The pessimistic belief of resource scarcity emerged once again in the 1990s, and with it the hope that the newly independent states of Central Asia and the Caucasus would provide a resource boom – the new "Persian Gulf" – and with it competition for oil and gas in a 21st-century version of The Great Game. These expectations were not supported by the facts, and came with an exaggeration of the region's commercial and geopolitical value. Since that time, some journalists have used the expression The New Great Game to describe what they proposed was a renewed geopolitical interest in Central Asia because of the mineral wealth of the region, which was at that time becoming more available to foreign investment after the end of the Soviet Union. One journalist linked the term to an interest in the region's minerals and another to its minerals and energy.