For those who have not studied world history in a while, during the 18th, 19th and early part of the 20th Centuries, Russia, Great Britain and China engaged in an extended game of "Spy vs. Spy" over control of the passes through the high mountains between north and south Asia. They called it the "Great Game". It seems they are all at it again except the US has taken Great Britain's place at the table. It mostly ended when the parties decided mayhem in other areas of the world was more fun than the baroque intrigues in the mountain passes.
The latest flare up on the road to Armageddon occurred in what I call the lesser Stans, Kyrgyz, Uzbek and Tajik ( As opposed to the Greater Stans. Afghan, Pak and Kazakh--I do not know whether Turkmen should be classified as a Greater of Lesser Stan).
Old Joe Stalin, the almost forgotten beloved "Uncle Joe," of legend, did not have enough white Russians to resettle on this portion of the Border to protect Mother Russia from the Turk or whomever else it was that kept Uncle Joe up at night worrying about invading his adopted homeland (Joe you see was an immigrant, a fact that argues in favor of severe restrictions if not outright prohibition of immigration).
Among the reasons for this sudden lack of slavic genetic material and cannon fodder was, as I am sure we all remember, at about this time 20 million or so of them were busy being slaughtered in the most recent Slavic-Tueton struggle over who would have the right to kill the remaining Jews in the Pale.
So crafty old Uncle Joe decided that if the people in the area were too busy watching one another they would be too busy to consider bothering him while his attention was focused elsewhere. So he took a large fertile valley, the only piece of land in the area worth anything since most of the rest was mountain, and gave it to the Uzbeks, except that the Uzbeks lived on the other-side of the mountains and the only way into the valley was through a very long narrow pass that that scamp Uncle Joe then gave to the Tajik and to add to the hilarity of the situation, Joe the Comedian gave the foothills surrounding the valley where many Uzbeks lived to the Kyrgyz who although from their towns on the foothills they could threateningly look down on the Uzbeks in their happy valley, they could not defend those same towns because they also lived mostly on the other-side of the mountains from the valley on the side opposite the Uzbeks .
And so it remained after Uncle Joe, departed this world leaving it to the Eagle and the Bear to fling scat at each other for a while. Then the Bear realizing that England had abandoned the Great Game and and its successor did not know what it was all about, decided to kick over the Afghan bee hive and got stung so badly that it collapsed and almost died and went into hibernation appearing for the time being also to have abandoned the Great Game.
Now the USA assumed the role of Merry Old England in the Greater Stans of Afghan and Pak (The role of winning the battles and ultimately losing the war). It decided its brand of empire building in the area required it to put its supply bases in the land of the Kyrgyz over the mountains from Happy Valley and make many of the Kyrgyz rich. The Kyrgyz than took that money and began a pogrom against the Uzbeks living in the foothills overlooking their brethren working their farms below.
The new Kyrgyz government, although gaining power through a nationalist revolution, claimed surprise with the turmoil and blamed it on the prior administration. Nevertheless, they recognized the need to stop the pogrom before the Uzbeks decide to assist their oppressed cousins across the border.
What to do? What to do? They cannot ask the Americans because the Americans being the new English do not see the Lesser Stans as in their interest. Also, the Kyrgyz realized seeking Anglo-American assistance would piss off the Russians once they realized that the Anglo-Americans where involved in affairs of state on their turf so to speak. So the Kyrgyz turned to the Russians for help.
While the Russians mull over their request, what happens next? Will China, with its already unhappy Uzbeks and Kyrgyz and all the other minorities in its western provinces feel threatened? What the hell is everyone fighting for anyway? The Great Game was about trade routes. Is this all about mineral resources? Is it another man-thing?
Meanwhile in the Greater Stans, the oblivious Americans are engaged in a war of attrition to retaliate and punish the prior Afghan government for allowing their country to shelter a tall skinny ex CIA operative lunatic on dialysis while he plotted to send citizens of a US ally, using funds obtained from that same ally to launch a terrorist attack on the US for the purpose of creating enough turmoil the US would respond as the Soviet Union did previously and destroy itself economically by spending too much money on war and the things of war.
Stay tuned for further episodes of, "As the World Turns" or to bring it more up to date, turn to the next post of the blog, "As the World Warms".