GORBACHEV'S LEGACY

Author: By H.D.S. Greenway, Globe Staff

Date: Friday, December 27, 1991
Page: 15
Section: OP-ED PAGE

It is a story of such magnitude that few have been able to capture its essence. Perhaps The Boston Globe's Paul Quinn Judge came closest when he wrote of once-elite army units searching for new protectors and swearing allegiance to new republics, "like Roman legions in the fifth century."

The collapse is more than the break up of the 74-year-old Soviet Union, or even the 19th century empire of the Czars. It is more than the end of the Russia that Peter the Great consolidated in the 18th century.

Holy Russia began, grew and expanded from its Kiev-Rus heartland in what is now Ukraine. It is as Mikhail Gorbachev said: a thousand years of history that was discarded this week.

Few will miss the Soviet Union of the last 74 years, least of all those who lived under its monstrous tyranny. The experiment in social engineering that Vladimir Illych Lenin unleashed upon the world in November of 1917 -- especially when you add in the excesses of his disciples, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot -- caused more misery and murder than any other political movement in this century.

One wishes the new union of like-minded republics well. Considering their history, their evolvement has been remarkably painless and bloodless. But, of course, they are not like-minded, and fragmentation is likely to continue.

The future for many may be written on the bullet-pocked walls of Tbilisi where, at this writing, an elected leader cowers in the cellar while heavily- armed rebels outside howl for his head. Georgia's President Gansakhurdia may be no model of democracy, but events in Georgia give an indication of how power is going to be transferred in some of these newly sovereign republics.

Professor Stephen Cohen of Princeton says that the maneuvering between the former Soviet republics is nothing more than a scramble "for power and property." Despite assurances given to Secretary of State James Baker, no one can say for sure which of the nuclear armed republics will keep the agreements reached so painstakingly with the United States.

Winter has descended over all the Russias. People haven't enough to eat. The West equivocates on emergency aid and Eduard Shevardnadze, who predicted last August's coup, says he fears mass uprisings in these lands that have never known democracy or freedom.

The aspirations of Mikhail Gorbachev, who wanted to reform his country but keep it intact, have gone for naught. Will he be remembered as a transitional figure who was, ultimately, unable to either comprehend or control the forces that had been loosened -- alongside Alexander Kerensky who took over from the Czar only to lose to the Bolsheviks?

It may seem so to him now. A sense of failure and regret came through his Christmas Day abdication speech -- especially in his sorrow over his people ''ceasing to be citizens of a great power." Certainly, if man in the street interviews can be believed, the former Soviet peoples consider him a failure.

History will be kinder. The Nobel prize he received for ending the Cold War was well deserved. Every man, woman and child in this country should be eternally grateful.

His statue should stand in the center of every east European capital; for it was Gorbachev who allowed them their independence. The same is true for the newly independent countries further east and in Central Asia. No Russian has done more to free his people from bondage since Alexander II who freed the serfs.

Maybe he did cling to power too long, and maybe he put too much faith in communism and its ability to reform. But his place in history has been assured.

It is a pity that there cannot be some larger role for him in the world, such as Secretary General of the United Nations. He has said that he won't ''hide in the woods," but it is unlikely that his former rival, Boris Yeltsin, will find use for his considerable talents.

One hates to think of him as a performing bear in some American think tank, as Harvard, Boston University and Stanford would have him. Better a dignified exile in his own country.

greenw;12/26 NKELLY;12/27,13:56 HDSG27