After a delay that made some people impatient, President Bush this week granted official U.S. diplomatic recognition to the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia as independent nations. But the once-important act has been overshadowed in many ways by the virtual disintegration of the rest of the Soviet Union.

In fact, the term "union" may be a misnomer. What eventually may emerge from the current crisis certainly will be a smaller USSR with only 10 of the present 15 republics remaining as part of the nation.Even the word "nation" may be too tight a definition. The final result may be only a loose confederation of states with a weak central government. How weak is open to question, but the political power to reshape the country clearly resides with the republics at the present time.

The whole issue is being debated in Moscow this week by the Congress of Peoples Deputies. Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev used the occasion to declare that full independence would be granted to the Baltic states, making them the first to be given such status by the Kremlin.

This is a cause for rejoicing and is a sure sign of the end of the old aggressive Soviet Union.

However, there are complex economic, commercial, industrial and transportation ties and dependencies with the Soviet Union, as well as a large Russian minority population that has lived in the Baltics for decades since being resettled there.

All of these problems will have to be worked out with as little disruption and human suffering as possible. Haste won't be the best approach.

But haste is vital when it comes to the fate of the rest of the Soviet Union. Baltic-type independence for every republic would be a disaster. Some kind of stable structure must be built - and soon - before the country collapses into total disarray and economic and ethnic chaos.

Indeed, some ethnic groups may try to secede on their own. An Armenian area of the republic of Azerbaijan this week declared itself independent. With 108 ethnic groups, many of them with ancient grievances, there may be further splintering.

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Even without that problem, the idea of eight, 10 or more small, independent republics, each with its own currency, economy, language, flag, foreign policies, and restless minorities, would hardly be viable. In the short run at least, that would be a recipe for starvation.

The plan being argued in Moscow would allow the Baltics to go free, as well as Moldavia and Georgia. The remaining 10 would join a loose confederation giving the national government control over the armed forces and foreign policy and some kind of single economic structure. The independent states also would be asked to join the economic agreement. That would make sense.

Even if that can be brought off quickly, dozens of serious questions remain, including the makeup and responsibility of the armed forces, control of the thousands of nuclear weapons, harvesting and distribution of crops, control of natural resources, taxes, details of the political structure, and many more fundamental issues.

What emerges from Moscow in the coming days and weeks will be fraught with profound consequences for Russians, Americans and everybody else for decades to come. It will require more than rebels; it will require statesmen as well.

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