Will Take ‘Appropriate Responses,’ Bush Warns : Lithuania: The President weighs economic measures against Moscow if it carries out its threats.

The war of nerves over Lithuania’s independence movement neared a new and more ominous juncture Tuesday as President Bush warned he would take “appropriate responses” if the Kremlin carries out a threat to sharply curtail Lithuania’s access to Soviet natural gas.

Bush’s comments prompted Lithuania’s president to call for a stronger response from the U.S. President, but Bush said he is reserving more definitive action until U.S. officials determine that the Soviets have actually cut back the crucial gas deliveries to the breakaway republic.

“I want to be sure anything we do is productive,” Bush said. “There’s been dramatic change in the world, and I don’t want to inadvertently take some action that would set it back.”

At the same time, Administration officials indicated that the President would consider a variety of economic measures to retaliate against the Soviet Union.

These include discouraging U.S. investments in the Soviet Union or slowing U.S.-Soviet trade by delaying an agreement that would grant “most favored nation” status to the Soviet Union and thereby give it the best available terms on tariffs. Officials also would consider delaying support for granting the Soviet Union observer status in the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs, the 97-nation compact that governs world trade.

However, officials here said the latest developments have not jeopardized next month’s summit conference. President Mikhail S. Gorbachev is scheduled to visit Washington starting May 30.

“Gorbachev has shown a willingness to back off when he’s up against a wall,” said one Administration official, holding out the hope that the Soviets would not actually carry out their threat to reduce the flow of natural gas and to halt crude oil deliveries.

For his part, Bush reiterated his call for “dialogue, discussion and a peaceful resolution of this great difficulty there.”

The President, breaking his own rule against speaking to reporters during photo sessions with Oval Office guests, said at the start of a meeting with Honduran President Rafael L. Callejas that “we’re watching the situation very, very closely, and we are waiting to see if the Soviet announcements are implemented.”

“Clearly, these announcements are contrary to the approach that we have urged and that others have urged upon the Soviet Union. And we are considering appropriate responses if these threats are implemented,” Bush said, adding: “I’m going to leave it right there.”

Lithuanian President Vytautas Landsbergis said in an interview with Cable News Network that he would have preferred Bush to give a “very clear position as to Soviet Union dealings against our country.”

“This very clear position would be saying that (the) Soviet Union has no right in Lithuania, no constitutional or lawful rights, and all dealings of such kind would be considered as forms of aggression,” he said. “Mr. Gorbachev needs more strong, more clear words. We also.”

At the State Department, spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler praised Lithuanian efforts to step back from the angry confrontation with the Soviet Union that has been brewing since the Parliament in Vilnius declared the republic’s independence on March 11.

“A way must be found to defuse this situation and begin a process that can resolve it,” Tutwiler said.

“The Lithuanians appear to be making an effort to do precisely that. They’ve called for a dialogue in Moscow, and they’ve made it clear they’re prepared to discuss many of the issues and concerns that the Soviets have raised,” she added.

Bush’s comments, warning of “appropriate responses,” left some in the Administration unsure of what he meant. One official said that--because there was no evidence at that point that the gas supplies were actually being curtailed--it was “a little presumptuous to begin talking about appropriate responses.”