Max Euwe

Max Euwe was a Dutch chess player and mathematician. He was the fifth world champion (1935-1937) and the third president of FIDE (1970-1978). He played for the Netherlands in seven Chess Olympiads from 1927 to 1962, in which he won a silver medal and a bronze medal. His presidency was characterized by ups and downs in relations with the Soviet Union, which believed it could have a say in important decisions, since it contributed significantly to FIDE's budget and Soviet players clearly dominated the world rankings. Among the conflicts with the Soviet Federation we can mention: The events that led to Fischer's participation in the world championship against Boris Spassky, which ended with Fischer's victory, the first non-Soviet champion after the Second World War. Euwe believed that it was important for the reputation of the game that the American should have the opportunity to compete for the title as soon as possible and interpreted the rules very flexibly to allow Fischer to participate in the 1971 Candidates' Tournament. Grandmaster Gennady Sosonko's escape from the Soviet Union in 1972. The USSR demanded that Sosonko be treated as a "non-person", excluded from competitive chess, television and any other situation that might highlight his abandonment of the Soviet Union. Euwe refused, and as a countermeasure, no Soviet players participated in the 1974 edition of the important tournament in Wijk aan Zee, the Netherlands, as Sosonko was present there. In 1976, world title contender Viktor Korčnoj requested political asylum in the Netherlands. A few days earlier, in a conversation, Euwe told Korčnoj: "of course you will get all your rights back." He later opposed Soviet efforts to prevent Korchnoi from challenging Anatoly Karpov in 1978. Also in 1976 he supported FIDE's decision to hold that year's Chess Olympiad in Israel, which the Soviet Union did not recognize as a nation. The Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union then took action to try to force Euwe to resign from the presidency. From 1921 to 1952 Euwe won every Dutch chess championship in which he took part, achieving a further title in 1955: his twelve successes are still a record. On December 15, 1935, after 30 games played in 13 different Dutch cities over a period of 80 days, Euwe defeated Alekhine 15.5 to 14.5 to become the fifth world chess champion. In the initial stages of the match Alekhine quickly took a two-point lead, but from the thirteenth game onwards Euwe won twice as many games as the Russian. This was the first world championship in which players could take advantage of the help of seconds to analyze matches between updates. Euwe's victory was a major surprise and has been attributed by some to Alekhine's problems with alcohol. But Salo Florh, Euwe's second during the match, pointed out that overconfidence had been a bigger problem for Alekhine than alcohol and Alekhine himself said that he would have won easily. World champions Vasily Smyslov, Boris Spassky, Anatoly Karpov and Garri Kasparov, analyzing the match during their studies, concluded that Euwe deserved the victory and that the quality of the matches was worthy of a world championship. Vladimir Borisovich Kramnik, also a former world champion, stated that Euwe won the 1935 match with full merit and that the result was not influenced by Alekhine's drinking before or during the match. Euwe's victory contributed greatly to the popularity of chess in the Netherlands. Euwe lost the title in the rematch against Alekhine in 1937, again played in the Netherlands, by a relatively one-sided score of 9.5 to 15.5. Alekhine stopped drinking during his preparation for the fight, although he started drinking again later. The Russian returned to the kind of form he had shown in the period 1927-1935, when he dominated the chess world. The match was initially close, but Euwe's play collapsed towards the end and he lost four of his last five matches. After Alekhine's death in 1946, Euwe was regarded by some as the moral holder of the world champion title, based at least partially on his 2nd place in the very strong 1946 Groningen tournament, behind Mikhail Botvinnik. Instead he agreed to take part in a five-player tournament that was to designate the new champion, the 1948 World Chess Championship. At 47, by far the oldest of the contenders, and long in decline, Euwe ranked last with 4 points out of 20. His last major engagement was the 1953 Zurich Candidates' Tournament, in which he came second to last. In 1957 Euwe played a short match against fourteen-year-old Bobby Fischer, winning the first match and drawing the second. He played Fischer only one more time, in 1960, losing. He thus managed to obtain a draw in the matches against the great American champion. This was my tenth article, I wanted to thank everyone who follows me and who is part of the club, but I especially wanted to thank akibat for his support of the blog and for his interest. You have always been a very good friend.