantle of technological leadership.
Table stakes (noun phrase):最低限度的投入
Example: In great-power competition, defense capabilities are considered table stakes.
Sophisticated (adjective): 复杂的，高级的
Example: China is playing a more sophisticated game in technological innovation.
Bolster (verb):增强，支持
Example: Synthetic biology is being used to bolster food supplies.
National Security (noun phrase):国家安全
Example: The government needs to prioritize technologies with national security implications.
Long and Complex Sentence Translation:
In the face of China’s technological drive, U.S. policymakers have called for greater government action to protect the United States’ lead. Much of the conventional wisdom is sensible: boost R & D spending, ease visa restrictions and develop more domestic talent, and build new partnerships with industry at home and with friends and allies abroad.
面对中国的技术推动，美国决策者呼吁采取更大力度的政府行动以保护美国的领先地位。很多传统智慧都是明智的：增加研发支出，放宽签证限制并培养更多国内人才，与国内产业和国际友邦建立新伙伴关系。
综上是“2024考研英语同源外刊1月:美国是怎么把中国当成假想敌的”，希望对备战2024考研考生们有所帮助!让我们乘风破浪，终抵彼岸，考研加油!
推荐阅读：
![京网文[2014]2116-316号](https://bj.wendu.com/imgs/jingicp.jpg){kind=link}
