251 - Pot Kettle Black: Yugoslav Map of the Near-Collapsing US
“While on vacation in Dubrovnik, Croatia this summer, we ran across an old Yugoslav atlas which included this map on the entry for the US. My Serbo-Croatian isn’t so good so I don’t know the true details as to what it’s about, but it appears to be plans for a Russian invasion,” says Andrew, who sent in this map.
“Submarines labelled SSSR are on both coasts. The apparent flight paths of ICBMs are marked. Cuba’s soldiers and bases are indicated (…) If you can figure out more precisely what’s going on I’d certainly be curious, and I imagine that other readers would get a kick out of it.”
My Serbo-Croatian isn’t very good either, but the map does seem to speak the language of the Cold War. Guessing the exact year is complicated as national borders in the Americas have remained stable in the last few decades, unlike in other parts of the world, where they allow easier carto-dating.
A look at the actual legend of the map does allow for some closer dating. Item #3 (the red vertical stripes) indicates the pro-soviet regimes in the hemisphere – Cuba and Nicaragua. The inclusion of that second country limits the timeframe of the map to 1979-1990, the era when the Sandinistas were in control of Nicaragua.
Although the Soviet navy has got the North American continent completely surrounded, in my opinion, the map does not demonstrate a Soviet plan of attack, but restates the Communist ideological orthodoxy of the US as an aggressive, unstable monstrosity at near-collapse – a remarkable example of the pot calling the kettle black.
• Whereas blue indicates the US itself (Sjedinjene Americke Drzave, acronym SAD – but that is a coincidence, I presume), yellow indicates ’separatist’ forces at work in the North American continent, such as Quebec (although that is a Canadian, not a US issue) and Black Muslims (around Chicago) and Mexican-Americans (in Texas). Again, a pretty remarkable comment, coming from a Yugoslav atlas.
• Item #5 on the legend indicates, I think, ‘disputed’ marine boundaries, mainly between Canada and the US, thus misrepresenting the mainly friendly relations between those two countries – the disputes might be real, but their significance is relatively minor.
Anyone able to elucidate on the meaning of the other symbols? Please do!
I think it is interesting on how misplaced Los Angeles is. It’s like 300 miles too far north
Comment by Robert — March 5, 2008 @
I like how they’re hitting Albany with an ICBM and not NYC. Makes me want to move to Vermont.
Comment by Stewart — March 5, 2008 @
Note the line of what look like “Y”s that runs between misplaced LA and the general area of Prudhoe Bay, Alaska. Wildly exaggerated Trans-Alaska Pipeline?
Comment by UberMitch — March 5, 2008 @
But why would the Russians call them ICBMs? I would think they had their own name for these missiles.
Comment by karl strom — March 5, 2008 @
I think that icbm headed for Albany is really meant for Groton, Ct to eliminate the submarine base there.
I also noticed in the text above the map itself, extreme left side, above the rump of Siberia, something about 7,000,000 km followed by (1984), so I would presume that it would be between 1984/5 and 1990.
Comment by jon — March 5, 2008 @
Fascinating! It’s probably after 1984, since that date is mentioned in the text up the top. I’m sure you’re right that parts of the map are intended to show that the US has separatist elements, and that there are border disputes with neighbours, but there are too many military elements for it to be only that.
The ICBM paths, for example. Those blue asterisks in northern Canada represent the DEW Line (distant early warning radars). The black zigzags with the numbers next to them would seem to be naval blockades (the caption at the bottom seems to refer to a Hudson Bay blockade), with the red and blue arrows being attempts by Soviet and US Navies (respectively) to break them — though why there would be an anti-US blockade across the Gulf of St Lawrence, I don’t know, unless the mapmaker assumes that the French navy is sallying force from Miquelon and St Pierre to defend free Quebec (!) There seems to be a bomber or cruise missile flight path marked from the Beaufort Sea to Los Angeles, avoiding major cities (for a sneak attack?)
