The struggle for Empire in Central Asia

 

A 'must-read' (not only) for those who plan to travel to central asia!

 

The "Great Game" was played between Tsarist Russia and Victorian England for supremacy in Central Asia. At stake was the security of India, key to the wealth of the British Empire. When play began early in the 19th century, the frontiers of the two imperial powers lay two thousand miles apart, across vast deserts and almost impassable mountain ranges; by the end, only 20 miles separated the two rivals.

The true story of the Younghusband mission to Lhasa

 

In 1903 a British force marched over the Himalayas to encounter a non-existent Russian threat. It was met by a medieval Tibetan army ordered to resist without violence. What resulted when these armies clashed was a wholly avoidable tragedy that shocked the outside world in this, Britain's last attempt at empire-building.

On Foot Across Tibet's Chang Tang

 

Rick Ridgeway, Corad Anker, Galen Rowell and Jimmy Chin's walk across the Chang Tang in search of the calving grounds of the chiru, an endangered antelope.

 

"In the east a fingernail of moon glows through a reef of clouds. We are traveling at a compass bearing of 30 degrees, and I assume that Conrad, like me, is using the stars in the sky to maintain our course." But Ridgeway also offers a thoughtful regional history and an affecting description of the complex human struggle surrounding the rampant poaching of chiru and the illegal trade in their pelts (their fur is woven into shahtoosh, an ultrafine and precious wool). The group’s mission is ultimately successful: the Chinese government plans to create a national preserve based on their discovery.

The secret Exploration of Tibet (engl.)

 

Hopkirk traces international attempts at breaking Tibet's isolationism since the mid-19th century.

 

The Search for Mount Kailas and the Sources of the Great River of Asia

 

Throughout the East there runs a legend of a great mountain at the centre of the world, where four rivers have their source. Charles Allen traces this legend to Western Tibet where there stands Kailas, worshipped by Hindus and Buddhists alike as the home of their gods and the navel of the world. Close by are the sources of four mighty rivers: the sacred Ganges, the Indus, the Sutlej and Tsango-Brahmaputra. For centuries Kailas remained an enigma to the outside world. Then a succession of remarkable men took up the challenge of penetrating the hostile, frozen wastelands beyond the Western Himalayas, culminating in the great age of discovery, the final years of the Victorian era.