Chess openings named after countries

Introduction

In total, there are over 1,327 chess openings named after various places and countries, primarily because many of these openings are named for the nationalities of the players who advocated them or the locations where significant games featuring those openings were played.  

Of course, there are more common openings such as the Italian Game, French Defense, Spanish Opening, or the Ruy López Opening, and so forth, so we're not going to mention them today. Instead, I've gathered 8 interesting chess openings named after countries that most people don't know about, so without further ado, let's begin!

1. Austrian Attack of the Pirc defense

This is an opening that you can play with white against the Pirc Defense, where you play the most aggressive variation and reinforce the center by playing the move 4. f4, even though white's kingside is now open. It's not that dangerous because black's queen & bishop can't come out to attack white's king that easily, since black's plan is likely to just fianchetto their bishop and play solidly.

2. Chinese Variation of the Pirc defense 

An opening that comes out of the Pirc defense again! This is an opening you can play with white, where you aim to attack the kingside immediately by pushing the g-pawn early, even without fully developing your pieces. Even though it goes against chess principles, it can catch your opponent off guard since it's relatively uncommon and may lead to a very high win rate for white.

3. Kazakh Opening of the King's Indian Defense 

This is an opening that can be played with the black pieces against the normal variation of the King's Indian Defense, where you play a questionable but good move: 6...Na6, developing the knight to the side of the board. 

4. Hungarian (Chekhover) Variation of the Sicilian Defense

An opening that you can play with white against the modern variation of the Sicilian defense. Where you recapture the central pawn with the queen instead of the knight. Even though it's risky, the queen is in a position where it can't be attacked easily.

5. Icelandic gambit of the Scandinavian defense 

This is an opening that you can play with black against the Scandinavian defense. The point of this opening is to trade another pawn for the lead in the development of the black pieces if white were to accept the gambit.

6. Macedonian Variation of the English opening

A name for an offbeat chess opening that you can play as white against the English opening: King's English Variation, the point of this opening is to lure black's pawn on e5 by you pushing your pawn to f4, sacrificing it, and then following up with d4, and can lead to an interesting game dynamic.

Surprisingly, this opening has a very decent win rate for white. Due to how uncommon a move f4 is, most people that are playing with the black pieces don't know how to play against it.

7. Peruvian (Been-Koomen) Variation of the Queen's gambit declined

This opening can be played as Black against the Queen's Gambit Declined: Modern Variation. Where you try to counterattack the center immediately by playing the move 4...c5, after white pins black's knight, there's not much to say about this, but it's worth mentioning.

8. Philippine attack (Bryne Variation) of the Pirc the Defense

Yet another chess opening that comes out of the Pirc Defense, and a very successful opening for white, is to play the move 5.f4 to reinforce the center and prepare to push e5 and also for a potentially pawn-storm attack on black's kingside. This opening has a 53% win rate; Black can lose the game if they're not defended properly.

Conclusion

These chess openings may not be considered the best openings, but it’s interesting to play, since most of these openings are not that common; it can surprise your opponent if they’re not prepared.

Hope you learn a thing or two, Good luck and have a nice day everyone!

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