I believe that the view, which I learned from many, but above all from General Marshall and from Colonel Stimson, the Secretary of War, the view that they had that we would have to fight our way to the main islands, and that it would involve a slaughter of Americans and Japanese on a massive scale, was arrived at by them in good faith, with regret, and on the best evidence that they then had.

我相信，我從許多人那裡，但首先是從馬歇爾將軍和戰爭部長史汀生上校那裡瞭解到的他們的觀點，即我們將不得不戰鬥到主要島嶼，這將涉及大規模屠殺美國人和日本人。

To that alternative, I think the bomb was an enormous relief. The war had started in 1939.

對於這種選擇，我認為原子彈是一種巨大的解脫。戰爭始於 1939 年。

It had seen the death of tens of millions.

它見證了數千萬人的死亡。

It had seen brutality and degradation, which had no place in the middle of the 20th century.

這裡曾發生過野蠻和有辱人格的事情，這在 20 世紀中葉是不允許發生的。

The ending of the war by this means was certainly cruel, was not undertaken lightly, but I am not, as of today, confident that a better course was then open.

以這種方式結束戰爭當然是殘酷的，也不是輕率的，但時至今日，我仍不相信當時會有更好的辦法。

I have not a very good answer to this question.

對於這個問題，我沒有很好的答案。

Dr. Oppenheimer, nevertheless, with all the rationalization, with all the inevitability of the decision that history demonstrates to us, you and many like you who brought the bomb into being still seem to suffer, may I say, from a bad conscience about it.

奧本海默博士，然而，儘管歷史向我們證明了這一決定的合理性和不可避免性，你和許多像你一樣帶來原子彈的人似乎仍然對此感到良心不安。

Is that true, sir? Well, I don't want to speak for others because we're all different.

是這樣嗎，先生？我不想替別人說話，因為我們每個人都不一樣。

I think when you play a meaningful part in bringing about the death of over 100,000 people and the injury of a comparable number, you naturally don't think of that as with ease.

我認為，當你在造成 10 多萬人死亡和相當數量的人受傷的事件中發揮了重要作用時，你自然不會認為這是一件輕鬆的事。

I believe we had a great cause to do this, but I do not think that our consciences should be entirely easy at stepping out of the part of studying nature, learning the truth about it, to change the course of human history. Long ago I said once that in a crude sense, which no vulgarity and no humor could quite erase, the physicists had known sin, and I didn't mean by that the deaths that were caused as the result of our work.

我相信我們有很大的理由這樣做，但我認為我們的良心不應該完全輕易地跳出研究自然、瞭解自然真相的部分，去改變人類歷史的進程。很久以前，我曾經說過，在一種粗俗和幽默都無法完全抹去的意義上，物理學家已經知道了罪惡，我指的並不是由於我們的工作而造成的死亡。

I meant that we had known the sin of pride.

我的意思是，我們知道驕傲的罪過。

We had turned to affect, in what proved to be a major way, the course of man's history.

我們轉而影響了人類的歷史進程，這一點已被證明是非常重要的。

We had the pride of thinking we knew what was good for man.

我們曾驕傲地認為，我們知道什麼是對人類有益的。

And I do think it has left a mark on many of those who were responsibly engaged.

我確實認為，它給許多負責任地參與其中的人留下了印記。

This is not the natural business of a scientist. You know, in the first days after Hiroshima, you pointed out that the scientists who built the bomb had nurtured the hope, really, that nuclear weapons, as you put it, would lead to new patterns of behavior.

這不是科學家的本職工作。你知道，在廣島原子彈爆炸後的最初幾天裡，你曾指出，製造原子彈的科學家們孕育了一種希望，真的，正如你所說的那樣，核武器會帶來新的行為模式。

Why has that hope failed of realization? Well, I think I may have said that then.

為什麼希望落空了呢？我想我當時可能已經說過了。

I think I wrote it recently.

我想我最近寫過。

I said two things, new patterns of behavior and new institutions.

我說了兩點，新的行為模式和新的體制。

I think that when you remember the manifest causes of conflict between the Soviet Union and the United States, which have bedeviled us for 20 years and which are by no means in any conventional sense solved, when you remember the ideological ferocity that animated the post-war communists that we see now in the Chinese unmuted form, you think of the anti-communist ferocity with which we met this, the notion that there is a telephone communication between the White House and the Kremlin to make sure that there are no misunderstandings is a damn new pattern of behavior. I think it's something that, almost without precedent, in wars and conflicts which have such a total character as that between the communists and the free world has tended to have, I think the notion that the United States should be fixing up its power to fight limited engagements on the ground and in the air with old-fashioned weapons that we hope are a little better than they used to be, not as a step in conquering the world, but as a step in giving a chance to think, to pause, to argue and to persuade before a holocaust, that's a pattern that I believe is not familiar either. When you think that for years the intellectuals of Russia were interested in France, the United Kingdom, the United States, have gotten together to talk to each other about the problems of armament and the problems of the application of science and the problems of maintaining the peace, this also is not quite something that is familiar.

我認為，當你回憶起蘇聯和美國之間衝突的明顯原因（這些原因困擾了我們 20 年，而且從任何傳統意義上講都沒有得到解決），當你回憶起戰後共產黨人在意識形態上的凶殘（我們現在看到的是中國的無聲形式），當你回憶起我們遇到這種情況時反共的凶殘，白宮和克里姆林宮之間通過電話溝通以確保沒有誤解的概念是一種該死的新行為模式。我認為，在共產主義和自由世界之間的戰爭和衝突中，美國應該加強力量，在地面和空中使用我們希望比過去更好一點的老式武器進行有限的交戰，這幾乎是沒有先例的、不是作為征服世界的一步，而是作為在大屠殺之前給人們

The institutions are not there.

機構不存在。

The patterns are faulty, frail, very vulnerable.

模式是有缺陷的、脆弱的、非常容易受到傷害的。

But there is a wind blowing. Dr. Oppenheimer, from all that you have said, it seems that when you contemplate the future, it is more with hope than with pessimism.

但有風在吹。奧本海默博士，從你所說的一切看來，當你思考未來時，更多的是希望而不是悲觀。

Or is that an oversimplification? Yes, I've tried to talk about the hopeful things.

還是過於簡單化了？是的，我一直在努力談論充滿希望的事情。

The unhopeful ones jump to everyone's mind.

每個人都會想到那些不抱希望的人。

Will the Chinese change their views of human destiny and of the relations between them and us before or after they have the power to make major nuclear war?

中國人是否會在他們有能力發動大規模核戰爭之前或之後改變他們對人類命運和他們與我們之間關係的看法？

It's anybody's guess.

誰也說不準。

Will the detente between the Russians and the West survive the strains of this time?

俄羅斯與西方之間的緩和關係能否經受住這次考驗？

Will they survive what's going on in Asia today?

他們能在當今亞洲發生的一切中倖存下來嗎？

We don't know.

我們不知道。

There are a hundred reasons for seeing no hope at all.

看不到希望的原因有一百種。

And I take it for granted that everybody can think of them without being reminded.

我理所當然地認為，每個人都能在不經意間想到它們。

It's harder to think of anything on the other side.

要想在另一面想到什麼就更難了。

And I have tried to say that however frail and however tentative and however limited, they do exist and they look to me like a bridgehead to a livable future, but not without work.

我想說的是，無論多麼脆弱，無論多麼試探性，無論多麼有限，它們確實存在，在我看來，它們是通向宜居未來的橋頭堡，但並非不勞而獲。