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Garry Kasparov became the youngest world champion in chess history at the age of 22. Since that time in 1985 Kasparov has continued to be rated and recognized as the best chess player in the world. In the 1990s Kasparov competed in two highly publicized matches against Deep Blue, a supercomputer designed to play chess. In 1999 Kasparov challenged chess enthusiasts everywhere in an Internet project called “Kasparov Vs. The World.” In this September 1999 Encarta Yearbook interview, Kasparov discusses taking on the world, Deep Blue, and his future challengers in chess.

Interview with World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov

Encarta Yearbook: How did you get the idea for “Kasparov Vs. The World”?

Kasparov: The idea, I think, is quite natural because I was and still am a great believer in using new technologies to promote chess. I always believed that it would be great for chess to find the right match with computers, with the Internet.

And so I was always available for experiments such as playing against the IBM supercomputer or events like that. But even with the public relations generated around the Big Blue match, I still believed that we could do better if a way could be found to involve the public directly in the event, to make it more interactive.

I discussed different sorts of ideas with my friends and associates, and sometime in 1998 we came up with the plan: Kasparov Vs. The World, the world champion playing the rest of the world. And we made a few approaches, and to our pleasant surprise, Microsoft was fairly quick in grabbing the idea.

Encarta Yearbook: And how has the game gone?

Kasparov: I have to admit, I was surprised. I expected a difficult game—I was the only one who warned Microsoft and the press against considering the game just a cakewalk. And I've been saying from day one that the game would be a chess battle of a very high quality.

But I think even my expectations were set very much below the real level. At one point I realized that either I take it very seriously or I would face a real danger of defeat. So sometime in July, I had to very seriously spend a lot of time and attention and mobilize my resources to beat my opponents.

So the game has been very productive. I think it's a unique game for the history of chess. It's by far the best analyzed and the best quality of chess ever shown. It amazingly includes all the components of modern chess: a novelty in the opening, a sharp middle game with disturbed balance on both sides of the board, and a sharp endgame with six passed pawns that I've never seen in my life.

So I think everybody underestimated the ability of the chess community on the Internet to analyze information and virtually build a Deep Blue on-line. They have the command center, the Irina Krush bunch, but obviously there are much stronger grandmasters behind the scenes sending the signals all over the world indicating what positions have to be analyzed.

So what is most impressive is the management structure that has been created and that this structure has enabled hundreds of chess players of reasonable strength equipped by the computers and thousands of grandmasters to participate in producing very sophisticated analyses. The strategy and tactics used by the whole team deserve a lot of attention and studying, because it is the first time this kind of technique has been used.

Encarta Yearbook: When you took on Deep Blue, did you see that as kind of a novel experiment? What did it teach us about chess and artificial intelligence?

Kasparov: Well, unfortunately, it taught us much less than we could expect, because in my opinion the experiment could have produced great results. Chess is probably ideal for comparing human intuition vis-à-vis the brute force of calculation, because you can clearly see at what point the simple calculative process matches the results based on human intuition.

So it was a very interesting experiment, and that's why I didn't hesitate to make myself available. The problem was that in the second match IBM treated this event differently, as a win or lose proposition, not as an experiment. They had a totally different attitude than they had the first time. Without going into the details of the match, the major problem was that IBM refused to release printouts of the computer's analysis, and basically cut us off from any information that might have made this event very exciting.

And this is a great tragedy, because I believe this experiment could lead us to some new and interesting discoveries. Now everything is more or less stalled since no other corporation is willing to contribute money toward the experiment, because in the public eye the event is over. They say, the machine has won, so why do we have to invest?

So IBM communicated a very bad message: the machine has won, so there's no need to continue these studies, no need to continue investing money. Someone dismantled the machine because “We've accomplished it.” I mean, what did you accomplish? It's very, very questionable, because an accomplishment means that you can prove it and you can prove the pattern. So the public didn't realize the simple thing that if the machine has won, the machine should be able to do it again.

Encarta Yearbook: So you would do another computer match?

Kasparov: With great pleasure. With great pleasure. I'm always available for such experiments. But other corporations are not taking the challenge. If the machine is around, everybody may count on me.

Encarta Yearbook: What are some of the efforts you've made to get more young people involved in chess? Does chess need help, or is everything going great?

Kasparov: No, I don't think it's going great. I think we are very much behind schedule in making progress. I think chess missed some great moments in history and now the future of the game is lying with our success in the schools. And that, for me, is a top priority, and that's where I've been concentrating for quite a few years.

I think thousands of schools in America are already practicing chess, either as part of the curriculum or in after-school classes. And when I say thousands of schools, I'm not exaggerating. The problem is that everything is decentralized. You don't have a single, unified curriculum.

