MAPS OF HISTORY · COLD WAR · MAPS BY YEAR · December 1991The Cold War, 1945–1991 · THE MAP IN DEC 1991
Map of the world in December 1991
The map the present inherits · Cold War
The world in December 1991: The map the present inherits. Since November 1989, 43 territories changed status on this map: including Russia (RSFSR), Ukraine, Belarus and 40 more.
DEC 1991 · THE COLD WAR, 1945–1991 These maps are reconstructed from published sources · North Atlantic Treaty: Algerian departments cease to apply from 3 July 1962 · Cliopatria v0.2.1 historical polities · Decolonization of Asia and Africa, 1945–1960 · United Nations Command: the 1953 armistice · NATO membership chronology · Natural Earth v5.1.2 country geography · The collapse of the Soviet Union · South Yemen: independence and alignment chronology · South Yemen: Soviet relationship, 1971 intelligence estimate
Source details NATO, treaty footnote 2. Historical treaty facts cited; no artwork or prose reproduced Cliopatria contributors / Seshat Global History Databank. CC BY 4.0 · Selected dated records; documented component selection, unions and shared-edge extraction. US Department of State, Office of the Historian. US government publication United Nations Command. Historical facts cited; no source artwork or prose reproduced NATO. Historical facts cited; no artwork or prose reproduced Natural Earth contributors. Public domain · Full source components and holes retained; documented historical unions and repairs. US Department of State, Office of the Historian. US government publication US Department of State. US government historical publication US Department of State, FRUS 1969–1976, volume XXIV, document 182. US government historical publication This political-alignment geography uses national and administrative extents; it does not map every military front. Modern-reference perimeters are explicitly recorded where no more suitable reviewed historical geometry was adopted. All source parts and holes are retained.
The Soviet, Yugoslav, Czechoslovak, Sudanese and other historical unions remove later internal borders. Occupation and armistice lines retain their separate meanings.
Dated assignments correct omissions across the legacy views: independent Algeria is non-aligned after July 1962; Greece and Turkey join NATO in 1952, and Spain in 1982. South Yemen is separate from North Yemen, with British administration before late 1967 and the Soviet-aligned Marxist government after 1969.
proxy: Natural Earth v5.1.2 contemporary reference · reconstruction: 1945–1991 · reconstruction: 1952–1991 · reconstruction: 1953 · reconstruction: 1960–1991 · reconstruction: 1976–1991 · reconstruction: Late 1991 · vector: 1953–2023 · vector: 1958–1959 · vector: 1969–1975 · vector: 1987–2005 · vector: 1987–2023
Layer records and reconstruction methods
What changes on the map Russia (RSFSR) USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Ukraine USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Belarus USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Estonia USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Latvia USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Lithuania USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Moldova USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Georgia USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Armenia USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Azerbaijan USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Kazakhstan USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Uzbekistan USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Turkmenistan USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Tajikistan USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Kyrgyzstan USSR & Warsaw Pact → Non-aligned & neutral Poland In upheaval / changing sides → Non-aligned & neutral Hungary In upheaval / changing sides → Non-aligned & neutral Romania In upheaval / changing sides → Non-aligned & neutral Bulgaria In upheaval / changing sides → Non-aligned & neutral Czech lands In upheaval / changing sides → Non-aligned & neutral Slovakia In upheaval / changing sides → Non-aligned & neutral Serbia Communist, outside Moscow’s bloc → In upheaval / changing sides Croatia Communist, outside Moscow’s bloc → In upheaval / changing sides Slovenia Communist, outside Moscow’s bloc → In upheaval / changing sides
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