《FP：吾皇万岁游泳 公开否之玄机》

老上

《FP：吾皇万岁游泳 公开否之玄机》

What the sporting habits of China's top officials say about the nature of power in the Middle Kingdom.
BY ISAAC STONE FISH | AUGUST 14, 2012

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/art ... swim_anymore?page=0,1

In October 1997, Jiang Zemin, the Chinese president at the time, visited the United States for an eight-day visit that was fraught with significance. He presented a necklace of Hawaiian flowers at Pearl Harbor, admitted in an appearance at Harvard University that "mistakes" may have been made during the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, and helped build support for China's 2001 entry into the World Trade Organization.

But arguably the most significant act of the trip for Jiang was the hour he spent swimming breaststroke off Waikiki Beach in Hawaii. Jiang, then 71, was still consolidating power after the death of Deng Xiaoping that February. Deng's health had deteriorated since his last public appearance in 1994, but as China's paramount leader since 1978, he still cast a huge shadow over policymaking. Jiang had looked unhealthy at Britain's Hong Kong handover ceremony less than four months earlier, leading to rumors that he had suffered a heart attack. So Jiang did what any top Chinese leader would have done: He swam. Donning a "pair of black swim goggles and a pink-and-white bathing cap," the New York Times reported, Jiang spent an hour bobbing his head through the water. "I swam more than a kilometer," he bragged on the beach afterward.

Early this August, China's current president, Hu Jintao, might have visited Beidaihe, a beach resort on the Bohai Sea, for an annual seaside conference to discuss the future of Chinese leadership. (The Communist Party's People's Daily reported that Vice President Xi Jinping was there in early August along with other senior leaders; Hu officially canceled the meeting in 2003 but has likely attended conferences there after that.) The conference comes ahead of this autumn's 18th party congress, the twice-in-a-decade Communist Party meeting at which Xi is almost certain to replace Hu as China's president, but many top spots in China's most powerful governing body, the Politburo Standing Committee, remain up for grabs. In Beidaihe, the leaders will also likely discuss the continuing repercussions of purged Chongqing Communist Party Secretary Bo Xilai: On Aug. 9, Bo's wife pleaded guilty to murder in a trial that lasted just seven hours. (Bo's fate remains uncertain, though in March he was rumored to be held under arrest in Beidaihe.)

The conclave continues a half-century tradition started by Mao Zedong, who loved to swim in Beidaihe, whose early beach houses were built by foreigners escaping the heat of Beijing and where the sea is the color of "old gray silk," as one New Yorker writer described it; Deng, his successor, and Jiang followed in his paddle strokes, so to speak. But there appears to be no mention of Hu ever swimming in Beidaihe or, indeed, swimming anywhere. Bizarre as it may sound, the lack of records of Hu swimming tells us a lot both about his governing style and about the nature of power in today's China.

Chinese Communist leaders have long used swimming to prove that they're healthy and competent enough to rule. Mao was a master, using his prowess in the water to demonstrate his power and keep his political rivals off balance. Against the pleadings of his physician and his security guards, Mao would drift "miles downstream with the current, head back, stomach in the air, hands and legs barely moving, unfazed by the globs of human waste gliding gently past," wrote historian Jonathan Spence. "'Maybe you're afraid of sinking,' he would chide his companions if they began to panic in the water." His infamous swim in the Yangtze River in 1966 showed his intention to reassert power after nearly half a decade of self-imposed isolation, and it seemed "a bid to put him in the tradition of a ruler showing his personal worth," wrote academic Ross Terrill in his 2000 biography of Mao.

Deng reportedly spent the summer after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre in Beidaihe, where the then 85-year-old paramount leader said he swam outside "for an hour a day"; the pictures released to the public of him in the water "conveyed a carefree, reassuring image to the world," wrote Harvard professor Ezra Vogel in his 2011 biography of the reformist leader. Later, in the 1990s, photos of Deng swimming there were used to counter rumors that he was deathly ill.