There is plenty of proof that teaching chess in schools helps improve results in testing, improves attitude, self-confidence, logical thinking, and responsibility. With chess kids are doing better in social behavior and in general education, so that's why there is little doubt that chess could be very effective as an important educational tool.

In Israel I've been working on establishing such a curriculum. We have reached an agreement with Israel's minister of education. We're making progress in some cities. We're starting pilot sessions, and I hope that within 18 to 24 months I'll be able to present to other countries that are interested in acquiring such a program a model that has been tested by a reliable educational ministry of a developed country.

What is crucial is to teach the teachers, because with in-school programs there is a very little hope that chess players by themselves could teach everyone. Chess players are not necessarily good chess teachers. Sometimes it's the contrary.

Encarta Yearbook: Players from the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and Russia have dominated chess for most of the 20th century. Why is that, in your opinion, and will this continue in the next century? Can the United States ever catch up?

Kasparov: I think the popularity of chess in Russia should be assigned to factors related to the totalitarian nature of the Soviet regime. Communism left very few options for kids to express themselves in the USSR. Chess was among the few choices. Chess, sports, some kind of science, ballet, or music were available, but more was available in the free world.

Also the Soviet system had a big interest in developing these talents in order to prove its superiority over the decadent West in intellectual games. So chess was one of the big priorities, and this attitude guaranteed that a big percentage of kids would go through the system.

In America you maybe had one percent of the kids who had a chance to show themselves in the competitions, probably fewer, because in America you have other sports, other attractive things.

Encarta Yearbook: Is the popularity of chess declining somewhat in Russia?

Kasparov: Yes. It's declining. And you may expect growth in America or somewhere else if chess is properly established. Just introduce chess scholarships in some U.S. universities and you will see the difference. So it's very simple. You give an incentive to play and, I believe, the talent in America is as good as anywhere else. It's just giving them the incentive.

Encarta Yearbook: How old were you when you started playing chess, and what are your earliest chess memories?

Kasparov: Thirty years ago—a really long time.

Encarta Yearbook: So you started when you were six. Do you remember having one person who you wanted to be like, who you looked up to in chess?

Kasparov: Alexander Alekhine was, chess-wise, a big hero. Also Bobby Fischer—when I was nine he was the hottest player. The way he played was quite amazing. So we all wanted to be like him.

Encarta Yearbook: How old were you when you made up your mind to try to be a world champion, when you first thought, “I want to go all the way to the top”?

Kasparov: I would think that at 14 I had no doubt I would be a professional player. So I knew I had a big chance, but at about age 16 it was clear that I was set to challenge [reigning champion Anatoly] Karpov.

Encarta Yearbook: Is there some advice you would give to a young player today, someone who says, “I want to be the next Garry Kasparov”?

Kasparov: No, but to become the world champion, you need a talent, you need a lot of talent first. And if you want to win in whatever, whatever sport, you have to make some sacrifices. To be a real big shot in the world of chess requires certain sacrifices as does any other sport or any other profession. Chess is to be taken seriously at the top level, as with everything else.

Encarta Yearbook: You were the youngest world chess champion in history. Did you, or do you, find it hard to stay motivated once you've reached that pinnacle?

Kasparov: Motivation is always a big issue. I've been staying at the top longer than any other sportsman in any sport—14 years, that's quite a term.

So motivation, from time to time, has been a big issue, but I was able to solve this problem because at one point I realized that I could do many things quite well. I have quite a high general intelligence to work with other issues, but chess is still the turf where I'm most comfortable and where I could make a lot of difference for the world.

So I have motivated myself just to do more in this game. And also, due to the very quick development of the game, I don't have a lack of challengers. I always have new, young opponents going after me.

In the world of chess every five or six years you have a new group of talented players, and you can count on at least three of them having one goal: to beat Garry Kasparov. So it sets up some new challenges. Also I promised myself that my three-year-old son would see me fighting and winning the title. So I'm motivated to stay at the top for at least another three or four years.

Encarta Yearbook: So you feel like at that point you might step back, retire?

Kasparov: Maybe. I don't know. It depends on how I feel, because chess today is a matter of experience and energy. So if I maintain the same level of energy, if I keep up, you know, my physical and psychological shape, you never know. I'm a very good chess player. So far, all my younger opponents, they fail to find a crack in me.

Encarta Yearbook: It's almost as if you're waiting for someone to come along who's good enough to take your place and then you'll feel like maybe you can leave?

Kasparov: Maybe. Maybe. I have big goals. I want chess in education and I want chess on the Internet, in every household. So that's a goal, but in order to accomplish it I have to stay the world champion for quite a while.

