(FORTUNE Magazine) – If Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev doesn't soon deliver some kind of pocketbook payoff to his long-suffering comrades, they could boot him off history's stage. What should the Bush Administration do to help? First, stop talking only about ''helping Gorbachev.'' U.S. policy should be to encourage the Soviets to take the essential great leap forward to the free market -- as fast as possible and regardless of who's in charge. Gorby's great, but he's no longer the most radical -- and certainly not the most popular -- of the reformers striving to build a Western-style economy on that stubborn socialist soil. Second, the U.S. should continue to avoid the kind of giant government-to- government cash transfusions advocated by the West Germans and French at the recent Houston summit. Never mind the risk of subsidizing the Soviets' still mighty military machine or their aid to Cuba, though both are legitimate worries. Without radical Soviet reform, such profligacy would be utterly wasted. Third, move fast to offer the Soviets such carrots as most-favored-nation trading status along with technical advice on things like setting up stock markets and commercial banks. Small dollops of targeted aid could also bring a big payoff. These might include the extension of U.S. government insurance to American companies doing business with the nascent Soviet private sector. Says Leningrad City Council Chairman Anatoly Sobchak, a leading free-market reformer: ''Everything begins and ends with individual enterprise.'' Only by fostering the spread of that awareness is the U.S. likely to serve the Soviets' long-term interests -- and its own.