Checkmate - Into the wild world of chess

Something incredibly exciting is unfolding in the world of chess. Grandmaster Magnus Carlsen's allegation against Hans Niemann has sent shockwaves across the community of chess players and enthusiasts, and reeled in, almost, everyone with pique interest. 

The allegation is that Niemann cheated, not only at the Sinquefield Cup in September but, according to Carlsen's Twitter account, many times before too.  

"I believe that Niemann has cheated more — and more recently — than he has publicly admitted. Throughout our game in the Sinquefield Cup I had the impression that he wasn't tense or even fully concentrating on the game in critical positions while outplaying me as black in a way I think only a handful of players can do," read Carlsen's first public statement since the Julius Baer Generation Cup. (This post came after Carlsen was partnered with Neimann at the Julius Baer Generation Cup. Carlsen resigned in protest without playing a single move.) 

On 4 October, Chess.com stated that Neimann likely cheated in more than 100 games. 

While this remains in the foyer of discussions about chess, a quick look into the recent history of this sport can tell you why and how chess is not only a paramount sport of intellect but one that has the purview to influence geopolitics (the classic Cold War era chess), that prescribes to unconventional methods by chess players to win (for instance a case of hypnosis), among other things. 

This mysterious game, while primarily played by individual chess players, resonates with a large audience and has the capability to amass nations as spectators. Into the world of chess lies stories and events that have captivated the audience, not just by moves on the chessboards but off the board too. 

The quirks among the intellect

Chess experts are renowned for using unusual strategies to win games. 

The famous Spanish chess player and priest Ruy Lopez allegedly said, "Sit your opponent with the sun in his eyes." Try to play after your opponent has had a free meal or drink, as another player by the name of Lucena once advised.

Harry Nelson Pillsbury is said to have had sharp thinking in the 19th century when playing games while smoking a cigar. Szymon Winawer, on the other hand, said that he purposefully smoked inferior cigars in an effort to disrupt his opponent's focus. 

And during the 1935 World Championship, Alexander Alekhine, who believed in superstition, would put his Siamese cat on the chessboard before a game as a charm. Additionally, Alekhine apparently hoped for his opponent to experience an allergic response. Alekhine resorted to donning a sweatshirt with a picture of his pet cat on it after being told he couldn't play with the cat on his lap.

A World Championship of sheer lunacy

The 1978 World Championship match between Viktor Korchnoi and Anatoly Karpov was one for the books. The two great masters engaged in fierce competition. 

Karpov was a Communist Party member. He received a Mercedes, a chauffeur, a Moscow apartment and a country dacha as compensation, just like any chess champion who brought credit to the Soviet Union. 

Korchnoi, on the other hand, was the first strong Soviet grandmaster to have defected from the Soviet Union. He left for the Netherlands in 1976. In effect, Korchnoi did not stay on the Soviet's good books.

In the 1978 championship, set in Baguio, Philippines, Korchnoi faced the Iron Curtain's best contender, Karpov.

Interestingly, at their opening game, a game of distractions and complaints took root. Korchnoi wore mirror sunglasses apparently to shield his eyes from Karpov's glare, which, he said, had disturbed him in a prior match. 

Karpov, on the other hand, lamented that the light was reflecting off the mirrors and into his eyes. Karpov also demanded that Korchnoi's chair be checked for "prohibited devices" (likely mind-controlling gadgets), and during games, he would spin in his own chair to divert attention from his opponent.

It was documented that even the yoghurt served to Karpov during matches was not spared critique. Korchnoi's team said that the colour might have been a hidden message. It's possible that a strawberry yoghurt meant one thing and a raspberry another. 

The parapsychologist Vladimir Zukhar, a member of the Soviet entourage, would sit in the front row and glare menacingly at Korchnoi, which upset him. Zukhar was hypnotising him, in Korchnoi's opinion, and messing with his brainwaves. By the eighth game, Korchnoi was a nervous wreck thanks to the "psychic."

Two members of the Indian cult known as Ananda Marga, Dada and Didi, were brought in by Korchnoi to combat Zukhar. The two mystics taught yoga and transcendental meditation to Zukhar. When Dada and Didi surrounded the Soviet delegation during the games, it was now their time to feel uneasy.

Korchnoi recovered from falling behind by three games to tie the match at five games each. The winner of the following match would be crowned champion. 

Unfounded rumours said that the KGB was prepared to poison Korchnoi. If that's the case, he probably didn't lose his life when he lost the tiebreaker. Korchnoi promised to bring the CIA the next time they faced off after failing to defeat Karpov in their grudge bout. 

Moscow merely dismissed him in jest.

Chess in the time of the Cold War 

Korchnoi - a grandmaster in the sport - is among the many who were born, raised and trained in the Soviet Union. He was one of many because even long before the Cold War took root following the end of the second World War in the mid-1940s, chess was already well-established in the USSR. The Soviet players received remarkable funding and very good education and unsurprisingly, they completely dominated the top world tournaments, where the elite players were, you guessed it right, Soviet players. 