Encarta Yearbook: You broke with FIDE, the chess organizing body, in 1993, and they stripped you of your title. They recently held a world championship tournament, in which you did not participate. Do you have any plans to reunite with FIDE again?

Kasparov: I am not going to reunite with anybody. I don't think there's any need for reunification. I won my title in 1985. I've been living without FIDE for six years. I do not think that the FIDE title today has anything to do with the tradition I represent, a tradition of champions that goes back more than 100 years, long before FIDE existed.

In 1993 it was Nigel Short's idea—he won a FIDE cycle to win the right to challenge me—for us to play outside of FIDE [because of organizational disputes]. So here we come with a complicated legal issue. Nigel Short has won the FIDE competition. He was a legitimate challenger. I was a legitimate champion. So two players that had to play a championship match decided to play it outside of FIDE. So FIDE in our point of view was merely an organizer.

Does it mean that FIDE has rights to have another championship and say, “okay, we strip your title”? They say yes. I say no, because I believe that since I represent the tradition of world champions, the world champion has the final say, providing the world champion plays the strongest challenger. It's sort of a moral issue, because if I don't play the strongest challenger, if I try to avoid the match, if I disappear like Fischer did, I lose my rights.

But my argument for about six years is simple. I play the strongest challengers. I play Nigel Short, I play Vishy [Viswanathan] Anand. I play many tournaments. So the gap between me and number two is only increasing.

I'm sort of the defender of the tradition. I'm very proud of that. And I think it's important that the message is correctly communicated to the rest of the world that we have to make a clear distinction between organizational interest—and I believe organization is very important—and the tradition, which is the main heritage of the game of chess.

And it should be very clearly explained that there's one lineage, and as long as this lineage exists, as long as there is a big match—and the big match is the only traditional event—the only chance to take the title is to win the real championship match.

Encarta Yearbook: How do you keep in “chess shape”?

Kasparov: I do up to six hours of chess at a training session, if it's before the big match. Normally it's in the summer. I also do some shorter training sessions during the year. In the meantime I'm trying to do some little chess work, by just looking at the computer screen, analyzing some new games. No matter whether I have an event coming up or not, I have to work hard because today in chess you can't stay behind developments. The moment you are losing the momentum, you could experience serious problems, very serious problems with your openings because your opponents are now ahead of you.

You have to invent. You have to invent things, you know. So one of the secrets of my success is that I'm always inventive, just trying to come up with new ideas regularly. And that's how I dominate most of the players.

Encarta Yearbook: Unlike basketball and football, women can compete on a level “playing field” with men in chess. Do you see women moving up at the world championship level of chess, becoming equal in numbers with men over the next 20 or 30 years?

Kasparov: It's a very provocative and dangerous question. You start the question with an assumption that women in chess are competing equally, unlike in basketball and football. If it's physical strength, yes, you don't argue. So if you talk about psychological warfare, here it should be equal? I don't know.

As a matter of fact, I think you can separate this issue into two sides. One is political correctness, and there are certain rules that now exist in U.S. society. The other side is to look at the merits of the facts: There's a clear dominance by men. [Hungary's] Judit Polgár is the only woman player who ever entered the top 10. She has now slid down. She's probably number 20 or 25.

But what's most important, there is no pattern, there is no demonstration that the gap is getting narrower. It's definitely not as big as 20 or 30 years ago, but with the same success I may argue that the gap between average players and top grandmasters is also getting narrower, because you have more information available, you have better training systems. So that's why everybody is playing better.

So that's why we do not see a very convincing pattern that should tell us otherwise. There is a gap [between men and women] and this gap will stay for quite a long time. I do not see in the near future women competing for the world championship. Whether somebody likes or doesn't like it, it's a mere fact.

Encarta Yearbook: Do you look down the road and see a chess player who's really young, say, in their teens, who you think you might have to worry about in four or five years?


Kasparov: The real danger could come from the players 20 years or so younger than myself. I don't think that I should expect real danger from players like [24-year-old Russian Vladimir] Kramnik or even [20-year-old Hungarian Peter] Leko.


There are players like [16-year-old World Team adviser Etienne] Bacrot, but I don't know. I mean, it's too early to make a final call. These players could create a danger, a potential problem, because time is on their side. Time is their biggest ally, and there's nothing I can do about it.


And there are also some very young players, 10, 11, 12 [years old], very talented, and most likely one of them will be next. So, I don't think that anyone who is older than 17 today is a danger from my point of view.


Source: Encarta Yearbook, September 1999.
Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2009. © 1993-2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.


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