老兵不死

埃瓦德-海因里希·冯·克莱斯特，世界上最后一位参与刺杀希特勒的德国军官，于2013年3月8日逝世，享年90岁。冯·克莱斯特在战后成为防务和国际关系专家，发起创办了著名的慕尼黑安全会议。FT副总编昆丁·皮尔回顾了他的一生。

测试中可能遇到的词汇和知识：

lieutenant [lef'tenənt] n.中尉；副官

Führer['fjurə] n.元首，特指阿道夫·希特勒

Claus von Stauffenberg 施陶芬伯格上校，1944年刺杀希特勒计划的领导人。计划失败后，盖世太保处决了包括他在内的4,980人。汤姆·克鲁斯在影片Valkyrie中扮演了他。

Atlanticist[ət'læntisist] n.大西洋主义,主张西欧和北美在政治、经济、军事防卫等议题上紧密合作，维护共同价值观，与大陆主义相对。北约就是大西洋主义组织。

Pomerania[,pɔmə'reinjə] n.波美拉尼亚，波罗的海南岸的中欧地区

monarchist['mɔnəkist] n./v.君主主义者

Infantry Regimentv步兵团

Gestapo[ɡes'tɑ:pəu] n.盖世太保

unashamed[ʌnə'ʃeɪmd] adj.问心无愧的

Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist, plotter against Hitler (821 words)

By Quentin Peel

Anti-Nazi and founder of elite security forum 1922-2013

Though hailed as the last survivor of the group of conspirators who attempted to assassinate Adolf Hitler on July 20 1944, Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist might have achieved far greater fame if an earlier plot had succeeded.

The previous year, as a 21-year-old lieutenant in the German army from a deeply conservative Prussian aristocratic family, he undertook to wear a suicide vest underneath the army uniform he was to model for the Führer. He was supposed to detonate the explosives when Hitler stood in front of him.

In the event, the parade did not take place. But Kleist, who has died in Munich aged 90, was again willing to lay down his life by being part of the 1944 assassination attempt led by Claus von Stauffenberg. The plan behind the detonation of a bomb in the Wolf’s Lair, the East Prussian military headquarters (Hitler was saved from serious injury by a table leg), has become an essential part of Germany’s postwar national narrative.

“It showed that at least there was a group that took action, and took it upon themselves to try to ensure that things could not go on,” says Gebhardt von Moltke, former ambassador to the UK. “It is always said it was too little, too late, but at least they tried.”

Kleist was one of the very few plotters who survived interrogation and imprisonment. Almost 5,000 were executed after July 20, including his father Ewald.

His enduring accomplishment came later. After launching a publishing company specialising in defence, in 1963 he founded the Munich Wehrkunde, named after his magazine, as a conference for US and European politicians to discuss security. By attracting top-level American participants such as Henry Kissinger, who went on to become secretary of state, and Edward Teller, “father of the hydrogen bomb”, as well as leading senators, he succeeded in turning the event into an exclusive annual debate for which invitations were eagerly sought. Now called the Munich Security Conference, it has expanded well beyond Nato, although the core remains firmly Atlanticist.

Kleist’s reputation as a member of the anti-Nazi resistance undoubtedly helped gain credibility for his conference, especially in the US. But he always admitted that he was not an instant hero during the war.

He hesitated before accepting the 1943 suicide mission. “When you are young, you don’t want to die,” he said in an interview shortly before his 90th birthday. When the plan was proposed by Stauffenberg, Kleist asked for a day to consult his father on the family estate in Pomerania (now part of Poland). “My thinking was that parents love their children, so I would ask my father, and he would surely say: ‘Don’t do it’.”

But he had underestimated the old man, a passionate monarchist and anti-Nazi. “The answer came in seconds: ‘You must do it,’ he said. ‘If you refuse at a moment like this, you will never be happy again in your lifetime’.”

Born on July 10 1922, Kleist was a member of Infantry Regiment 9, descended from the 1st Prussian Regiment of Foot Guards. Graf Neun (“Count Nine”), as it was known because of its many titled officers, contained no fewer than 19 resistance plotters in its upper ranks.