So I think it is meant to show all military threats to the US. Or possibly a NATO breakup with the US at odds with its former allies, with the USSR swooping in to attack one or both sides. Something wacky like that.
Comment by Brett — March 5, 2008 @
Maybe it wasn’t a textbook atlas…
Just a really elaborate guide to a board game…
like Risk.
Comment by sohojinks — March 5, 2008 @
Maybe ask the submitter to send in a scan with the legend and all, we might be able to piece it together a little better even without tranlators.
Comment by Michael Newton — March 5, 2008 @
This is obviously someone’s speculation about “How the USA and USSR might come to war!!”. There are enough cartographic, logical and political errors to undermine its professionalism. I’m curious why it was done for Croatian readers (not Serbs). I don’t think Croats ever shared the Serbs’ affinity for Russian expansionism. After all they were some of the Nazis best clients.
Comment by Drew Robertson — March 5, 2008 @
The bottom text reads:
CURRENT GEOPOLITICAL RELATIONS:
1. National area of USA
2. Areas where there are significant signs of separatism
3. States in close proximity to USA which favor USSR
4. National boundaries
5. Contested boundaries on the sea (followed by the numbered list)
6. Main nautical routes
7. Possibility of blockading a nautical route (followed by the numbered list - the only one I can read is “(4) blockade of Hudson Bay”
The rest is cut off.
Comment by IvanT — March 5, 2008 @
The upper yellow circle reads “crni musulmani” = Black Muslims. Well, I don´t know: were L. Farrakhan´s followers such a major separatist force? And located around Chicago?
Comment by -rip- — March 5, 2008 @
If you like, I can translate it, but there is little text there. if you have a bigger scan of the map I can translate the rest of the legend for you, but from what I can see, here is the translation:
1. USA state territory
2. areas where seperatist (presumably armed) movements would be supported
3. pro-soviet states near USA
4. state borders
5 Sea borders
(1) George Bank
(2) Beaufort Sea
(3) Dixons passage
(4) “Juan de Fuca” Canal
(5) northwest passage
(6) islands of St. Pierre and Miquelion
6. Main shipping routes
7. Potential Barricading of straits
…. (I can’t see the rest)
To me, it looks like a mockup of a reverse-geopolitical situation.
Some background:
Around the time this map was published (it was past 1984 in my opinion, I’m thinking maybe 89/90) there was a general belief among the Yugoslav populace that the USA was trying to foster the breakup of Yugoslavia by lending financial and military support to seperatist elements in the country.
My speculation:
This map reverses the situation, with the USSR
lending its support to separatist elements inside the USA, the idea being that these separatist elements would distract the USA Forces before a direct USSR attack.
The legend talks about blocking all naval routes , while the ICBM’s all seem to be targeting radar/communication stations (I think they are radar/communication stations, that part of the legend is missing).
How I perceive what is going on:
* Initially armed separatists emerge to demand independence, and commence fighting for it. The US military moves to engage these forces, thereby letting their guard down of external threats. (Note that none of the areas marked for separatist action is on the northern border with Canada. I think the idea is to draw away forces from the North of the border.)
* While the US is fighting inside its own border (I presume the ideal for the USSR would be all out Civil war within the US) the USSR Navy would block <> traffic in and out of North America, thereby stifling its resources. This would probably be in tandem with ICBM strikes on the radar/communication systems, followed by (I presume) an all out invasion from the USSR, coming down through Canada, through the Canada-US border into the USA proper.
As for Brett’s comment above, I don’t think the USSR see France as a military threat. I think the blockade is more to do with just plugging every potential naval access for the US. If you see every single land and sea border in the entire North American region is blocked. You have pro-USSR forces moving upward from Mexico, both east and west coast areas covered, while the actual USSR army would come down from the North.
Comment by ogi — March 5, 2008 @
Looks like quite a good plan
Comment by Jonny — March 5, 2008 @
Meh, we’d have been ready for them.
Wolverines!