The chess culture and phenomenon was already thriving in the USSR at the time, while in the United States, it was not popular but rather more amateurish; more of a hobby for the masses. 

Chess tournaments between the Soviets and the United States came to the fore as a symbolic showdown between the two countries during the Cold War. (Netflix's recent fictional miniseries The Queen's Gambit captures well the chess climate between the sparring competitors). 

The trump card, or more accurately, the saving grace for the US was Bobby Fischer. The reason why he continues to be hailed as one of the most formidable chess players in the world is perhaps not only for his unparalleled talent, but how his participation altered the game of chess. 

Fischer, who seemed to have appeared on the scene of chess out of nowhere, is not only the first American world chess champion, but also the chess player who, for all intents and purposes, dismantled the Soviet chess empire. And he was someone who learned a lot on his own. 

Fischer pulled off a spectacular feat of going on to play 20 consecutive matches undefeated against top grandmasters (including Soviets) in the world.  

There is no official ranking but the top three greatest chess players of all time - the divine trinity you could say - are Bobby Fischer, Magnus Carlsen and Garry Kasparov. (And the odd one out is Bobby Fischer, more on that later.) 

Espionage meets chess

That the KGB would be so active in chess is hardly surprising. The setting of the game is ideal for covert operations. A perfect cover was to disguise messages as chess moves because the USSR was a chess-obsessed nation. In fact, the KGB featured a section on chess in its manuals. 

The Soviet embassy in Washington employed a chess expert who was also a KGB operative in the 1960s and 1970s. Many of his fellow Soviet grandmasters were "KGB infiltrators," according to defector Lev Alburt.

A number of postcards with Graham Mitchell's address appeared in 2009. Mitchell served as the British MI5's deputy director general in the 1950s. Experts believe the enigmatic notes, which all referenced chess games, were some sort of code. The postcards are believed to have been sent by a covert agent from Frankfurt, a hotbed of Cold War espionage. They include chess notation for different moves. However, these are possibly cyphers that contain sensitive data. The suspicious-sounding communication might have included covert messages.

The agent's affiliation with MI5 is unknown because Mitchell was at the time thought to be a Soviet snoop. Mitchell might have been enlisting double spies for the KGB as chief of counterespionage. Nevertheless, no treasonable proof was ever discovered, and Mitchell retired in 1963.

Alastair Denniston, director of Bletchley Park, recruited chess players to decipher the German Enigma machine during World War II because of the intimate relationship between chess and code-breaking. Chess experts Hugh Alexander, Harry Golombek, and Sir Philip Stuart Milner-Berry all left the 1939 Chess Olympiad right away to go to work at Bletchley Park. Years before the required machines to run such software even existed, mathematician Alan Turing, the most well-known member of the code-breaking team, later developed a chess programme.

Fischer exposes the false prophet

The recent film Pawn Sacrifice, starring Tobey Maguire, is based on Bobby Fischer's lonesome destruction of the Soviet chess colossus. 

However, Fischer had a second area of interest - religion. He joined the Worldwide Church of God (WCG), a movement that many people consider to be a cult, in the middle of the 1960s. It was run by Herbert W. Armstrong, a charlatan who founded his radio ministry on end-time prophecies. 

Armstrong's odd end-of-the-world prophecy was built around the idea that the US and Britain were truly descended from the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. He preached that a German-led invasion from the United States of Europe would serve as God's retribution against America and Britain. 

Fischer, who is usually sensible and sane, swallowed it whole.

Fischer was driven insane by the cult's strict beliefs, which included tithing, keeping the Sabbath, and adhering to dietary restrictions. He was also forbidden to associate with anyone who was "unconverted." Even after returning from the chess club at four in the morning, fatigued, he would force himself to do Bible study and pray. 

Fischer also started contributing to the cult with his hard-earned cash. He donated $61,200 of his prize money from the 1972 World Championship triumph to the WCG.

He never raised either his mother's or his own level of living, who both resided in a run-down apartment without a bathroom. Armstrong, on the other hand, was leading a luxury lifestyle, travelling the globe in his own aircraft and presenting high-end gifts to world leaders.

Since the 1930s, Armstrong had been making predictions about the coming of the Great Tribulation but had consistently been proven wrong. At the time, he was predicting that 1972 would be the end of the world, but after the year had passed, Fischer started to recognise Armstrong for what he really was—a false prophet and skilled con man. He discovered Herbert's son Garner Ted's extramarital affairs as well, and he came to the conclusion that both of them were hypocrites. The WCG was left by Fischer.

There are many more interesting events revolving around the world of chess and what it goes to show is that this is a game that some of the most intriguing individuals in the world play and master. A game within a game at times. Long may this wonderful game continue to captivate, wow, bedazzle and create more jaw-dropping stories.