Soviet Union Knell of the Union?

By Jill Smolowe

After four days of pitching their hastily improvised vision of a loosely knit union of sovereign states to wary Soviet legislators, Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin tried to sell an equally skeptical audience on the viability of their new enterprise. In an extraordinary live broadcast orchestrated by ABC television that linked U.S. viewers with the Kremlin's St. George's Hall, the Soviet and Russian presidents sought to allay American fears that there would be any backsliding toward communism.

"I think this experiment that was conducted on our soil was a tragedy for our people," said Yeltsin.

"That model has failed," concurred Gorbachev. "I believe that this is a lesson not only for our people, but for all peoples."

Playing up their new partnership, the two leaders smiled and quipped before the cameras, alternately deferring to each other. But as they fielded American viewers' questions, the underlying tension in their respective agendas was palpable. While Gorbachev repeatedly stressed the need for "cooperation" between the republics and for a new central order, Yeltsin preferred to press the interests of his Russian state.

What, then, to make of the legislative spectacle in Moscow last week during which a re-energized Gorbachev delivered the coup de grace to the mortally wounded carcass of communism? Working in concert with Yeltsin and the leaders of nine other republics, Gorbachev rammed through laws that both eradicated the final traces of authoritarianism and erected a shaky central structure to guide the republics toward confederation. After four days of acrimonious wrangling, the Congress of People's Deputies endorsed by a vote of 1,682 to 43 a sketchy transitional government that establishes an executive State Council and two subordinate bodies, a reconstructed parliament and an Inter-Republican Economic Committee. In tandem, and largely at the sufferance of the increasingly restless republics, the task of these organs will be twofold: to provide the glue that maintains some semblance of unity and to convince the world that there is still a there in Moscow with which to deal.

While the overwhelming vote gave the impression of slowing the Soviet free fall precipitated by the Aug. 19 coup, the newly created bodies were ill defined and presented only a stopgap solution. It was impossible to predict how much of a counterforce they would exert against the centrifugal strains unleashed by the Big Bang of the failed coup. As it was, the first act of the State Council, a body made up of Gorbachev and the top officials of 10 republics, was to grant independence to the three Baltic republics. The move, which a mere month ago would have dazzled the world, last week seemed belated and inevitable, coming four days after the U.S. had extended formal recognition to Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and scores of other nations had already done the same.

At best, the transitional government can buy time as the splintering Soviet Union struggles to enact sweeping free-market reforms that must be centrally coordinated if the republics hope to bring their bankrupt economies into the 20th century. The rump authority can also try to write a new constitution and serve to persuade an international community that progress is being made on such crucial matters as the upholding of treaty obligations, nuclear disarmament and economic reform. "Let me tell you, the West is watching," Gorbachev warned the Congress last week. "If we are able to coordinate, unite within new forms, find new structures, the West will support us."

But will these republics, most of them freshly sovereign by self- proclamation, be able to unite in common cause now that the boot of the coercive state has been lifted? Last week's hard-won consensus left more questions than it answered. Who, for instance, will wield the greater influence within the State Council: Gorbachev or the republic leaders? Will there continue to be a need for a confederative President? Or constitution? Most important, how effectively will this new center check the disintegration of the union, and for how long can it hold? Voices of caution that proved prescient in the recent past sounded new alarms. Warned former Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze: "The struggle between the democrats and the reactionaries is not over."

That much was in evidence early last week as members of the highest legislative body in the land descended on Moscow for an emergency session. In reformist corridors, there were loud warnings of a pending "constitutional putsch" in which conservatives would rout Gorbachev from his presidency. But in one of those unpredictable twists that have become the breathless stuff of which Soviet history is made, it was Gorbachev who corralled the required two- thirds vote to consign the Congress to oblivion -- and it was the recalcitrant hard-liners who wound up complaining of an unconstitutional coup.

If Gorbachev's performance was a taste of the cracked empire's dawning democracy, it smacked of democracy by decree. Though the transitional plan was presented by Nursultan Nazarbayev, the president of Kazakhstan -- a clever ploy to underscore the new importance of the republics -- it was Gorbachev who cowed the Deputies into submission. Alternately shutting off microphones to silence opposition, flouting rules and berating the Deputies like naughty schoolchildren, Gorbachev imposed his will. On Day 4, he delivered an ultimatum. "If we can't agree on this, the Congress ceases to work," he said, making it clear that if all else failed, he and the republic presidents would push through the reforms by decree.

Meanwhile, hard-liners, threatened with the loss of their last remaining privileges, retreated behind the threadbare mantle of the Soviet constitution to press their demand that reforms proceed in a "legal" manner. It was an ironic line, coming from those who had overtly or passively backed the plainly unconstitutional coup attempt. In the end, their support was bought with what amounted to a bribe: the right to continue enjoying perks such as apartments and cars until 1994, when their terms would have expired, as well as salary payments worth $175 a month.

Old-fashioned conservatives were not the only ones agitated by the high- handed manner in which Gorbachev and the republic leaders railroaded their plan through the Congress. "We should stop treating the constitution like a whore, adjusting it to the lusts of any new ruler," argued Alexander Obolensky, a gadfly Deputy with a liberal bent. But such rhetorical arpeggios were offset by equally impressive flourishes from democracy-minded reformers who were not about to let a creaky constitution stand in their way. "It's not correct to say Congress was forced to its knees," radical Deputy Ilya Zaslavsky said, tweaking his colleagues. "This Congress was never off its knees in the first place."

