Having overcome years of anger and bitterness, Mr. Kinneman says he now feels ''the process of growing into our new lives is finished.''

He and his companion, Bitte, have three children and have scraped together enough money from their jobs at a day care center to make that most Swedish of all investments - the purchase of a summer cabin in the Baltic archipelago.

To endure in Sweden, Americans like Mr. Kinneman had to learn a new language, adapt to a different culture and eventually establish themselves as functioning adults, in nearly every case without having previously lived on their own.

Relationships Didn't Survive

In many cases they were isolated from relatives and friends who could not afford to travel to Sweden. Although some had wives or companions who joined them here, interviews and published studies indicate that none of the relationships survived the move to Scandinavia.

Although the exiles, as they initially called themselves, were denied political refugee status, they were welcomed far more than in Canada. Indeed, they were lionized in some intellectual and cultural circles.

''The United States is no longer the country to which rebels and revolutionaries flee,'' wrote Vilhelm Moberg, the author of ''The Immigrants,'' an epic novel about the journey of 19th-century Swedish peasants to the United States. ''Just this category of people are instead now leaving the U.S.A. and going in exile to Canada and Europe. For me, these Americans fulfill the great heritage of their country; in reality they are faithful to this heritage.''

'Such a Long Time Ago'

''It all seems like such a long time ago,'' said Richard Bailey, a 37-year-old inventory control manager for a small electronic components company in suburban Stockholm. He deserted from Southeast Asia in November 1967 with three other Americans and came to Sweden from Japan. Once here, the four came to prominence as activists against American policy and encouraged other American soldiers to desert. Only one of the other three, Michael Lindner, is still in Sweden; he works nearby as a carpenter.