Comment by TimThompson — March 5, 2008 @
I don’t think it’s so much a map of the breakup of the US. I’m inferring from the “contemporary geopolitical” bit. It seems to indicate the existing (at the time) geopolitical problem areas in and around the USA (insomuch as they could lead to it’s breakup, yes - it could be a map of the breakup). There’s no timeline as such, only a list.
It’s more like, say, a current map of Africa marking out conflict hotspots, Chinese, Indian, US, European and Japanese interest spheres, etc.
For example: “glavni pomorski pravci” indicates major naval trade routes - and therefore major routes that the US has to keep open.
Comment by Lukc — March 5, 2008 @
I think it’s part of the script to Red Dawn.
Comment by bob_vinyl — March 5, 2008 @
The dark blue areas on each coast and near Chicago and New Orleans…are those indicating the main population corridors?
Comment by Karl — March 5, 2008 @
Question for people who know this language: Is there a reason why El Salvador is just “Salvador” ?
Comment by Lurker — March 5, 2008 @
This is probably a good reflection of Yugoslavian anxieties. I can’t imagine the Black Muslims in Chicago ever being any sort of political threat. Yet the Muslim population in Yugoslavia were a significant minority with political clout.
Comment by El Santo — March 5, 2008 @
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Yeah wolverines! Although it was cuban & russian paratroopers bailing out of commercial airliners…
Comment by RalphCipipici — March 5, 2008 @
Chicago is as strategically significant as Dresden was in WWII. Why would any hostile foreign power bother with the strategically insignificant Midwest? If the Yugoslavs wanted to bomb a muslim area, they would be better off bombing Detroit.
The white arrows coming out of Mexico represent the invasion of the Mexican worker/civilian army, which continues to this day.
Comment by Ron — March 5, 2008 @
No ICBMs for the Bangor base in Washington? Aw, c’mon! I always thought Puget Sound was a likely target…
Comment by Lukobe — March 5, 2008 @
I suspect it might be related to the upset when in 1988 US President Ronald Reagan issued Executive Proclamation 5928, which officially increased the outer limit of U.S. territorial waters from three to twelve miles (54 Fed. Reg. 777).
I recall at the time issue of Soviet subs coming up to the 12 mile limit was considered a threat by “hawks” at the time. Much international upset fell out of the unilateral decree.
Comment by Bryan — March 5, 2008 @
In response to Karl (post no 17) I also wondered whether the darker blue areas refer to population density. It does look like they would be targeting those areas to kill the maximum number of people.
However, their knowledge of US geography was probably as patchy as mine. I would have expected to see dark blue shading round areas like Mimai and Seattle too.
Comment by Pat — March 5, 2008 @
There’s a yellow (seperatist) circle surrounding Florida, as well. Perhaps a presumed Cuban uprising? (the politics of actual Florida Cubans notwithstanding…
Comment by Ian — March 5, 2008 @
The map is post-1981 as it shows an independent Belize. Interesting that it shows the Canadian Queen Charlotte Islands of the coast of British Columbia as American territory
Comment by Jacob — March 6, 2008 @
Pat: Migration in the US has tended to the south and west, so I’m wondering if Florida just wasn’t as rich a target 20+ years ago.
http://www.cast.uark.edu/local/catalog/national/html/Population.htmldir/USpop1980.html
This 1980 map makes it look populous, but not as much as the BAMA. It looks more dense than New Orleans-Houston, though, so who knows.
Comment by Bill — March 6, 2008 @
It looks more like the emphasis is on trade disruption. The blockades are on trade routes. That’s why the Gulf of St. Lawrence is marked. It leads to the port of Montreal. Same with Hudson Strait and the gaps between Cuba and the mainland.
As for Russians coming down from Canada, the grey arrows go the other way. There are also arrows entering the US from Mexico, but there are no arrows indicating movement of Soviet troops.
Note the ICBM path lines have arrows at both ends, indicating two way traffic.
The cartographers knowledge of the west coast of North America seems to be shaky. Not only is LA roughly where SF should be, the Queen Charlotte Islands (Haida Gwaii) are marked as US territory with Dixon Entrance to the south, rather than the north.
