How to Answer the Cry for Help : * For Now Humanitarian Aid Is Best Bet

The Soviet Union makes no secret of its urgent interest in getting aid from the West. Its officials warn that without massive assistance the country’s stagnating economy could collapse, pulling down with it President Mikhail Gorbachev and his plans for reform and crushing the great hopes that have been raised for a calmer and more stable international order.

That argument has won a sympathetic hearing in Europe, especially in France and West Germany, whose leaders plan to raise the aid issue at next month’s seven-nation Western economic summit meeting in Houston. President Bush, who heretofore has scoffed at the notion of Western aid for Moscow, now indicates he’s at least ready to talk about it.

Certainly there’s a case to be made that strictly in its own self-interest, the West should do what it can to try to head off a Soviet economic collapse. What’s at issue is not saving communism, which is sick beyond any hope of revival, but a chance to forestall threatened domestic turmoil and its probable consequences, including the re-emergence of regressive rule in the Soviet Union.

Few would dispute the value of doing what can be done to help Soviet reformers gain time to effect changes, especially given the probable alternative. For if efforts to replace a thoroughly discredited system fail, if the reformers can’t deliver, there’s little doubt that it would be the most brutal and reactionary elements in Soviet society who would move to seize power, reimposing with whatever violence was needed the full and terrible weight of state tyranny.

What exactly might be done by Western donors?

Firm ideas are scarce for now, although it’s probable that at least a European consensus could take shape by the time of the Houston summit. Any U.S. contribution, given economic realities, would almost surely have to be limited to food and other humanitarian help. Far clearer is what the Soviets must do if they expect to invite significant outside aid. The major need is for bolder steps toward a reasonably true--not a “regulated”--market economy. Without such structural changes it’s inevitable that much if not most of any foreign aid given would be devoured by inefficiency and corruption.

President Bush is right in insisting on a second condition: It would make no sense for Western donors to deliver money or resources through the Soviet Union’s front door, while out the back door an estimated $5 billion in annual support continues to flow to Cuba. If the Soviets expect Western help, that subsidy has to stop. Congress, which must repeal or suspend certain laws before U.S. aid would be possible, undoubtedly shares that view.

What are the chances of a Western aid program for the Soviet Union? Better now, certainly, than at any time since World War II. But there’s still a lot to be done on both sides before that idea becomes a reality.