At nearly 70, Hu is much younger than Mao and Deng were, as both men kept the seat of power warm well into their 80s. (Jiang stepped down as president at 76.) Although thought to be diabetic, Hu is seen as healthy. But Hu, a stiff, diffident apparatchik, also lacks his predecessors' athleticism, ease, and charisma. Despite rumors that he was "a mean dancer at Tsinghua University in the 1960s," Hu "is not a physical man," says Kerry Brown, executive director of the University of Sydney's China Studies Center and author of Hu Jintao: China's Silent Ruler.

Hu's robotic personality at state and international functions might be a subtle criticism of Jiang, whose detractors criticized him for embarrassing China with his buffoonish behavior abroad, including singing a karaoke version of Elvis Presley's "Love Me Tender" at an Asia-Pacific summit in 1996. Hu acts so constrained that one European head of state, after a visit with Hu, called him the most boring person the leader had ever met, according to a person briefed on the conversation.

But it's not just personality holding Hu back. The president's evident lack of interest in swimming might also have to do with the changing nature of Chinese leadership, an American academic who asked to remain anonymous told me. Unlike his flashier predecessors, Hu must govern by consensus -- he doesn't have the clout to stage an event rich in symbolism like public swimming. "Maybe no one covered it when he swam because if you let other people do that, you have to give them something else," said the academic.

A lack of willingness to share the spotlight might have led to Bo's downfall. Bo's Mao-style campaigns in Chongqing, where he sent text messages of the Great Helmsman's quotes to millions of cell phones across the municipality and encouraged thousands of people to meet to sing Cultural Revolution-era songs, worried other leaders who thought he was becoming too transparently ambitious. Bo also reportedly liked to swim; in a 2009 speech in which he accepted the honorary chairmanship of the Chinese Swimming Association, Bo quoted a line from a Mao poem about swimming: "With confidence man can live 200 years, and can swim 3,000 li."

It's anyone's guess what kind of leader Hu's heir, Xi, will be and whether he has the confidence that Mao and Bo shared, but he seems like a step up in the charisma department. In a written question-and-answer session with the Washington Post in February, Xi said, "I like sports, and swimming is my favorite."

中共前最高领导人毛泽东、邓小平和江泽民都喜欢游泳。即将上位的习近平今年访美时透露自己最喜欢游泳。中共建国以来，领袖游泳不但可以展现个人魅力和情怀，还能驱散一些涉及领袖健f康问题的捕风捉影的谣言。自从1997年江泽民在夏威夷海滩纵情畅游后，中共高层领导人鲜有公开游泳。美国《外交政策》14日发表文章称，胡锦涛之所以不愿公开游泳，除了个人低调的性格之外，还透射出中国政坛的一些玄机。

　　美国《外交政策》杂志副主编费什(Isaac Stone Fish)8月14日撰文，历数中共领导人的“游泳爱好”，尤其是他们在某个关键时期游泳。但胡锦涛担任国家主席以来，中共高层还没有出现穿着泳装高调亮相的领导人。

　　费什此前是《新闻周刊》驻北京记者，长期关注中共官场及西藏等热点议题。
　　文章称，毛泽东喜欢在北戴河游泳是相当出名，为了证明他的健康，他可以不顾医生和警卫的劝阻“沿河漂游数英里”，1966年畅游长江更是一次极富象征意味的出游；邓小平的1989年之夏也是在北戴河度过，当时这位85岁高龄的领导人据说“每天要游一小时”。当年一大背景是“六四事件”，而邓小平相关游泳照片公开也传达了这位领袖“气定神闲”（reassuring）的心态。

　　费什在文中指出，江泽民也曾有过以游泳证明自己的时候。在1997年香港回归的交接仪式上，江泽民在一些人看来有些“不太健康”（look unhealthy），但在1997年历史性访美的第一站，江泽民就在夏威夷的维基基海滩（Waikiki Beach）上通过游泳斥退了这种传言。