Comment by paulmct — March 6, 2008 @
Being a resident of the dark area around New Orleans, Dallas, and Houston in the southern part of the US, my guess as to why that area is shaded would be that this is a center of oil production. There are lots of oil refineries located here, especially in southeast Texas. I’m assuming though that the shaded areas mean strategic importance.
Comment by Boznia — March 6, 2008 @
Re post #26: the yellow circle around Florida isn’t the “separatist” yellow, it’s number 11 in the legend. But what it means is cut out completely from the image.
Comment by Marc — March 6, 2008 @
“carto-dating”. I *love* that term! I have to use it in my everyday conversation (and, being a map geek, there’s plenty of opportunity, “everyday conversation” isn’t an exaggeration.)
And answer to 18: Same reason “Greenland” is called “Grenland” (or “Canada” is “Kanada”, or “Iceland” “Island”), that’s simply the name of the country in Serbo-Croatian. Remember, “El” means “The”, the name of the country translates to “The Salvador” (which I’ve seen on one or two poorly done English language maps), or, more precisely, “The Saviour”. A few countries in English begin with “The” (though I don’t know about how official it is), like The Bahamas and The Gambia, but they’re rarely depicted with the initial “The”. But the official name of the Latin American country in English is “El Salvador”. Maybe it’s official name in Serbo-Croatian is “Salvador”, I don’t know enough about the language.
Comment by David — March 6, 2008 @
A lovely map. Thanks for posting it.
At a glance, it seems to show what conventional analysis posited as the mechanics of the Soviet threat, with some geoplotical items thrown in too.
I think the point made that this map, “restates the Communist ideological orthodoxy of the US as an aggressive, unstable monstrosity at near-collapse” is spot on. Remember too that nobody in Yugoslavia or the Soviet empire would publish a real war plan- those things are secret, no matter how trivial or obvious.
I wish I had time to sort thorough all thats posted here and google the rest and produce a translation of the text on the pages.
Bill Abbott
1) The bi-directonal arrows labeled ICBM are curious- the radar dish #15 accurately shows the location for ABM radars or proposed ABM radars in the USA, but the places the ICBM arrows end in the USA aren’t rational strategic targets- none on Bangor as someone mentioned, nor Washington DC, for what its worth. Perhaps the intent is to show in a general way how ICBMs would travel to the USA without specifying where they’d be aimed.
OUR missiles are mostly located in North Dakota, with a few elsewhere, and abord submerged submarines. THough the arrows are bi-directional, there are no missiles in the areas they come from in the USA.
Two of the ICBM lines end in what could be battle radars, in Mass. and California, the later at Pt. Magu?
The wiggly lines #7 show choke points in the waters around the USA but also possibly the location of hydrophone arrays that would spot any transiting Soviet sub. The pink subs #12 marked SSSR adn their pink arrows #13 could be Soviet missile subs forward deployed for minimum warning time attacks, but no arrows support this. Maybe they are commercce raiders as suggested by Bill above.
What are the blue flowers #16, arrayed on the border of the Arctic ocean?
What’s the funny line #20? The pipeline for Alaskan oil?
If the shaded areas are dense population, then the ICBM tracks, #14, are aimed right at them. Its possible but I think the smart money was that Soviet targeting against the USA was counter-force rather than counter-value-
Leaders talked about Mutually Assured Destruction, but the spooks and military people who actually picked targets almost certainly aimed at items of military import- the other side’s missiles, command, control and intelligence, (what’s the third “c” in C3I?) I have to believe they’d have planned to bounce the green glass on DC and Cheynne Mountian and Bangor and all the rest MANY times before they *targeted* population. Not because they were nice but because they wanted to win. Killing civilians doesn’t win the war, it never has, with the possible exception of the Nazi attack on Rotterdam and the two US atomic bombs in Japan.
