Soviet Coup Seems to Have Doomed an Early Mideast Peace Conference : Diplomacy: The Kremlin, the talks co-host, is expected to be too preoccupied with pressing domestic matters.

Although Bush Administration officials insist that it is too early to make a final judgment, the coup in the Soviet Union seems to have dashed hopes for an early Arab-Israeli peace conference, Middle East experts said Monday.

The Soviet Union had been scheduled to serve as co-host with the United States for a conference in October that U.S. officials envisioned as the forum for an unprecedented series of face-to-face negotiations between Israel and its Arab adversaries.

In the aftermath of the ouster of Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, however, the Soviet Union is expected to be so preoccupied with internal matters that it will have little time for the subtleties of Middle East diplomacy. In addition, the United States may decide in the days to come that Moscow is no longer a suitable partner for the endeavor.

The Soviet Union played only a minor role in the painstaking diplomacy of Secretary of State James A. Baker III that secured at least tentative agreement to participate from Israel, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt and the Saudi Arabian-led Gulf Cooperation Council. But the negotiations were so delicately balanced that the deal may not hold together without at least the nominal participation of Moscow.

“You can take it for granted that the Middle East peace conference is blown out of the water,” said Edward N. Luttwak, a senior analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Few experts believe that the new Soviet leadership will return to Moscow’s Cold War support for radical Arab elements such as Syria, Iraq and the Palestine Liberation Organization. But the Soviet Union could resume saturation arms sales to the region, if only because it needs the money.

However, even if the Soviets continue to support U.S. policy in the region, the disruption in Moscow will surely dull the luster of the proposed peace conference, at which Soviet Foreign Minister Alexander A. Bessmertnykh had been scheduled to serve as co-chairman with Baker.

“Any joint project requires that their goals in the region be the same as ours,” said Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations during the Reagan Administration. “That has not been true for most of our history. It may have been true for a brief period, but it may not be true right now.”

Helmut Sonnenfeldt, a former State Department and National Security Council expert on Soviet affairs, said the Soviets may be unable to play a very positive role for the time being even if they want to.

“Bessmertnykh is an old Gromyko man, and he will do what he is told,” Sonnenfeldt said, referring to former Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei A. Gromyko. “But I don’t think we can count on them to be very helpful.”

After months of exhausting shuttle diplomacy, Baker persuaded Israel and Syria to agree to participate in the proposed conference. Although other issues were clearly more important, the expected participation of the Soviet Union was seen as an incentive to both Israel and Syria--although for starkly different reasons.

Israel welcomed Soviet co-sponsorship of the conference because Moscow was ready to restore diplomatic relations with it once the meeting convened. Israel has long sought normal relations with the Soviet Union, which severed diplomatic ties at the time of the 1967 Arab-Israeli War.

For its part, Syria sought to improve its relationship with the United States after it found that it could not sustain its earlier policy of belligerence toward Israel without Soviet weaponry and diplomatic backing.

William B. Quandt, a former National Security Council expert on the Middle East, said the coup in Moscow will distract both the United States and the Soviet Union for months to come, leaving little time for delicate Middle East negotiations.

“It will be difficult to generate a real head of steam behind the Middle East peace process,” Quandt said. “It is a matter of priorities, and the Administration has to concentrate on its relationship with the Soviets.”

At the same time, Quandt said, the Middle East parties will also be distracted.

“The Israelis will want to know what this will do to Soviet Jewish emigration,” he said.

“The new Soviet regime also could get back into aggressive arms sales to the Arabs, just to generate money that they will need. The moderate Arab forces will worry that this will throw the diplomacy off the track.”

In addition, he said, the Soviet coup “may raise the hopes of some of the hard-line factions that the Soviets will get back into the game as a counterweight to the United States.”

Perhaps most disappointing to Baker and his aides is that their diplomatic victory may be turned to ashes because of events in a nation that never seemed crucial to the process in the first place.

“The Soviet Union is not all that critical to a Middle East peace conference except for the opening ceremony,” said Arnold Horelick, a senior analyst of Soviet policy at the RAND Corp. in Santa Monica.

But without Soviet participation, that opening ceremony may never occur.