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Before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin addressed the nation, blaming communist leaders for “historic, strategic mistakes” that precipitated the collapse of the Soviet Union.
在俄羅斯全面入侵烏克蘭之前，俄羅斯總統弗拉基米爾·普丁(Vladimir Putin)向全國發表講話，指責共產主義領導人犯下了「歷史性的、戰略性的錯誤」，導致蘇聯解體。
One of those leaders was Leonid Kravchuk, who died this week aged 88. Kravchuk, a former Soviet apparatchik who adopted the cause of Ukrainian independence and became his country’s first democratically elected president, may have done more than anyone else to bring down the Soviet empire.
其中一位領導人是本週去世的列昂尼德·克拉夫丘克(Leonid Kravchuk)，享年88歲。克拉夫丘克是前蘇聯的一名官員，他投身於烏克蘭獨立的事業，併成爲烏克蘭首位民選總統。在摧毀蘇維埃帝國的過程中，他所做的貢獻可能比任何人都多。
A wily bureaucrat and astute tactician, he freed Ukraine from Soviet dominion without bloodshed. He outmanoeuvred hardliners and kept Ukraine remarkably united despite its internal divisions.
作爲一個長袖善舞的官僚和精明的戰術家，他沒有流血就把烏克蘭從蘇聯的統治中解放出來。他在策略上戰勝了強硬派，使烏克蘭在內部分裂的情況下保持了驚人的團結。
Russia could not prop up the USSR without Ukraine, the union’s second most populous state and also a fellow Slavic one. As Serhii Plokhy describes in The Last Empire, his account of the Soviet collapse, “Kravchuk performed a difficult balancing act, maintaining a veneer of loyalty to the centre while aggressively advancing the interests of his homeland.”
沒有烏克蘭，俄羅斯就無法支撐起蘇聯，因爲烏克蘭是蘇聯第二大人口大國，也同屬斯拉夫族。正如浦洛基(Serhii Plokhy)在《最後的帝國》(The Last Empire)中描述的那樣，「克拉夫丘克進行了艱難的平衡，既保持了對中央的忠誠，又積極推進了祖國的利益。」
Kravchuk’s life story followed his country’s turbulent history. He was born in western Ukraine in what was then Polish territory. As an eight-year old boy living under Nazi occupation, he witnessed German troops executing Jews by machine gun. His father died fighting for the Red Army against the Wehrmacht.
克拉夫丘克的人生經歷伴隨著他的國家動盪的歷史。他出生在烏克蘭西部，當時是波蘭的領土。作爲一個生活在納粹佔領下的8歲男孩，他目睹了德國軍隊用機槍處決猶太人。他的父親在爲紅軍對抗德國國防軍的戰鬥中犧牲。
He studied political economy at Kyiv University and joined the Communist party, quickly rising through its ranks. In 1990, as chairman of Ukraine’s supreme soviet, he became the country’s most senior official.
他在基輔大學(Kyiv University)學習政治經濟學，並加入了共產黨，在黨內迅速晉升。1990年，作爲烏克蘭最高蘇維埃主席，他成爲該國最高級別的官員。
As the Soviet Union crumbled, Kravchuk managed to perform loyalty to his Soviet masters while hastening their end.
隨著蘇聯的解體，克拉夫丘克在加速蘇聯滅亡的同時，還設法表現出對蘇聯主人的忠誠。
Although Kravchuk declined to join Yeltsin’s active resistance to the 1991 coup, he criticised it enough to stay on the right side of history when the putschists faltered. He then left the party.
雖然克拉夫丘克拒絕加入葉利欽對1991年政變的積極抵抗，但他對政變的批評，足以讓他在政變者倒臺時站在歷史正確的一邊。然後他離開了該黨。
After the coup attempt, he supported the thousands of Ukrainians who protested in Kyiv in favour of independence. He did so despite pressure from US president George HW Bush, who feared a chaotic collapse of the Soviet Union.
政變失敗後，他支援數千名在基輔抗議支援獨立的烏克蘭人。儘管美國總統喬治·HW·布希(George HW Bush)出於對蘇聯出現混亂的解體的擔心，對他施加了壓力，但他還是這麼做了。
Kravchuk then backed a seismic declaration of independence in the Kyiv parliament. Within eight days, Belarus, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan followed suit.