For example, the radar dish target in New England is probably the ultra-low frequency system continually sends “W e ‘ r e H a p p y I t ‘ s a l l f i n e” at a very low data rate to our subs. Should those messages stop, some think our sub commanders would fire, some thing they would be good americans and wait for proper authority.
Comment by Bill Abbott — March 6, 2008 @
To continue the answer to the missing “El”, Slavonic languages (of which Serbo-Croat is one) have no articles, so “El” or “The” are not reflected in translation. Though of course the name isn’t a translation (whereas the United States of America gets translated literally) cos that would be - the Serbo-Croat for “saviour” (I’ll guess something akin to “Zbawiciel”
and that would be just a weird name!
As for the map itself, you obviously wouldn’t publish an invasion plan, so my guess it’s meant as propaganda for domestic consumption, to show how weak and unstable the USA “really” was.
Comment by Cudzoziemiec — March 6, 2008 @
Bryan (24):
By 1988, the 12 mile limit on sea claims had become pretty much universal, with the US being one of the holdouts at three miles. Reagan’s proclamation, while seemingly belligerent, was actually bringing the US in line with the rest of the world’s nations.
Comment by godozo — March 6, 2008 @
Looking at the dark blue areas, my guess is that those areas would be the most important parts of the “SAD”:
New Orleans/Texas: Oil/Gas production
East Coast: The Megalopolis
Great Lakes Area: Industry
Southern California: Cultural Center
Comment by godozo — March 6, 2008 @
Drew (9): What makes you think this was aimed at a Croat audience? It may have been published in Croatia, but Serbs read books in Latin script.
Comment by Mira — March 6, 2008 @
I agree with comment 36 that these centers are havens for our resources.
I also concur with comment four that the ICBM trajectories can be best placed in these directions without receiving any response from military radars.
Mutually Assured Destruction is the end game of any country involved, so here is my take on what this map is trying to demonstrate.
The territories for resistance are probably the places that will have the most conditioned unrest after a nuclear attack.
The attack is not designed to attack military targets from the beginning. If it was a full-scale attack, it would escalate into MAD within probably 5 minutes, wiping out both countries within a matter of 3-5 hours, give or take some ICBM duds.
The placement of these bombs are there to destroy ( or at least cripple mightily) the manufacturing + water( Upper Midwest ) The East Coast ( Banking & World Corporate Systems), The West Coast ( Energy Tech/Comp Tech & Cultural, and the Gulf ( Dinosaur Energy).
But the placement of these ICBMs are not to get the military to begin a full-on nuclear war. Maybe since there are only 4 missiles ( or maybe they are just trajectories?) it stands to insight a crash and soon after a war without inducing the MAD retaliation.
From that, externally, the US would mobilize for war, but the bombs actually have done their job because they are placed in perfect position to spread the fall-out through the wind currents of the US. Where the one falls near Ottawa, the wind current will push the fall out back into the northern US territory, and destroy pretty much half of our water supply.
The bomb in the midwest would produce fallout where the current is soft in that region but will quickly permeate toward the southern coast. From this point the fallout will move up north, pretty much wreaking so much havoc on citizenry life that the military & state will have to intervene on the slow but lethal nuclear chaos.
The fallout in Los Angeles would go through both the Northwestern current and Southwestern current heading east. Within a few weeks, the agricultural sector of our country would be severely depleted.
Our country is in such disarray by such a small attack ( in comparison to a bigger one where the Russians try to take out our bases and radar ) that even if we do retaliate, the damage is too great for an army & nation-state system already spread around the world to consolidate itself back home and take care of business.
Then, the dynamic uprisings of separatists groups in two places compounded by ( I guess ) an unguarded Mexican border ( as usual ) that is invaded, then maybe you get a win.
Because of the threat of MAD, it would be foolish to make up a plan involving blockades and shipping routes when 1000s of nukes are going off. It would be hard to come up with a blockading contingency plan after both countries ( and maybe the world) are destroyed, so maybe this is the best plan someone created to take out the US without the MAD plan taking place?