Through it all, Gorbachev and his former political nemesis, Yeltsin, remained in lockstep. Gorbachev signaled both that he understood the tenuousness of his position and that he had no intention of crossing Yeltsin or any of the other republic leaders. "Today you have a President. Tomorrow you may have another President," he told the Congress midway through the session. "In any case, we are all one, side by side, and we shouldn't spit on each other." Yeltsin, in turn, allowed that Gorbachev had returned from his Crimea internment a changed man. "He found within himself the courage to change his views," Yeltsin said. "I personally believe in Gorbachev today."

Gorbachev apparently believed in Gorbachev too. Half bully, half beggar, he appeared fully recovered from the lack of political surefootedness that had attended his return from the Crimea. Gorbachev seemed to accept the reality that the transitional structure he had so forcefully championed severely circumscribed his powers as the nation's chief executive. He took easily to his self-created role as the Great Coordinator. It was a position that no one else could fill, and one that republic officials, perhaps overwhelmed by recent events, yielded gratefully. Gorbachev is "the man who unites all others," said Yuri Shcherbak, a leading Deputy from Ukraine. "In this he plays a critical role."

While Gorbachev's continuation at the helm now seemed assured for some time, it was difficult to tell what drove him. Pragmatism? Resignation? A determination to salvage what he could of his crumbling empire? And his crumbling job? "Gorbachev is a great believer in the precept that if you can't beat them, join them," suggested Sir Bryan Cartledge, a former British ambassador to Moscow. Perhaps. But no one in recent memory has reversed course with greater resiliency and panache. As Gorbachev intoned, "A new reality has emerged in the country," it was easy to forget that just three short weeks ago, he remained under the sway of communist stalwarts.

Yeltsin, by contrast, stepped back, ceding center stage after two weeks in the limelight. Singed by the outcry that he had touched off a week earlier when he precipitously threatened to "review" Russia's borders with other republics, Yeltsin perhaps understood intuitively that his role as leader of the new Russian nationalism precluded him from effectively playing the arbiter's role. To allay fears that Gorbachev might be acting as his front man for a resurgent Russia, Yeltsin promised that his gargantuan republic would not dominate any confederative structure. "The Russian state, which has chosen democracy and freedom, will never be an empire, neither a younger nor an elder brother," he said. "It will be an equal among equals."

It was a message aimed not only at fellow Deputies but also abroad, particularly at the Oval Office. The avalanche of decrees that Yeltsin issued in the immediate wake of the putsch, coupled with his initial high-handed treatment of Gorbachev, did much to undermine the goodwill and trust that Yeltsin had built with the Bush Administration during the heady three days of the coup. Wariness prevailed last week. "The man clearly has courage and political talent," said a White House insider. "But he's also clearly a demagogue and an opportunist, and we'd be fools if we didn't worry about those tendencies."

Last week the Bush Administration seemed confident enough of Gorbachev's continued stewardship not only to accord recognition to the Baltics but also to set forth "five principles" that would govern the U.S. response to the - rapidly shifting situation in the Soviet Union. Tipping its preference for a clearly delineated central authority that could oversee inter- and intra- republic conflicts, the Administration emphasized the need for orderly and peaceful change, safeguards to ensure the rights of ethnic minorities, and respect for international obligations.

There were hints that the U.S. Administration might soon venture further. Just hours after the Soviet legislature concluded its business, President Bush summoned his top advisers for a secret meeting. Discussion centered on concern that now that the Soviets had cobbled together a working relationship between the center and the republics, the Administration would no longer be able to drag its feet on economic and defense policy questions. Secretary of State James Baker argued forcefully, as he had at a Cabinet meeting the previous day, for a more aggressive program of economic aid that would go beyond immediate humanitarian measures. "Nationalism can turn to fascism," he warned the Cabinet. "If they move to fascism, or slip back to communism, we will get the blame."

While the demonstration of cohesion in Moscow dominated Washington's field of vision, there was ample restiveness in the republics to stir concern. Most alarming was the violence unleashed in Georgia when the republic's dictatorial president responded to mounting calls for his resignation by ordering a police crackdown. In the ensuing mayhem, at least five demonstrators and 21 police were wounded. Moldavia's Dniester region, populated largely by Ukrainians and Russians, declared its independence from the republic, which is moving to distance itself from Moscow and renew ties with neighboring Romania. To the west, in Chechen-Ingush, an autonomous republic of the Russian Federation, pro-democracy forces surrounded the parliament building and demanded that the government resign. In response, Soviet television reported, the region's president declared a state of emergency.

Even the Baltic republic of Lithuania gave cause for concern. Since early this year, the new government has exonerated at least 1,000 Lithuanians convicted by Soviet courts for allegedly collaborating with the Nazis. Although the republic denied that it had knowingly rehabilitated anyone guilty of genocide, the action provoked protests from Jewish organizations in the U.S. and Israel. It also left the Bush Administration in the uncomfortable position of warning against extrajudicial exonerations at the very moment Washington was renewing diplomatic ties with Vilnius.

Given the welter of events, the only certainty was that the various republics will improvise as they go, pushing the boundaries of their independence to see where the points of resistance may lie. The same can be expected of the freshly manufactured central structure, as it sorts out which republics will fully join in a new confederation and which will opt for either associate or observer status. Optimists predicted that having broken apart, the republics will fast recognize their joint interests. But if the new State Council unravels or is paralyzed by disagreement, the attempt to restore some coherence will be short-lived -- and a disillusioned populace may find new merit in the predictable positions of the old hard-line.

With reporting by James Carney/Moscow, Dan Goodgame/Washington and William Mader/London