His 1944 role was modest. Charged with helping to disarm pro-Hitler forces in Berlin, he was arrested as soon as it became clear the Führer had not died. Imprisoned and interrogated, he was then surprisingly released that December. He speculated later that the Gestapo hoped he would lead them to other plotters who had not been identified.

Kleist is survived by his wife Gundula, a son and a daughter. In 1998 he handed over the running of the security conference, which as a result of being an initially intimate event had won a reputation as a forum for outspoken views, even though the debates were in public.

It was the scene in 2003 of an extraordinary confrontation between Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, and Joschka Fischer, when the German foreign minister declared “I am not convinced” about the US arguments for waging war on Iraq.

In 2007, Vladimir Putin was the first Russian leader to attend. He used the occasion to launch a furious attack on US foreign policy, to the organisers’ acute embarrassment.

An unashamed conservative, Kleist nonetheless ensured that Social Democrats were present, although while he was in charge he never invited members of the pacifist Green party such as Mr Fischer.

Kleist, whose family traced its roots back to 1289, always paid tribute to the views of his parents in convincing him that the Hitler regime was evil. Both parents and grandparents, he said, “possessed above all a clear moral compass”. What made him act was experiencing the bombing raids on Berlin. “I saw the misery, the deaths – and it moved me to do something about it.”

请根据你所读到的文章内容，完成以下自测题目：

1.Which event happened first?

A. He planned to wear a suicide vest and detonate it in front of Hitler.

B. He participated in Stauffenberg's plot of assasination in 1944.

C. His father was killed as a member of anti-Nazi resistance.

D. He helped to disarm pro-Hitler forces in Berlin.

答案(1)

2.What made him decide "to do something about it"?

A. His father's encouragement.

B. His aristocratic family.

C. His experiencing the bombing raids on Berlin.

D. Stauffenberg's proposal.

答案(2)

3.What is correct about the Munich Security Conference?

A. It is a closed-door conference.

B. Kleist's reputation helped gain credibility for the conference.

C. The conference invited only european piliticians at first.

D. It is exclusively open for NATO country politicians.

答案(3)

4.What do we know about Mr.Kleist's view of defence?

A. He was firmly Atlanticist.

B. As a conservative, he shared the view with Social Democrats.

C. He never liked Hawkish politicians.

D. All of above.

答案(4)

* * *

(1) 答案：A.He planned to wear a suicide vest and detonate it in front of Hitler.

解释：从第一段1944年施陶芬伯格计划，以及第二段的The previous year可以看出，克莱斯特先生在1943年就计划过一次刺杀计划，虽未成功，但也未泄露。

第二次参与的刺杀计划失败了，随后包括他父亲在内的抵抗人士被害。而他自己被关押了一段时间后只被轻罪处理。

(2) 答案：C.His experiencing the bombing raids on Berlin.

解释：这是文章最后一段中提到的，他的家族出身高贵，父母和祖父母一直认为希特勒政权是邪恶的， 而目睹柏林在战争中所受的灾难使他决心做些什么（还不是刺杀计划）。When the plan was proposed by Stauffenberg, Kleist asked for a day to consult his father...这时才决心以自杀袭击的形式刺杀希特勒

(3) 答案：A.Kleist's reputation helped gain credibility for the conference.

解释：the debates were in public，所以A不对。安全会议一经创办就邀请美国高官和科学家参加，获得了巨大影响，所以C不对。D也不对，普京在2007年的会议上猛烈抨击美国这一著名事件就很让会议组织者尴尬。

(4) 答案：A.He was firmly Atlanticist.

解释：慕尼黑安全会议自他创办以来，一直是坚定的大西洋主义：the core remains firmly Atlanticist. BC与事实相反，An unashamed conservative倾向于鹰派，与社民党和绿党的鸽派(Dovish)相对。倒数第二段中说， 他主持会议的时候总是邀请社民党但是不邀请绿党。