“day by day democracy is proving itself to be a not at all fragile flower.”
[영어로 읽는 세기의 名연설] ⑨ 로널드 레이건의 공산주의 몰락 예견 <上>
⊙ 배경

이 연설은 40대 미 대통령인 로널드 레이건이 런던 웨스트민스터 의회에서 행한 연설이다.

레이건 대통령은 소련의 경제 상황을 근거로 소련의 몰락을 예측했지만 당시 그의 말을 받아들이는 사람은 아무도 없었다.

하부구조와 상부구조의 모순에서 혁명적 위기가 도래한다는 마르크스의 말을 빗대 소련 체제의 위기를 규정한 부분이 흥미롭다.

⊙ 원문 읽기

We're approaching the end of a bloody century plagued by a terrible political invention －－ totalitarianism.

Optimism comes less easily today，not because democracy is less vigorous，but because democracy's enemies have refined their instruments of repression.

Yet optimism is in order because day by day democracy is proving itself to be a not at all fragile flower.

From Stettin on the Baltic to Varna on the Black Sea，the regimes planted by totalitarianism have had more than thirty years to establish their legitimacy.

But none －－ not one regime －－ has yet been able to risk free elections.

Regimes planted by ①bayonets do not take root.

The strength of the Solidarity movement in Poland demonstrates the truth told in an underground joke in the Soviet Union.

It is that the Soviet Union would remain a one－party nation even if an opposition party were permitted because everyone would join the opposition party…

Historians looking back at our time will note the consistent restraint and peaceful intentions of the West.

They will note that it was the democracies who refused to use the threat of their nuclear monopoly in the forties and early fifties for territorial or imperial gain.

Had that nuclear monopoly been in the hands of the Communist world，the map of Europe－－indeed，the world－－would look very different today.

And certainly they will note it was not the democracies that invaded Afghanistan or suppressed Polish Solidarity or used chemical and toxin warfare in Afghanistan and Southeast Asia.

If history teaches anything，it teaches ②self－delusion in the face of unpleasant facts is ③folly.

We see around us today the marks of our terrible dilemma－－predictions of ④doomsday，antinuclear demonstrations，an arms race in which the West must，for its own protection，be an unwilling participant.

At the same time we see totalitarian forces in the world who seek subversion and conflict around the globe to further their barbarous assault on the human spirit.

What，then，is our course？

Must civilization perish in a hail of fiery atoms？

Must freedom wither in a quiet，deadening accommodation with totalitarian evil？

Sir Winston Churchill refused to accept the inevitability of war or even that it was imminent.

He said，"I do not believe that Soviet Russia desires war. What they desire is the fruits of war and the indefinite expansion of their power and doctrines. But what we have to consider here today while time remains is the permanent prevention of war and the establishment of conditions of freedom and democracy as rapidly as possible in all countries."

Well，this is precisely our mission today: to preserve freedom as well as peace.

It may not be easy to see: but I believe we live now at a turning point.

In an ironic sense Karl Marx was right.

We are witnessing today a great revolutionary crisis，a crisis where the demands of the economic order are conflicting directly with those of the political order.

But the crisis is happening not in the free，non－Marxist West but in the home of Marxism－ Leninism，the Soviet Union.

It is the Soviet Union that runs against the tide of history by denying human freedom and human dignity to its citizens.

It also is in deep economic difficulty.

The rate of growth in the national product has been steadily declining since the fifties and is less than half of what it was then.

The dimensions of this failure are ⑤astounding: a country which employs one－fifth of its population in agriculture is unable to feed its own people.

Were it not for the private sector，the tiny private sector tolerated in Soviet agriculture，the country might be on the brink of famine.

These private plots occupy a bare 3 percent of the arable land but account for nearly one－quarter of Soviet farm output and nearly one－third of meat products and vegetables.

Overcentralized，with little or no incentives，year after year the Soviet system pours its best resources into the making of instruments of destruction.

The constant ⑥shrinkage of economic growth combined with the growth of military production is putting a heavy strain on the Soviet people.

What we see here is a political structure that no longer corresponds to its economic base，a society where productive forced are ⑦hampered by political ones.

The decay of the Soviet experiment should come as no surprise to us.

Wherever the comparisons have been made between free and closed societies －－ West Germany and East Germany，Austria and Czechoslovakia，Malaysia and Vietnam －－ it is the democratic countries that are prosperous and responsive to the needs of their people.

And one of the simple but overwhelming facts of our time is this: of all the millions of refugees we've seen in the modern world，their flight is always away from，not toward the Communist world.

Today on the NATO line，our military forces face east to prevent a possible invasion.

On the other side of the line，the Soviet forces also face east to prevent their people from leaving.

The hard evidence of totalitarian rule has caused in mankind an uprising of the intellect and will.

Whether it is the growth of the new schools of economics in America or England or the appearance of the so－called new philosophers in France，there is one unifying thread running through the intellectual work of these groups －－ rejection of the arbitrary power of the state，the refusal to subordinate the rights of the individual to the superstate，the realization that collectivism ⑧stifles all the best human impulses…

Chairman Brezhnev repeatedly has stressed that the competition of ideas and systems must continue and that this is entirely consistent with relaxation of tensions and peace.

Well，we ask only that these systems begin by living up to their own constitutions，abiding by their own laws，and complying with the international obligations they have undertaken.

We ask only for a process，a direction，a basic code of decency，not for an instant transformation.

☞ 다음호에 계속


▶ Words & Idioms

① bayonets : 총검

② self－delusion : 자기 기만

③ folly : 어리석음, 우둔함

④ doomsday : 운명의 날

⑤ astounding : 깜짝 놀란

⑥ shrinkage : 축소

⑦ hampered : 방해하다, 훼방하다

⑧ stifles : 숨막히게 하는