GULF WATCH: Day 37 : A daily briefing paper on developments in the crisis : Diplomatic Front:

President Bush left for Sunday’s superpower summit in Helsinki, Finland, where he is expected to tell Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev that the United States is prepared to use military force against Iraq if diplomatic and economic sanctions are unsuccessful. The Soviet foreign minister said Gorbachev would urge Bush to avoid taking unilateral military action.

A plane carrying 171 American women and children arrived in Amman, Jordan, from Baghdad in the first U.S.-arranged airlift of American citizens who had been trapped in Kuwait. The group was expected to return to the United States today or Sunday.

The United States is sending $12 million worth of emergency food supplies to Jordan to feed thousands of refugees from Kuwait and Iraq. The shipments include 20,000 metric tons of rice, 5,000 tons of wheat flour and 2,000 tons of vegetable oil.

Military Front:

In a reversal of longstanding U.S. policy opposing any Soviet military presence in the Middle East, a top Bush Administration official said Washington would welcome Soviet troops as part of the multinational defense force deployed in Saudi Arabia. Also, the Pentagon began advising soldiers being sent to Saudi Arabia to pack a portable FM radio to help relieve the boredom of their desert deployment. The government lifted a 12-ounce restriction on military mail to the gulf so the troops can receive shipments of movies, newspapers and library books.

Trade Front:

The exiled emir of Kuwait agreed to help bankroll the mounting cost of the U.S. military deployment in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia already has agreed to pay part of the tab, which some U.S. officials have estimated could top $11 billion in fiscal 1991.

The gulf crisis has caused gasoline prices to soar across the globe. Price hikes since July 30 range from 13 cents a gallon in Japan to 40 cents in France and Germany, the Energy Information Administration reported. Current prices, excluding taxes, range from 99 cents a gallon in America to $1.83 in Japan.

Crisis Indicators:

* U.S. troops on the ground: 70,000

* U.S. sailors aboard ships in region: 35,000

* U.S. warships in region: 50+

* U.S. reservists to be mobilized: up to 49,703

* Iraqi troops in/near Kuwait: 265,000

* Iraqi tanks in Kuwait: 1,500

* U.S. diplomats remaining in Kuwait: 9

* U.S. diplomats, dependents held in Iraq: 58

* Other Americans detained in Iraq

and Kuwait: 90

* Total Americans in Kuwait: about 2,200

* Total Americans in Iraq: about 300

* High temperature in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: 111

* Retail gasoline (U.S. average per gallon): $1.249, up $.005

* Wholesale gasoline (spot price per gallon): $1.033, down $.015

* Crude oil (spot price per barrel): $30.04, down $1.39

* Dow Jones Industrial Average: 2,619.55, up 23.26