克拉夫丘克隨後在基輔議會上支援一項具有震撼力的獨立宣言。八天之內，白俄羅斯、摩爾多瓦、亞塞拜然、烏茲別克和吉爾吉斯斯坦也紛紛效仿。
Kravchuk assuaged Moscow by agreeing to put independence to a referendum. Gorbachev doubted it would pass — it did, by an extraordinary 90 per cent, with a turnout of 84 per cent. Kravchuk was elected president that same day. The former party head of ideology and servant of the Soviet empire convinced Ukrainians that he was truly committed to their country’s self-determination.
克拉夫丘克同意就獨立問題舉行公投，從而安撫了莫斯科方面。戈巴契夫懷疑該法案能否透過，但結果卻出乎意料地獲得了90%的支援，投票率達到了84%。同一天，克拉夫丘克當選爲總統。這位前黨的意識形態負責人和蘇維埃帝國的僕人讓烏克蘭人相信，他真正致力於他們國家的自決權。
A week later, Yeltsin arranged to meet Kravchuk and Stanislav Shushkevich, his Belarusian counterpart. At a hunting lodge in the Belavezha forest, Yeltsin made the case for both Belarus and Ukraine to stay in a reformed union with Russia. But Kravchuk saw that any such arrangement would be dominated by Moscow. He threatened to walk away, reportedly telling Yeltsin: “And who will you be when you return to Russia? I will return to Ukraine as the president elected by the people, and what will your role be — that of Gorbachev’s subordinate, as before?”
一週後，葉利欽安排與克拉夫丘克和白俄羅斯總統斯坦尼斯拉夫·舒什科維奇(Stanislav Shushkevich)會面。在貝拉維扎森林的一間狩獵小屋，葉利欽提出白俄羅斯和烏克蘭都應與俄羅斯保持改革後的聯盟關係。但克拉夫丘克認爲，任何這樣的安排都將由莫斯科主導。他威脅要離開，據說他對葉利欽說：「當你回到俄羅斯時，你會是誰？我將以人民選舉產生的總統的身份回到烏克蘭，你的角色是什麼？還是像以前那樣做戈巴契夫的下屬？」
He drafted an alternative plan for a looser Commonwealth of Independent States. Yeltsin acquiesced, seeing in it an opportunity to get rid of Gorbachev. The three leaders agreed to “hereby establish that the USSR as a subject of international law and a geopolitical reality ceases its existence”.
他爲一個鬆散的獨立國家聯合體起草了另一項計劃。葉利欽默許了，認爲這是一個除掉戈巴契夫的機會。三國領導人同意「特此宣佈，蘇聯作爲國際法主體和地緣政治現實不再存在」。
Kravchuk later agreed to give up Ukraine’s share of the USSR’s nuclear arsenal in return for security guarantees from Russia, the US and the UK — these turned out to be worthless when Moscow annexed Crimea in 2014 and orchestrated a separatist war in the Donbas region.
克拉夫丘克後來同意放棄烏克蘭在蘇聯核武庫中的份額，以換取俄羅斯、美國和英國的安全保證--當莫斯科在2014年吞併克里米亞並在頓巴斯地區策劃了一場分離主義戰爭時，這些保證被證明是毫無價值的。
Kravchuk lost the 1994 election to Leonid Kuchma. It was the first uncontested handover of power in democratic Ukraine and the last until Volodymyr Zelensky’s landslide in 2019. Kravchuk became a respected elder statesman, for a period presiding over diplomatic efforts to bring peace to the Donbas region.
1994年，克拉夫丘克在選舉中敗給了列昂尼德·庫奇馬(Leonid Kuchma)。這是民主的烏克蘭首次毫無爭議的權力交接，也是2019年弗拉基米爾·澤倫斯基獲得壓倒性勝利之前的最後一次權力交接。克拉夫丘克成爲一位受人尊敬的資深政治家，曾在一段時間內主持爲頓巴斯地區帶來和平的外交努力。
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said: “He was a person always able to find wise words and express them in such a way that they were heard by all Ukrainians. Particularly in times of crisis. When the future of an entire country can depend on the wisdom of one person.” Ben Hall
烏克蘭總統弗拉基米爾·澤倫斯基說：「他是一個總是能找到明智之言，並以所有烏克蘭人都能聽到的方式表達出來的人。特別是在危機時期。當整個國家的未來依賴於一個人的智慧時。」