In honor of the CIA’s Cartography Center’s 75th anniversary, the agency released a bevy of maps detailing the world since the start of the Cold War.
Perhaps more so than any other tool used by the clandestine services, an accurate map can mean the difference between success and failure — or between life and death.
The CIA, renowned for its secrecy, has long kept its maps and cartographic methods under wraps.
In honor of the agency’s Cartography Center’s 75th anniversary last year, however, the CIA put a number of maps online, revealing how ” the company ” has viewed the world since its inception after World War II.
Suspected sites of missiles in Cuba, 1962. CIA
President Franklin Roosevelt created the agency that would eventually become the CIA in the early 1940s. The map division produced a bevy of maps vital to strategic planning during the war, according to National Geographic.
The agency’s mapmakers had a broad mission, supplying maps and data relevant to national security issues facing the country.
