Middle East (Asia Transportation Map 1:4,000,000, Sheet 1, Series 5201, Edition 3-AMS) Army Map Service (AMS&S), Corps of Engineers

Colour printed paper folding map 122x81cm. Near fine, neatly folded, initialled to the top right corner. On a Lambert Projection, coverage is bounded by the Rumania-USSR border (NW), Aral Sea (NE), Karachi (SE), and the Libyan Desert (SW). The Arabian Peninsula is shown as far south as Qatar and the Trucial Coast, thus including all of the Gulf, naming all 7 Emirates. This was first compiled and drawn by the AMS in 1943, with main communications revised in 1955. Its printing date of October 1957 (10-57) suggests it may have been issued in relation to the Syrian Crisis (18 Aug to end-Oct 1957), a major Cold War flashpoint that threatened to draw in countries across the region. Iraq, Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey were considering supporting Arab or Western intervention to overthrow the Syrian government, believing it had become Communist. Turkey's deployment along its Syrian border escalated the situation with the USSR threatening to attack Turkey if it attacked Syria, and the US threatening to attack the USSR if it attacked Turkey. The Crisis resolved when Turkey backed down in response to US pressure, and Khrushchev visited the Turkish Embassy in Moscow. Details include 3 gauges of railroad, abandoned railroads, rail stations, 4 grades of roads and tracks, telegraph, towns of 5 levels of importance, streams, waterholes, canals, boundaries, the Armistice Line, contours at 1km intervals, and extensive geographical features. Users are encouraged to forward errors and omissions to the AMS Commanding Officer.