Afghanistan at the Centre of the new Great Game: Implications for Pakistan.

In the late 1990s, some journalists used the expression "The New Great Game" to describe what they proposed was a renewed geopolitical interest in Central Asia based on the mineral wealth of the region. The name is a reference to the original Great Game, the term used by historians to describe the 19th-century political and diplomatic competition between the British and Russian empires for territory and influence among Central Asian states.

In 1996, The New York Times published an opinion piece titled "The New Great Game in Asia" in which was written:

While few have noticed, Central Asia has again emerged as a murky battleground among big powers engaged in an old and rough geopolitical game. Western experts believe that the largely untapped oil and natural gas riches of the Caspian Sea countries could make that region the Persian Gulf of the next century. The object of the revived game is to befriend leaders of the former Soviet republics controlling the oil, while neutralizing Russian suspicions and devising secure alternative pipeline routes to world markets.