最近对於军事史的发展挺有兴趣的，於是陆续看了些书，其中看到一篇由英国着名军事家 Michael Howard所撰写的一篇短文，觉得蛮有趣、蛮有同感的，对身处台湾的我们来说也 许是个不错的省思与启发。由於老人家他的文笔相当幽默讽刺，但由於自己能力有限，仅 能凭着破烂的高中英文，在翻译上尽量采微言大义，让版上的大家见丑了。可以的话还是 建议看原文，如果有哪里翻译的不好或有误解之处也请大家多多指教。 原文有些长，因此我将它分成数篇。 转载请先经过本人同意 －－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－ Military History and the history of war by/ Michael Howard * Michael Howard （1922-）: 英国跨学科进行战争研究的奠基人，在伦敦大学国王学院 创立了着名的李德哈特档案馆，现为英国国际战略研究所（IISS）的荣誉教授与创办者之 一，其以在军事史杰出的贡献而在2005年由伊莉莎白女王颁赠功绩勳章（Order of Merit ）。 ** 本文收录自美国军事史家E. Williamson Murray所编着之"The Past as Prologue: The Importance of History to the Military Profession"第二章。 －－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－ When the first university chair in our subject was established at Oxford in the first decade of the twentieth century, its field was defined sinply as "Military History," and it took two world war s to broaden this to the "History of War." I have no firm evidence for this, but I suspect that the change was made to make it clear that the incumbent was expected to cover naval and air matters as well. 当牛津大学在1910年代建立我们这领域内的第一个大学讲座时，它仅仅被定义为＂军事史 ＂范畴，一直要到经历了两次大战以後，它才逐渐发展成＂战争史＂。尽管我没有办法证 实，但我猜想这个转变主要是想要将海军与空军纳入此一范畴。 The same enlargement occurred in the scope of the only other similar chair in this country, which was established after the First World War at King's College London for Lloyd George's nemesis, General Sir Frederick Maurice, and about this I can speak with greater authority. The people responsible for reviving it after the Second World War were not military men: they were academics in the University of London who had been involved in the civilian conduct of the war – economists like Lionel Robbins, social historians like Sir Keith Hancock, diplomatic specialists like Sir Charles Webster. They knew from personal experience that the conduct of war was too serious a business to be left to the generals and believed in consequence that the study of war was too important to be left to military historians. The scope that they had in mind was so wide that they were not sure how to define it. 同样的转变也发生在伦敦大学的国王学院，它在一次大战以後亦由劳合乔治的政治劲敌 腓特烈．莫里斯爵士建立了一个军事研究讲座。对於这件事，我想我有资格可以说，当年 那些在二次大战後负责复苏这个学科的人都不是军人出身，这些人多半是伦敦大学的学者 ，包括经济学家Lionel Robbins、社会史家Sir Keith Hancock与外交官查尔斯．韦伯斯特 爵士。他们根据各自领域的经验得出战争是一个相当严肃的事情，而这使得它将无法只靠 军事将领或军事史家们来研究。然而他们所想像的战争研究，其所涵盖的范围却又广到难 以被定义。 I recall a meeting of the great and the good in the early 1950s, where the title of the chair was being debated. Because its subject matter was not confined to history, they adopted that usefully vague term “studies”; one that was then in its infancy and today provides cover for innumerable soggy nonsubjects. But how were these “studies” to be defined? If they were not “ military,” what were they? “Defense Studies” was deemed too mealy mouthed. Strategic Studies“ was too narrow. “Conflict Studies” was too broad. One learned scholar suggested, in desperation, “Polemological Studies.”At last Sir Charles Webster, a blunt and massive Yorkshireman, hit the table with a fist the size of a large ham and demanded : “It’s about war isn’t it? So what’s wrong with War Studies?” 这让我想起当时发生在1950年代的那场争论，究竟这个讲座要挂上甚麽样的头衔？由於其 所涵盖的并不是只有历史学领域，是以无法和其他讲座一样以某某史讲座称之，因此最後 索性用一个更笼统的字眼来替代：＂某某研究＂。 然而这样的研究到底要＂研究＂些甚麽呢？除了军事史外还能是甚麽？若叫它防卫研究 似乎有些欲盖弥彰的感觉，只称之为战略研究的话又有些太狭隘了，但叫他冲突研究却又 太空泛了。甚至有学者绝望的建议：｢何不叫战争和平学研究呢？｣（编按：Polemology 是一个1930年代才出现的新词，源自於希腊文战争之意，用来泛指那些为了防制国与国之 间的战争与废除军事武力而进行的研究，战争和平学这一定义与翻译是出自复兴岗学报的 莫大华副教授。） 这个讨论最後是以查尔斯．韦伯斯特爵士，一个直率的约克郡佬，用他的拳头重击桌子做 结：｢反正它和战争有关对吧？那为什麽不叫战争研究就好了？｣ So, War Studies it became and has remained ever since. I was put in to hold the fort until they could find someone more eminent to occupy the chair (which I am glad to say they never did), and they genially made it clear to me that there were no limits to the claims I might stake out. I myself might teach the history of war, which was all I knew about, but I was to recruit as widely as possible among other disciplines: international relations, naturally; strategic studies, a subject whose birth had just been precipitated by the invention of nuclear weapons; economics, and the social sciences in general; law, both international and constitutional; anthropology; theology – indeed anything that I could think of and whose practitioners I could interest. If black studies, gender studies, gay studies, or media studies had then existed, I would certainly have colonized them as well. In short, I laid the foundation for that vast empire over which Professor Sir Lawrence Freedman now presides on both banks of the Thames. 