Last February, Gary Kasparov, 30, the world champion, and his challenger, Nigel Short, 28, stunned the chess world when they founded the Professional Chess Association to run the world championship.
Chess Life magazine called it "The most comprehensive change in international chess since FIDE claimed the world title in 1948."The International Chess Federation (FIDE) promptly stripped Kasparov of the title and organized a rival match between two also-rans (Timman vs. Karpov). "They can play, but who will pay?" quipped Kasparov, whose bout with Short for about $3 million starts in London in September.
Many fans are rooting for the rebels because FIDE has long been rife with scandal. But will the pros unite, as they did in tennis and golf long ago, to make chess a big-time sport?
Inside Chess, which often echoes the FIDE line, blasted Kasparov and Short for hijacking the title, and touted Bobby Fischer, 50, as "the people's champion."
After hibernating for two decades, Fischer made a comeback in 1992 by defeating Boris Spassky in war-torn Yugoslavia for a purse of $5 million.
Fischer is clearly past his prime, yet he still claims the crown that he abdicated in 1975. "But Fischer is world champion of nothing until he defeats Kasparov, or whoever is world champion at the time," said a bemused fan and reported by Larry Evans, former U.S. champion several times.
The modern scene is reminiscent of a banquet held a century ago where a toast was made to the world champion and two players stood up.
In his book "World Cup Chess," Lubomir Kavelek traces the current conflict back to 1985, when FIDE and its president, Florencio Campomanes, illegally stopped the first Karpov-Kasparov match.
"Kasparov was contemplating a violent and complete break with FIDE. Gary was ready after all, but he did not make the material public."
Here, then, are the first six points of the pamphlet that Kasparov, Keene and Evans dubbed "A Declaration of Independence."
1. Pros have no real voice in decisions affecting them.
2. In February 1985, FIDE president Campomanes exceeded his authority by halting the first Karpov-Kasparov title match.
3. During the four K-K matches, FIDE increased its share of the purse from 5 percent to 25 percent and then diverted the extra money from the source for which it was intended (chess in developing nations).
Later it was learned that Campomanes had siphoned official funds from Switzerland to his own bank account in England.
4. Neither the champion nor the challenger had the power to veto all officials in their title match.
5. FIDE frequently changed rules without consent of the players.
6. After stripping Fischer of the title, FIDE gave his Soviet successor a bigger mathematical edge than the American sought.
Ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
- THRASHING - Almost everyone else may have given up the hoary principle of education, "Spare the rod and spoil the child." But not Victor Korchnoi.
The 62-year-old Swiss grandmaster, originally from the Soviet Union, roundly defeated his pupil, the Dutch champion Jereon Piket, by 6-2 in a training match last month in Nijmeagen, Netherlands.
Korchnoi can justify his taking the rod to the Dutch grandmaster by noting that Piket, at 23, should be man enough to profit by it. Piket's reaction, according to Robert Byrne of the New York Times, is not known.