These days, if you search “The Great Game” online, and you’ll meet with a series of articles for World of Warcraft, Pacman. Minecraft and maybe Sonic the Hedgehog.
However, the Great Game couldn’t be further from these pixilated curios. Filled with intrigue, exploration, adventure, action and espionage, the Great Game had more than enough for a series of video games, several blockbuster movies and more than a few novels.
Want to know more? Then read on and we’ll explain just how much you’ve missed in this lesser-known Cold War.
The Game
There was a period long before the Cold War when the two vast empires of Great Britain and Imperial Russia faced off in a competition of wits and cunning. The stage was the mountain-tops and deserts of Central Asia, known as The Great Game by the British and The Tournament of Shadows by the Russians.
This precursor to the Cold War would see the two intent on expanding their borders and protecting what they had already conquered; each viewed the other with distrust, and the game began.
So shadowy was this game between nations that even today, historians disagree on when the Great Game actually began and when it finally ended. There’s also no real conclusion as to who won and who lost…
Setting the Scene
Early in the 19th century, the Russian army had tested its metal against Napoleon’s French legions and won, even after the ransacking of Moscow. Tsar Alexander I had his troops moving outwards, claiming more land and swallowing up swathes of Central Asia.
Many thousands of miles south in British-controlled India, later known as the British Raj, the jewel of the British Empire, the imperial rulers were dismissive of the threat that a resurgent Russia posed from the north.
However, the bear was just awakening from its hibernation.
Playing the Great Game
It is commonly believed that the Great Game began on the 12th of January 1830 when British Lord Ellenborough initiated a proclamation establishing a new trade route from India to Bukhara.
Great Britain had yet to take the whole of India, and as well as being keen to exert its influence in the area, it wanted to stifle Imperial Russia’s power in the region.
The plan at the time was to use Turkey, Persia, and Afghanistan as a buffer against Russia, preventing its access to vital ports in the Persian Gulf. Meanwhile, Russia aimed to establish a neutral zone in Afghanistan to allow them access to crucial trade routes.
As the British tried to control Afghanistan, Bukhara, and Turkey, they would fight a series of unsuccessful wars. The First Anglo-Afghan War (1838), the First Anglo-Sikh War (1843), the Second Anglo-Sikh War (1848) and the Second Anglo-Afghan War (1878). All would chalk up dismal losses for the British.
Meanwhile, Russia would lose the Crimean War (1853–1856) to a large allied army. Hemmed in to the west, they would continue their march south, taking control of several Khanates, including Bukhara.
1868 saw Imperial Russia swallow up the region known today as Tajikistan; the Russian empire now stood at the banks of the Amu Darya river looking south to the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan.
Britain had attempted, and failed, to take Afghanistan twice; now bloody nosed and embarrassed, they left the rugged country just as independent as they had found it. Afghanistan would remain independent, for now. Russian forces would attempt (in this century) to secure Afghanistan for themselves, and the country would go on to act as a buffer between British Imperial India and Imperial Russia.
Who Won The Great Game?
Officially, The Great Game ended in 1907 with the signing of the Anglo-Russian Convention in which it was decided that Persia be divided into a Russian-controlled northern zone, a nominally independent central zone, and a British-controlled southern zone.
During the meeting, it was agreed a borderline between the two empires would run from the eastern point of Persia to Afghanistan; it was further declared Afghanistan would be an official protectorate of Britain.
In a way, the Great Game wasn’t so much a game of losers and winners. As history moves on, empires rise and fall.
But fast forward to today, and relationships are still strained; we’ve seen the rise and fall of the Soviet Union, Great Britain in and out of the European Union and both Russia and Britain still worthy adversaries. Perhaps there are more players these days, but the game still looks to be afoot!
Why is it called the Great Game?
Many people associate the term “Great Game” with the legendary author Rudyard Kipling; it was actually many years before, in 1837 that Lieutenant Arthur Conolly coined the phrase in a letter to his friend he wrote:
“You’ve a Great Game, a noble one before you”.
Unfortunately, Lieutenant Arthur Conolly would be executed in 1842 by the Emir of Bukhara, accused of spying for the British whilst on a mission to rescue fellow Brit, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Stoddart.
It wasn’t until 1901 that Rudyard Kipling used the phrase “The Great Game” in his novel Kim:
“Why? He went alone before he came under the Colonel Sahib’s protection. When he comes to the Great Game he must go alone—alone, and at peril of his head. Then, if he spits, or sneezes, or sits down other than as the people do whom he watches, he may be slain. Why hinder him now? Remember how the Persians say: The jackal that lives in the wilds of Mazanderan can only be caught by the hounds of Mazanderan.”
Kipling influenced British attitudes to the period adding in a bit of spice and excitement, romanticising many of the clandestine operations. His mention of The Great Game added to his account of the period in his earlier works, such as his short story ‘Soldiers Three’:
“Listen in the north, my boys, there’s trouble on the wind;
Tramp o’ Cossack hooves in front, gray great-coats behind,
Trouble on the frontier of a most amazin’ kind,Trouble on the waters o’ the Oxus!”