I took my comments straight out of my bum. The only thing I contributed was the wind current theory and a zany story. But what a great post. Sudoku couldn’t keep me up this late.
Comment by redsoxmaniac — March 6, 2008 @
Don’t get too high on this map, calm down. It’s just a geopolitical what-if map, there are hundreds more. This is not an invasion plan, it’s just academic thinking about geopolitics and probable future events (back then). Something similar is done in the USA by RAND Corporation (I think). Map probably originates from Faculty of Political Sciences in Zagreb. Today there is course there named ‘Politicka geografija i geopolitika’ (Political Geography and Geopolitics) and it teaches students about political geography, geopolitical and geostrategic relations in the modern world.
http://www.fakultet.fpzg.hr/studiji/2008/politologija/3_semestar/pol_geodraf_i_geopolitika.aspx
Comment by rufus — March 6, 2008 @
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Its possible that the map was used as a kind of educational indoctrination. As Yugoslavia and the USSR seemed to be on the verge of collapse the educators tried to reinforce their positions by pointing out that the USA was equally divided and belleagured. It would also reinforce a population’s belief in its ability to defeat the potential enemy that America could be.
Comment by wulfstancrumble — March 6, 2008 @
Yes, I agree with 39 — we’re overanalysing this map a bit. There’s no way it’s any sort of official warplan or even based on one. (For one thing, Yugoslavia wasn’t even in the Warsaw Pact.) On the other hand, overanalysing is way fun.
12 (and others): you’re right, I was wrong, the blockades are (mostly) about trade — the blue arrows have arrows on both ends and aren’t labeled as navy, like the red ones. But some of the blockades would appear to be against Soviet subs, not US trade - eg Bering Strait, not a noted trade route! I guess the blockades against US trade are being carried out by the Soviet subs (it took me a while to realise that the ship symbol with the SSSR navy is actually a sub). Not France
33: the “blue flowers” (16) represent the DEW Line: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEW_Line
Also 33: the “funny line” (20) as an oil pipeline — hmm, interesting idea. I suggested above that it was a flight path for a sneak air attack but a pipeline could work better. But is/was there actually a pipeline going all the way down to LA? All I can find on the web suggests the oil from Prudhoe Bay gets piped down to the south coast of Alaska and then goes on to tankers (the Exxon Valdez was probably still operational when this map was made
Maybe it’s a proposed line though.
Comment by Brett — March 6, 2008 @
“but restates the Communist ideological orthodoxy of the US as an aggressive, unstable monstrosity at near-collapse – a remarkable example of the pot calling the kettle black.”
Sorry, but you are completely off on this one. As I sad earlier, this is just a geopolitical academic think tank/what-if map. It was not mass printed or used for propaganda, it was meant to be used by students and academic community. Yugoslavia was never a member of the Soviet bloc and there was no anti USA doctrine that would seek to present USA as a monster (not at least in the 1980’s and later). Communist regime in ex Yugoslavia was bad, but it was much lighter and flexible than in other communist states. If there were ever any chance of conflict between Yugoslavia and USA or USSR, it was way back in 1948 with the Soviet bloc, not USA and NATO.
Comment by rufus — March 6, 2008 @
how funny is this!
From what little text you’ve captured, the top part talks about the railroad and air traffic of the US and the bottom is just the legend of the map with a bit of what we’d call nowdays ‘terrorist cells’ or weaknesses
No clue as to what they used it for since when I went to school in Belgrade in the 90s, we didn’t use it.
It’s actually quite funny to see people puzzled by our translations of country names, especially of USA.
Comment by S. — March 6, 2008 @
[...] 251 - Pot Kettle Black: Yugoslav Map of the Near-Collapsing US « Strange Maps ‘in my opinion, the map does not demonstrate a Soviet plan of attack, but restates the Communist ideological orthodoxy of the US as an aggressive, unstable monstrosity at near-collapse’ (tags: maps 1980s Yugoslavia America politics) daily links | 6 March 2008 at 9:21 am | RSS « Links [...]
