Intro

The Ruy Lopez: Berlin Defense, is really an amazing line. Black allows his pawns to be doubled, forfeits his right to castle, gives white a lead in development, and accepts a position where white has no weaknesses, all in exchange for a light squared bishop! The strange thing is, almost all top GM's have used the Berlin on occasion. Hopefully in this article I can give you an idea of why black can play this defense at even the top levels, without ever having to worry about a theoretical refutation.

The Starting Position

The Berlin Defense is characterized by the opening line 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 Nf6. I would suggest that this move is actually more theoretically justified than 3. ... a6, Steinitz suggestion and the modern mainline. Let's compare a common position in the Ruy Exchange, with the Berlin mainline.

Ruy Exchange Mainline

Berlin Defense Mainline

Definitely an interesting comparison. Judging by the theoretical 'comfort' of black in the Ruy Exchange (I actually use the exchange and there are some concrete variations that are very interesting for white. Perhaps another article for another forum), it would appear that black will be absolutely fine with no problems unless white is able to find a concrete continuation that exploits black's uncastled king. We'll get into this a little later.

Critical Variation

The critical line, as played most frequently at top levels, and most notably used 5 times in the Kasparov - Kramnik (2000) World Championship match, is as follows:

This may come as a surprise, considering the Kasparov - Kramnik matches and the fact that GM's use this defense all the time, but black has very little theory to memorize. I've included a diagram with all the important variations in one place near the end of the article. For now, let's look at something much more important. Plans.

Positional Breakdown

For the sake of making the rest of this article a little more understandable, here's a quick little breakdown of the position.

The most notable plus for white is his kingside pawn majority. For black, his bishop pair (particularly his unopposed light square bishop). White has no structural weaknesses, but has essentially weakened 32 squares by playing Bxc6. Black has two weaknesses of note: he has doubled C-pawns, and has lost the right to castle.

This in mind, lets look at the typical plans.

Plans - White

I've decided to include this section on typical white plans here for two reasons. One, abstract theory aside, it really looks like white should be better by move 9. Secondly, it's just a lot simpler.

After our positional breakdown, it is fairly obvious that white has two ways to try and win. He must either take advantage of his lead in development and strike quickly, or he must trade down into an endgame where his unopposed kingside pawn majority will be decisive.

This is more or less accurate, when white wins, he's found a way to catch black's king in the center of the board, or (more commonly) he's slammed a kingside pawn down the board.

This kingside pawn majority is definitely white's claim to advantage. If everything but the kings and pawns were taken off the board at the end of our critical variation, black would have to resign.

Thankfully, black isn't helpless through all this.

Plans - Black

As we talked about earlier, black has several advantages (as opposed to white's kingside majority, which is really his only strategic plus), albiet subtler. Obviously, the bishop pair is a nice thing to have. However, much to even very strong players surprise, black would sooner give up his bishop pair. Black's number one preferred exchange is his DS bishop for a knight. The reason is fairly simple, white's dark squared bishop is rubbish in comparison to black's light squared. In fact, black's preferred endgame almost always involves opposite coloured bishops (obviously this is very drawish without another piece or two).

A second, and more subtle, advantage is black's queenside pawn majority. Of course, the fact that these pawns have been doubled is largely a disadvantage, and in variations where white opts to avoid this doubling black often finds himself with winning chances. However, the extra queenside pawn allows black to advance fairly threateningly without having to worry about leaving weaknesses.

All in all, the lack of weaknesses (and black's ability to manouvre without leaving weaknesses), is black's trump card. See the diagram below for a great example.

note: This is an unfinished article. I've saved my work here as I go along so as to avoid losing my work (for a second time). When the article is finished, I'll copy the article and repost it into an identical thread, deleting this one.

-matt

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