Selection of Military and Critical Sites in Iran-Turkey Borderlines: A Defensive Hydro-geomorphoclimatic Approach

Observation of inactive defense principles in site selection for infrastructures such as power plants, factories, military and big industries, telecommunication lines, refineries and pumping stations can reduce damage under dangerous circumstances and military threats. In fact, rational use of natural potentialities can play a key role in reducing the dangers originating from threats. Site-selection is affected by many parameters many of which have climatic-geomorphological origins. To identify critical and military significant sites located in Iran-Turkey borderlines in terms of inactive defense, two sets of data were obtained (i.e., the climatic such as frozen and rainy days and wind speed) from the Meteorological Organization and those of the hydro-geo were based on topographical, geological maps and satellite images. They, then, were quantified in GIS context and slope layers, and their directions, heights, distance from waterways, urban areas, and roads, land quality, rainy and frozen days and wind speed were investigated. An AHP-based analytic method was employed to quantify the data. Then, the overlapping method was used to synthesize all effective layers in inactive defense in GIS context. Finally, both appropriate and inappropriate sites in terms of military perspectives were identified. The findings revealed that the study area, specially the western mountainous region compared to that of the eastern, enjoys geographically sound capabilities to meet inactive defense purposes.