　　据《纽约时报》1997年的报道，江泽民在上岸后显得“强健”（robust）和“精力充沛”（vigorous），而且还少见地笑答了美国记者隔着保镖的大声提问。他当时有点兴奋地说自己游了一公里，很喜欢夏威夷。

　　当时陪同江泽民游泳的还有其心腹曾庆红。《纽约时报》称，作为江的“特别助理”，曾庆红喜好蝶泳，但泳姿“独具一格”，在游泳时还戴着自己的墨镜。

　　而在游泳方面，现任国家主席胡锦涛似乎不如自己的3位前任那样热情。当然，费什认为，胡锦涛的健康完全良好，也比以往的领导人更年轻；但胡似乎缺乏前任们的闲逸心态和超凡魅力，以及崇尚运动的热心。

　　费什称，在一些外界分析看来，胡锦涛低调、沉稳，不苟言笑，甚至有些“呆板”（stiff）。胡锦涛在国内外的各种公开活动中都显示其性格中“机械”的一面（robotic personality）。尽管此前有传言说胡锦涛在清华大学读书时曾参加过舞蹈演出，但据悉尼大学中国研究中心主任布朗所说，“胡并不是一个善于打动人心的人”（not a physical man）。

　　当然，胡锦涛也有过一些展示个性的时刻。他曾在全国文联的大会上倾情演唱《莫斯科郊外的晚上》，还曾在两岸青年联谊会上随着“电音”起舞。这些少有的个性展示都成了媒体的热点，并为中国百姓津津乐道。

　　除了费什所提到的，胡锦涛还曾在2009年60周年国庆天安门文艺晚会上秀舞姿。

　　然而，费什认为，胡锦涛多数时候还是保持一种正襟危坐的威严姿态。在费什看来，这种不显山露水的低调做法似乎暗藏某种玄机。人们都还记得，江泽民1997年在夏威夷时还曾倾情演奏钢琴；在1996年的亚太领导人峰会期间演唱猫王普莱斯利（Elvis Presley）的歌曲“温柔地爱我”（"Love Me Tender" ），可谓是个性十足。

　　因此，费什认为，胡的低调处事很可能是出于对前任领袖微妙的不认同（a subtle criticism of Jiang）。胡在国外的各种场合也是出了名的低调。一位欧洲领导人曾表示，胡是他见过的“最枯燥”（the most boring person）的大国领袖。

　　而更重要的是，据一位美国学者分析，胡锦涛之所以不愿公开“秀泳姿”还有性格之外的其它重要因素。这位学者认为，这大概与当今中国政坛的政治态势有关。与其极富个人魅力的前任不同，胡锦涛是靠“共识”来统属高层（govern by consensus）。这位学者认为，胡锦涛即便是游泳恐怕也不会有相关报道。如果报道了他游泳，恐怕还要让其他人露露脸才“平衡”。

　　费什还分析认为，薄熙来的倒台恐怕也和这种不愿在聚光灯下过分曝光的政治氛围有关。众所周知，薄熙来是位耀眼的“明星级”政治人物，唱红打黑中的高调做法似乎彰显其过盛的政治抱负。而在游泳方面，薄熙来也很爱“出镜”，他是中国游泳协会的名誉主席，还曾吟诵毛泽东“自信人生二百年，会水当击三千里”的诗句。

　　费什认为，人们都在猜测，习近平在游泳上是否有毛泽东和薄熙来那样的豪情，但习近平的个人魅力已经初露端倪。他年初访美接受《华盛顿邮报》的书面采访时曾表示，自己很喜欢运动，有空时也会通过电视观看NBA比赛，而游泳是自己最爱的体育运动。

　　习近平当时说：“我认为，我们所有人都需要在工作和娱乐之间保持某种平衡，这能够让我们保持精力充沛的同时，帮助我们将工作做得更好。”