The April uprising in Kyrgyzstan illuminates the latest phase of the Great Game.
The game’s initial phase ran from 1807, when Napoleon proposed to Tsar Alexander to invade British India, until 1907, when tsarist Russia and imperial Britain sat down and — like civilized Europeans — divided spheres of interest, some of which ran right through countries like Iran.
For Britain, the Great Game had primarily been about securing the jewel of the imperial crown — India — from Russian encroachment. For Russia, eastward expansion was a form of Manifest Destiny that wouldn’t be satisfied until the mountains of Asia were under its control and the shores of the Pacific were reached.
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