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I agree this was just an overall view of the situation at the time, for academic study. There was no actual strategy or plan, here. Any indications of potential conflicts or strategies were hypotheticals and not intended to be precise. So, I wouldn’t sweat about where the ends of any ICBM arrows are.
Comment by paulmct — March 6, 2008 @
I speak the language fluently and it’s difficult to tell what this really is without seeing the page or article in the full context.
So next time, scan or take a picture of an entire page so we can make a proper analysis and not a hypothesize. But jumping to conclusions without much regards for facts is a very American thing to do.
Comment by Memememe — March 6, 2008 @
Can you put the whole thing somehow?
Or can you say from which edition of atlas you took this picture…
Comment by technogenesis — March 6, 2008 @
My comment on number 38 was pure over-speculation; I totally concur with comment 42.
My view is that it is probably a geo-political class markup where maybe the test is to analyze future scenarios and contingency plans.
Comment by redsoxmaniac — March 6, 2008 @
I still am, you know - your greatest fan.
Comment by your greatest fan — March 7, 2008 @
Agreeing with Rufus. This is just a geopolitical study.
Comment by Lukc — March 7, 2008 @
Hello all, I’m the one who pestered my friend into taking a picture of the map and while I’m arriving a little late, I can respond to a few points people have brought up.
To everyone requesting a better scan/more context, I’m afraid that the source material is still in Dubrovnik, while I am not. Further details will have to wait for the next trip. At the time we were working with a no-frills digital camera, poor lighting conditions, somewhat glossy paper, and a big book that wouldn’t lay nicely flat, so I’m fairly pleased that we got as good an image of the map as we did. Besides, what fun would the comments section be if everything was completely clear?
To folks hypothesizing about the origins of the map, it wasn’t quite mass propaganda, but it certainly wasn’t a whitepaper or somesuch from a group like RAND. This was a pretty typical looking encyclopedia/CIA factbook of the sort that young children would use to write reports. The entry on elephants was not as interesting. Part of what so striking about the map was finding it included in such a book, akin to Encyclopedia Britannica including a list of which members of government are the most important to capture or kill in an article on Switzerland.
Being that it’s just an everyday encyclopedia, there’s also no question that it’s describing anything like a detailed plan of attack. This is the infographic that the Yugoslavian CNN might have showed, not anything folks in the government or military were looking at.
Anyways, glad that everyone’s enjoyed and helped shed some light on it!
-Andrew
Comment by Andrew — March 7, 2008 @
i think this is taken out of some old video game like medal of honour and printed lol Nancy
Comment by nancyjones28 — March 8, 2008 @
Hey Andrew,
I’m in Split and will be in Dubrovnik next month. Want me to take a better picture for you? email me at grhabyt at yahoo dot com
I could also get a better translation from one of my colleagues at the university here.
- Gwyan
Comment by Gwyan Rhabyt — March 10, 2008 @
i think its already translated well.. that it is taken from a some videogame lol.. http://nancyjones28.wordpress.com/
Comment by nancyjones28 — March 10, 2008 @
Okay guys, one thing to keep in mind here is some political context WITHIN Yugoslavia. Keep in mind that after 1948, Yugoslavia was not part of the Soviet bloc, and while relations warmed in the post-Stalin era, one of the cherished core tenets of Yugoslav foreign policy up to its breakup was its central role in founding the non-aligned movement. So chances are this has nothing to do with a Soviet invasion.
Second, the disintegration of Yugoslavia started for all intents and purposes with the death of Tito in 1980. After that, Yugoslavia adopted a rotating presidency among its 6 republics and 2 autonomous regions. That set up encouraged decentralization, and many of the republics used their turn at the presidency to strengthen themselves (and the politicians actually named to the post used it to make foreign trips). Such a weak system is what Milosevic used to his advantage, starting in 1989 with his speech on the 600th anniversary of the Serb defeat in the battle of Kosovo, to speed up the country’s break-up.
