It’s your move
Posted May 20 2007
The Sun Sentinel
“The USSR Sports Committee continues to consider it inexpedient in principle for such a match to be held. Should [Bobby] Fischer and his associates propose specific conditions, we regard it as expedient to drag out the talks and, jointly with [Anatoly] Karpov, to work out counter-proposals that would be unacceptable to Fischer.” Secret memo 3403C, Oct. 20, 1976, signed by Politburo member Mikhail Suslov.
“Karpov has asked the USSR Sports Committee for permission for such a match to be held in 1979. He has confidence in his powers and believes that his success in a match with Fischer would enhance the prestige of the Soviet school of chess and dispel the halo of invincibility created around Fischer in the West.” Secret memo 6697c, Dec. 30, 1977, signed by Sergei Pavlov, chairman of the USSR Sports Committee which finally consented to a Fischer-Karpov title match.Karpov speaks: It is hard to describe the feeling I experienced when I realized there would be no match.
I felt a sense of loss. A kind of vacuum opened up in my life. It did not cause me pain, but a great deal of time passed before I was able to overcome that feeling of regret. I realized the most important thing that could ever happen in my career did not happen.
Even after Fischer forfeited the title in 1975 I met with him three times, the last time in 1977 in Washington, D.C. We were close to signing a contract.
With pens in hand, Fischer suddenly said, “OK. It’s late. We agreed on everything, but one point is not clear. The match should be billed as the professional world chess championship.”
Here is the full article.
It would have been a great match!
After reviewing this, Fischer was in the right to get up and walk out, or not show up to games with Spassky it seems.
The question now becomes the validity of the source of information.
The question always is, when is it right to do something of this nature? Can it be done for the right reasons as a matter of conscience? Can such a thing even be articulated? What does that teach others?
You would have to be the world champion in the first place to consider it.
Is Fischer in the right today concerning his ignoring the ban on playing in yugoslavia, or in evading US authorities that have issued a warrant for his arrest?
Is Fischer a nobleman because of these things, or was he being distasteful?
Not sure, but the question is interesting, and merely underscores the fact that chess really is an outworking of the human dimension.
“Karpov has asked the USSR Sports Committee for permission for such a match to be held in 1979. He has confidence in his powers and believes that his success in a match with Fischer would enhance the prestige of the Soviet school of chess and dispel the halo of invincibility created around Fischer in the West.”
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Karpov said the same thing in [i]Chess Life & Review[/i] in 1979. He’s probably right. I wouldn’t be surprised if he were stronger than Fischer by that time.
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Even after Fischer forfeited the title in 1975 I met with him three times, the last time in 1977 in Washington, D.C. We were close to signing a contract.
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According to Karpov, he was walking into the hotel to meet Fischer on one of those occasions at the exact time that Korchnoi was walking into the Dutch police station to defect.
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With pens in hand, Fischer suddenly said, “OK. It’s late. We agreed on everything, but one point is not clear. The match should be billed as the professional world chess championship.”
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Yes, that’s the same story he tells in Karpov on Karpov. He and Campomanes worked out all Fischer’s objections and got as far as getting a contract in front of Fischer, and the pen actually in his hand to sign it. At the last second he came up with one more thing. What to call the match? He wanted it to be The Professional Chess Player’s World Championship, but this would have been very sticky for Karpov. The official Soviet Party Line was that their players were amateurs, not pros. All of them officially had other “jobs”, even if it were only journalist (i.e. chess journalist). Professional chess is for the decadent bourgois et ceteras.
Karpov explained that his fed would never let him play a match with that title. Campomanes said look, just sign the contract and we’ll work out a mutually acceptable name later. Fischer said no, he couldn’t do it that way, in stages, and refused to sign.
At that moment, says Karpov, he realized that the match would never happen. But that was vintage Fischer, all over. When it came to finding reasons not to play chess, he was and is unsurpassed.
Agree that by 79 Karpov would probably have beaten Fischer. Not sure about 75 though it would have been a good match.
Fischer seemed to develop a morbid fear/paranoia of losing. Recent events and pronouncements appear to confirm that he has lost his marbles.
Even when he “came back” in 92 it was against an opponent he had already defeated, who’s powers were almost all gone and who he knew he could beat. No danger of him taking on a really good player – GK or AK.