USSR military infrastructure research in the territory of Latvia

Study of the Soviet Military Infrastructure in the Territory of Latvia

Juris Paiders

University of Latvia, Faculty of Geography and Earth Sciences

DOI: 10.22364/fg.16.12

Keywords: USSR military bases, classified information, secret information, topographic maps, censorship

Abstract

Questions about the Soviet military heritage objects, their military significance, their inclusion and their use in contemporary context are widely discussed in the scientific literature, however, the declassified sources available in Latvia do not cover the specialization of different military objects during the Cold War. Various sources of information about the military infrastructure of the USSR during the Cold War - information published in open publications, published and classified statistics, USSR military (General Staff) topographic maps, US intelligence declassified sources etc. are evaluated. The paper concludes that in the light of restrictions on censorship, materials published in Sovietera printed materials do not contain important information that could be used to assess the scale of the military sphere of the USSR and the impact of the military sector on economic development. Soviet-era USSR General Staff topographic maps do not fully cover information on the location of Soviet military installations. Significant sources for USSR military infrastructure research are US intelligence information, orthophoto images of Latvia and a topographic map of Latvia in the scale of 1:10 000.