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Turkmen SSR (unpopulated)

The Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic was a Soviet constituent republic which existed from 1925 until 1991. This map attempts to faithfully recreate Turkmenistan sometime around 1960 in roughly 1:60 scale using height map data and the Biomes DLC.

For more maps, see my collection: https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2972427447

Some minor edits to the heightmap have been made to smooth city locations, salt flats and the courses of major rivers. This map contains 10 named settlements that were the largest population centers at the time. Settlements are located across all of Turkmenistan’s regions and largely reflect their relative populations. Some names (such as Krasnovodsk) may seem unfamiliar and this is because historical names were given precedence over modern ones. Some major modern cities which were part of the wave of planned cities constructed during and after the communist period (ie… Arkadag) have not been added. There are also thirteen border crossings. These are comprised of seven medium and two large eastern crossings and one large, one medium, and two small western crossings. The border crossings represent most of Turkmenistan's major international checkpoints and include the primary international rail linkages plus plenty of power connections. There are both eastern and western maritime borders. Not all rail and road connections shown on the map were existent throughout the communist period; some being built during it, and others after, but all have been included to improve playability of the map.

Turkmenistan is rich in oil and gas deposits which are scattered throughout the country. However, besides the abundant fossil fuels, the region is extremely resource poor. Some coal, iron, and uranium have been found in the remote Gyzylgaya area, but attempts at commercial exploitation have been extremely limited. Turkmenistan has no known bauxite deposits, but some have been added to the map in the northeast to reflect the region’s large salt mines. All resource deposits largely correspond to real-world locations.

This map is made using the desert biome to reflect the arid landscape of Turkmenistan and the severe difficulties of agriculture in such a region. The only suitable growing lands are found along the banks of the Amu Darya river in the north, the Mary and Tejen oases in the south, and a belt of irrigated lands along the base of the Köpet Dag range. The vast majority of the country is part of the Karakum Desert which receives extremely minimal rainfall and is completely unsuitable for agriculture.

The Turkmen SSR was one of the least developed regions of the Russian empire and later the Soviet Union. Apart from the construction of the Trans-Caspian railway in the late 1880s, it remained isolated well into the Soviet period. The armed resistance to communism as a part of the Basmachi Revolt and the forced collectivization programs in the 1920s and 1930s led to the end of the traditional nomadic lifestyle and the suppression of Islamic traditions. The Soviet leadership focused on cultural development such as the standardization of the Turkmen language and the development of an educational system, but Moscow retained close political control and many of the major urban centers had a professional class brought in from other regions of the Soviet Union.

While the Turkmen SSR remained largely politically stable throughout the later Soviet period, it failed to develop the economy beyond labor intensive cotton monoculture and fossil fuel extraction. Domestic processing capacity for cotton was severely limited and the majority of the cotton crop was sent to other parts of the Soviet Union for textiles production. Most petrochemical processes also took place outside of the Turkmen SSR as the region lacked the facilities and technical skills. Throughout most of the Soviet period, the vast majority of employment was in the agricultural sector, which suffered from low mechanization. There was a limited light industry.

The Soviet period must also be noted for its vast irrigation projects. The Karakum Canal, built from 1954 until 1988, diverts much of the Amu-Darya river across the desert to provide water to southern Turkmenistan. This canal allowed for a huge expansion in the area suitable for cotton farming, but the diversion of water also led to the drying up of the Aral Sea and the massive resultant environmental disaster.

This map features the new desert biome and offers the chance to choose between two different paths of economic development. The historical path of oil and crop exports only requires limited investment and lower skilled labor, but leads to an economy that fails to move up the production value chain and is highly impacted by fluctuations in commodity prices. The alternative approach of integrated vertical production chains allows abundant oil and crops to be leveraged into the creation of higher value domestic textile and petrochemical industries. This however, comes with a high cost and requires a more skilled workforce. Whichever path you choose, resource and environmental constraints will show the challenges of economic growth in this remote and arid region.


For the roads and railways only version of this map, see here:
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3278078210

For the populated version of this map, see here:
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3278079870

While technically an Uzbek band, Yalla, and their 1981 hit song Uchkuduk simply have to be mentioned here. They were popular across the Warsaw Pact in part for this song about Uchkuduk, a uranium mining closed city in the Kyzylkum Desert.
Учкуду́к, три коло́дца- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qr9EVULUGJs