这就是至今仍在使用的＂战争研究＂一词的由来。直到他们找到更合适的人选之前，我暂 时接下这个讲座职位（而我很庆幸他们从没找到这样的人选）。虽然他们很和蔼地说我可 以依照自己的想法来决定讲座的内容，然而由於我自己是教战争史的，所以我恐怕也只能 教这个。但我是还到处去找了各种可能派上用场的学科：国际关系（不意外）、战略研究 （某个因核武突然出现而产生的学科）、经济学与社会科学、法律（包括国际法与宪法等 ）、乃至於人类学与神学，几乎涵盖我所有能想得到会派得上用场的领域。我这麽说吧， 如果当时有所谓黑人研究、性别研究、同性恋研究甚或媒体研究的话，我想我毫无疑问地 也会把它们通通抓进来。总而言之，我替劳伦斯．佛里德曼爵士今天在泰晤士河两岸所主 持的事奠定了基础。（编按：佛里德曼是现任伦敦大学国王学院战争研究的教授，同时也 在伊拉克战争期间担任英国首相布莱尔的外交政策顾问） I am myself always a little uneasy when described as a “military historian.” Until very recently, the great majority of professional historians found it hard to think of the term in anything but a rather pejorative sense: “ military history is to history,” as I think someone once said, “what military music is to music.” To dismiss it in this way is of course grossly unfair, but for doing so I think there have been two good reasons. “Military history” was equated with “operational history, ” and most of it – at lest, before the twentieth century – was written, and studied, to enable soldiers to be better at their jobs. This was and remains a quite legitimate function. Past wars provide the only database from which the military learn how to conduct their profession: how to do it and even more important, how not to do it. 就我个人而言，每当有人叫我＂军事史学家＂时，我总是感到不太自在。因为直到目前为 止，绝大部分的专业历史学者都对其存有一种轻蔑的看法：｢军事史已经成为历史了｣ 就像某人曾经说过的一样：｢军乐就是军乐之於音乐。｣（编按：这是美国喜剧的一个 谚语：Military justice is to justice as military music is to music，军法之於司 法犹如军乐之於军乐，换言之就是废话，是用来讽刺强词夺理的军事官方说词） 这样的评论自然不太公平，但我想他们也有理由如此。第一，军事史几乎被等同於军事作 战史，而且至少在二十世纪以前，书写或研究军事史只是为了让军人能够更好的肩负他们 的任务，因为过往的战争经验往往是他们学习的唯一管道。 Good, accurate military history serves a necessary purpose so long as we have a military profession at all. Clausewitz warned of the misuse of military history, of expecting it to provide “school solutions” rather than to educate the minds of the military commander to expect the unexpected, but his warning have all too often been ignored. One does not, or anyhow should not, study the past in order to discover the “school solutions” – that is the first “lesson” that professional historians have to drum into the heads of their pupils. Nevertheless, however intelligently it may be studies, military history has preserved for many of its readers and writers a distinct didactic purpose to which few other branches of historical studies would lay claim and one which they regard with understandable suspicion. 只要我们还需要军事领域的专业，那麽一个优秀且清楚的军事史便是不可或缺的。尽管克 劳赛维茨曾经警示过我们，军事史并不能提供标准答案，它只是让那些军事指挥官们能够 对那些预料之外的事情先做心理准备。要想成为一个专业的历史学家，则所要学的第一个 课题，便是反覆告诫自己不要从过往的历史中寻求标准答案。然而对许多读者和作者而言 ，军事史仍旧提供了一个明显有别於其他历史学取向的研究，因为其他的历史学派往往对 军事史抱持着怀疑的眼光而不愿意关注这个领域。 The second characteristic of much – indeed I would say most –military history is its parochialism. It has all too often been written to create and embellish a national myth, and to promote deeds of derring – do among the young. I would like to be able to say that this is a characteristic that military historians have now outgrown, but we have only to stop into any bookshop to see that this would not be true. Leaving earlier history aside, the First World War in British historiography focuses almost exclusively on the British Army’s heroic sufferings and achievements on the Western Front. The Second World War is ransacked to provide material for the glorification of our past, while shelves are still being filled with scrapings from barrel bottoms about the Gulf and Falklands Wars. 第二个让军事史不被主流专业历史学所认可的理由，也是我认为最关键的原因，便是军事 史的眼界太过狭隘。军事史太常落入粉饰国家神话与宣扬英雄式行径的窠臼，我倒很希望 自己能够说：｢今日的军事史家们早已经成熟到不再有这种特质了｣，然而每当我走进任 一家书店，我便不得不打消这个念头：英国的军事史对於第一次世界大战的诠释总是离不 开西线那些英雄般的苦难与成就，而二次大战的书则充斥着歌颂过去的题材。较早期的历 史被无视了，而架上残留的空间则被波斯湾与福克兰群岛战争的碎屑所填满。 Heaven know that we are not the only ones to be parochial: American military historians, with a few brilliant exceptions like Carlo d’Este, seem unaware that the United States had any allies in the Second World War at all, in either Europe or the Pacific, and I doubt whether the Russians are any less oblivious either, although they have better reasons. No wonder bookshops have special sections on “military history” carefully quarantined from history proper. Some of my colleagues refer to it as “pornography”: This is going a bit far, but I understand what they mean. 天知道我们并不是唯一如此狭隘看待军事史的国家，美国的军事史学者，除了极少数像 Carlo d' Este这般优秀的史学家以外，多半忘记美国无论在欧洲战场或是太平洋战场都还 有其他盟友存在的事实。我敢说俄国的军事史也有同样的状况，只是他们的理由比较充分 一些。无怪乎书店总是会有一个特别的＂军事史＂书籍专区，小心翼翼的将它与正统历史 学给区隔开来。我有些同事甚至认为军事史犹如一种＂色情文学＂（自溺自慰用）。这也 许说得太超过了些，但我可以理解为什麽。 　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　［待续］ --

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