很少有人像李光耀察觉到苏联衰败的迫在眉睫。

 

1981年5月的一次演讲也同样体现了他对苏联体制的预见性和清晰性。

 

A May 1981 speech likewise captures his prescience and clarity with respect to the Soviet system:

 

二战结束36年后，我们知道，

在西方自由企业/自由市场民主

与

共产主义指令性经济/控制性分配的较量中，

共产主义制度正在失败。

它无法提供货物......。

 

Thirty-six years after the end of World War II we know that in the contest of Western free-enterprise/free-market democracy versus communist command economy/controlled distribution, the communist system is losing. It cannot deliver the goods . . .

 

除非这场竞赛以核武器的相互摧毁而告终，

否则结果将是那个在为其成员提供更多安全和更多经济/精神福祉方面更胜一筹的体系得以生存。

如果西方能够阻止苏联通过其军事优势轻易获得战利品，

那么由个人主动性和激励机制组成的自由市场体系，

将被明确证明优于中央计划/控制的市场体系。

 

Unless this contest ends in mutual destruction by nuclear weapons, the outcome will see the survival of that system which is superior in providing both more security and more economic/spiritual well-being to its members. If the West can prevent the Soviets from gaining easy spoils through their military superiority, the free-market system of personal initiatives and incentives will be clearly proved superior to the centrally planned/controlled market system.[121]

 

十年后，在苏联解体后，李光耀的观点将成为传统的智慧；

当时，很少有人察觉到苏联衰败的迫在眉睫。

 

Ten years later, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, 李光耀’s perspective would become the conventional wisdom; at the time, few perceived the imminence of Soviet decay.