This is CBS I Am The World. I'm John Bats with Gregory Copley, my colleague,

Editor-in-Publishment of Defense and Foreign Affairs, just returned from

Tashcan and Samarcan. These ancient cities were all powerful and practice

scientific investigation, education, poetry. Two, three, four millennium ago.

We're looking at civilization before it moved to Western Europe. So the great

game is back. My memory Gregory is the great game was Great Britain, the British

Empire, Persia at the time, and Russia. Who are the new players in the great game

for the riches of Central Asia? Well, we also had during the 18th and 19th century

the Imperial China as being a player in that. And of course today the people's

Republic of China is one of the great powers concerned with the domination of

Central Asia simply because that's the conduit area for much of the food and

energy which is keeping the wheels of industry at least ticking over in a

minor way in mainland China. So yes, the Russian Federation is back in the

game. Iran is not really a major player in this iteration but the fact that

Iran or Persia is the cultural dominance for the Central Asian region is

still critical. We also have India acting as the if you like the successor to

the British Empire. And it was from the Indian subcontinent in what now includes

Pakistan as well and as well as then British dominated in Persia. That the

British would attempt to foray into Central Asia in an attempt to curb Russian

eastward and southward expansion into Central Asia which went on particularly

in the late 19th century you had the the high nates of everything from the

Caucasus over to the Chinese border being invaded and dominated by Russia. So

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