In the months leading up to President Abdurrahman Wahid's removal as president yesterday, American State Department officials and the National Security Council developed a contingency plan that calls for the quick resumption of economic aid to Jakarta if his successor, Megawati Sukarnoputri, begins to carry out economic reforms.

"Things have been essentially frozen because of the incompetence of the Wahid government," one senior American official said. "Now the question is whether Megawati can execute promises that Wahid could not."

But the question, American officials say, is complicated by fears that Mrs. Megawati may use force to put down separatist movements. Several American officials have said in recent weeks that they are worried that the new president, to secure her position, will show less restraint when it comes to dealing with challenges to Jakarta's authority.

In recent months, the major International Monetary Fund program in Indonesia, begun during the Asian financial crisis, has essentially been in a state of suspension. Many private investors have fled. One senior IMF. official recently said, "We can't operate there efffectively until there is a government we can communicate with."

Speaking yesterday in Rome, where she was traveling with President Bush, Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser, said, "It is ours to try now to support the decision of the Indonesian people through their properly elected representatives." But she was not specific about what form that support might take.

She said she would urge the new government "to find peaceful ways to resolve the separatist tentions within Indonesia, to be respectful of human rights in doing so, and to really undertake economic reform in a very aggressive way."