One of the consequences of the disintegration is that each republic’s academic institutions came under pressure to support the nascent nationalist movements that came to dominate Yugoslav politics in the last years prior to the break-up. So the fact that this comes from an “encyclopedia “of some kind does not necessarily mean it isn’t propaganda. That said prior to the collapse of Yugoslavia, books like encyclopedias also were centrally published in both Cyrillic and Latin versions.
So if I had to speculate, I would suggest that this dates from the late 80s, when Milosevic’s influence was ascendant AND central control over publishing remained. It probably was designed to show that nationalistic tensions were ripping other countries apart, including the US.
Comment by Charlie — March 10, 2008 @
I’m going to agree with a few others here, the map looks like it takes american “propaganda” and “agression” against serbia and flips it back onto the us (I’m rubber, you’re glue, etc).
Comment by Nygdan — March 12, 2008 @
Well, I happen to work there (Faculty of Political Science in Zagreb). My guess is that the author of the book - I’m not sure it’s a real atlas, the text and the map look more like from a book on geopolitics - is Radovan Pavic, Croatian writer on geopolitics, but other names come to mind too, e.g. Radovan Vukadinovic.
Comment by Marko — March 14, 2008 @
As a Quebecer, I can tell you for sure that french separatist forces in Quebec would NOT have helped the Russians against Canada, not event against the States. As much as we hate English Canada, we don’t hate them so much has to help a communist country invade us.
Besides that, separatists in Quebec are not militarized. It’s only a political force. So in a global war, we would put our differences asides and help the US. Aborigene people are more militarized and more willing (maybe) to change government.
I see arrows coming from the US to Canada, and I guess it means that in the event of war, the US would invade Canada to better defend her borders against the Soviets. That means the real threat for Canadians would not be the Russians but the Americans.
Knowing Americans, it would not be a happy invasion force, canadian women and children would be raped and tortured. Pure speculation here from past events. Not that Soviet infantrymen would be more gentle.
The blockade of the gulf of St-Lawrence is for naval routes from the Great Lakes to the Atlantic. I heard that there are US Navy subs in the Great Lakes for an invisible launching platform away from soviet naval forces and attack subs.
The map is pretty accurate concerning radar site. The big phased array radar in Montana is depicted, there is also some radar sites in Quebec. The old radar line from the 50s is not there anymore, as are the BoMarc missile sites in North Bay Ontario and La Macaza Quebec (with US nuclear warheads under US supervision very well thank you) dismantled in 1972.
Comment by Quebec Liberation Army — March 14, 2008 @
Lol
Did anyone notice the area “crni muslimani” aka black muslims, haha!
Comment by Amel — March 15, 2008 @
The “1″ in a circle, “George Bank”, off the East Coast –
That is “Georges Bank”, an important fishing ground. It is not as productive as it once was, and the fishermen (and fisherwomen) of the US and Canada do have an ongoing dispute on who should have greater access to it.
It makes me lean more to thinking of this as a map related to troubles the US has, within and without.
To the folks thinking of going to the source and getting a better scan, thank you! We would be very interested.
To #16, the “Red Dawn” thing had occurred to me as well. But in that movie, by the time of a US invasion, Mexico and many other countries had already gone socialist/communist.
Comment by tom tac — March 15, 2008 @
I’m wondering if the dark blue was meant to show where black Americans lived, as it was a common belief in Eastern Europe that if American society crumbled the blacks would revolt.
Comment by Charlene — March 18, 2008 @
[...] Post by strangemaps. Read full post. [...]
Pingback by 251 - Pot Kettle Black: Yugoslav Map of the Near-Collapsing US | Blog Feed Aggregator — March 19, 2008 @
I speak Serbian, so I could translate the text which surrounds the map - if someone has it? There was an article in Greek , newspapers “ta nea” on Saturday about this map, with request for further information.
Comment by Anna — March 23, 2008 @
[...] is apparently a Yugoslav Map of the Near-Collapsing US. The The apparent flight paths of Russian ICBMs are marked on the map. Go read about it. Very [...]
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