The conflict in Cambodia, still unresolved in its thirteenth year, tends to obscure a range of other security issues in Southeast Asia, all of which involve China directly or indirectly and are of consequence to United States interests in the region. Fundamental to the security issues is the deep mistrust and suspicion of China on the part of the nations of Southeast Asia. This mistrust is rooted in two millennia of history during which China's haughty demeanor, expansionism, and powerful cultural attraction often touched its neighbors to the south. It has been magnified by the entrepreneurial zeal and interlocking financial networks of the overseas Chinese populations who are prominent in and often dominate the economies of Southeast Asia. Whatever political or security issues that now preoccupy the region's statesmen, the intentions of the Middle Kingdom to the north -1.1 billion population, as restless as ever - are never far from mind.
The existence of a common culture and the development of Nordic cooperation have promoted the image of an informal though genuine alliance among Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. Since even a united Nordic bloc does not have the resources to form an independent military factor in Europe, however, their respective security policies have long been vulnerable to great-power demands. Ever since the rise of modern Germany, security in the Nordic region has been dominated by the struggle between Germany and Russia. Thus the Finnish decision in 1990 to no longer consider as applicable the military restrictions of the 1947 Treaty of Paris may reflect a resurrection of the old struggle for influence in northern Europe between Germany and Russia. The deviation of the Nordic states from neutrality during World War II, however, was as much a reflection of public opinion in the Nordic countries as it was the reality of their geostrategic circumstances. Therefore, to the axiom that in a democracy the public gets the government it deserves may be added that the public also frequently gets the security for which it is willing to pay. The fate of the Nordic states during World War II may have been predictable from the percentages of state expenditures devoted to defense: Finland, 25 percent; Sweden, 17.5 percent; Norway, 11.5 percent; and Denmark, 10 percent.' Finland concluded that an attack could come only from the east and adopted a Northern Line policy in the hope that Sweden would help guarantee its security. This policy did not fail completely, as reflected in the fact that Sweden allowed arms from its own stocks to be delivered to Finland after 1939, including the antitank and antiaircraft equipment in which Finland was almost entirely lacking.2 Furthermore, when the Soviet Union attacked Finland, a Swedish Volunteer Corps was deployed in Finnish Lapland so that Finnish forces with battle experience could redeploy to the Karelian Isthmus, the only Finnish strategic troop movement during the Winter War of 1939-40.3 At the end of the war, there were about 8,000 Swedish volunteers in Finland. Military assistance from Britain and France, however, was
