Soviet Economic Aid in Southeast Asia: Threat or Windfall?

THE new Soviet diplomacy in Asia involves an active effort to extend economic aid to a select group of countries who qualify as non-allied with the United States, or, in some sense of the term, as “neutralists.” To date, the Soviet Bloc has made aid commitments in South and Southeast Asia of over $500 million to India, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Cambodia, and Burma. Virtually all the aid has been committed in the past two years; most of it since early 1956. TABLE 1 shows the size and character of the commitments.