KIng's Indian Attack

I was reading My 60 Memorable Games and the first game, against Sherwin, features the 'King's Indian Reversed' as Fischer calls it, or the King's Indian Attack (chessgames.com gives the opening as B40: Sicilian Defense: French Variation, which I guess makes sense):

I'm a 1. e4 player. I do not subscribe to Fischer's view that it is 'Best By Test', I merely feel that, as a weak player, I need to stick to my guns and develop a limited but effective Repertoire. Unfortunately, this means regularly facing the Sicilian. I really don't like playing against it, the sharpness is too much for me. So I was thinking about this type of set up, which seems solid, and would avoid typical sicilian games. Does anyone have any advice on the best plans for white? Is it as flexible as it appears? It would seem to be a not bad set up against most of what black would play; I've heard it described as an opening 'system' rather than a specific opening. Any advice would be much appreciated.

Incedentally, Kingscrusher has done an analysis video on the above game:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_q9gutxo3lI&feature=PlayList&p=BAC393B11BA550CF&index=0

ED.

I love the way that on moves 9, 10 and 11, the white pawns unfurl like a whip.

 Thanks for the advice Kepler. No indeed, I am not a swashbuckling player. The way I see it, if I can get out of the opening with material parity and a reasonable position, I've done ok. "He concentrates on playing KIA as a weapon against those who like to spoil the fun of 1. e4 by not playing 1. ... e5 " made me chuckle. That damnable sicilian!

There's a lot to be said for 1. Nf3. Perhaps the most flexible start available to white.

For what it's worth, you can go to a games database that has grandmaster games (chessgames.com, dare I say), and look up closed Sicilian games.  You might wanna try restricting the search to games where Spassky plays white, since he was quite fond of the fianchetto variation, although he often plays Ne2.  There are 87 games with him as white in a closed Sicilian:

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?yearcomp=exactly&year=&playercomp=white&pid=21136&player=&pid2=&player2=&movescomp=exactly&moves=&opening=B23-B26&eco=&result=

defenitly the KIA is the most suitable if u dont want to get to dozens of theory , its v flexible u can change to RETI or the ENGLISH whenever u like, besides it will encourage u to learn the KING'S indian defence as black against all white starts except 1.e4 , so in this case u limit the no. of openings u have to learn , and this was the philosophy of yasser seirawan in his excellent book "winning  chess openings" i agree that emms book is v good , but the best about KIA is "the ultimate king's indian attack " by angus dunnington, unfortunately this book is getting v expensive , so u may go for "how to play the king's indian attack" also by dunnington just a little old version of the "ultimate" , basically in our level there is no much difference ,

Oh...and as with the KID, the KIA can get pretty darn sharp as well.  You have to be pretty comfortable pushing your kingside pawns up the board, which can be nerve racking.  Another option might be the Grand Prix Attack.

What's the Grand Prix attack?

Good point.  I guess I tend not to think of the Grand Prix as being too nerve racking since the center tends to stay locked a bit longer, from my experience, anyway.

I love the KIA and have done well with it, even before I knew much about it. It feels "natural" to me.

before discussing the difference between emms and dunnington ......some players that uses 1.e4 refrain from it due to some uncomfortable replies , for example if u dont want to face the sicilian or the french or whatever , so u start with 1.e4 if black replied with any of those go for the KIA settup , thats why emms book is mainly about , starting with 1.e4 and forming KIA structure (named as the BARCZA setup which holds for KIA , KID , RETI, PIRC, MODERN) ,,,,, NOW the other route is to chose KIA as an opening from the begining regardless of ur opponent reply by starting 1.Nf3 so dunnington book talks of this against the all possible black replies . so in summary its a matter of strategy do u want to start CLASSICAL  with 1.e4 and transpose according to the situation , or chose to start HYPERMODERN with 1.Nf3 ......i am not against ems book its a great one , but its a matter of developing of style .... as u see in the fischer example he started 1.e4 when his opponent replied 1....c5 he chose the hypermodern route and went for KIA so as not to cont with the sicilian , the dunnington book doesnt mention 1.e4 at all it always starts with 1.Nf3 ....i hope i made my point clear, anyway no need for the ultimate , the how to play version is even cheaper than emms book...in amazon emms book is for 16.47 $  , the ultimate for 40$  and how to play is for 5.9$ (used) , i have the 3 books, no much diff between the ultimate and how to play , except if u care for the v recent trends in the KIA which i doubt it matters for any club player

As I recall Fischer's note on the Sherwin game, he opted for KIA not as a response to 1. ... c5 but as a response to 2. ...e6 (as distinct from Nc6 or d6). I think the reason is to do with the weakening of black's king's side dark squares, especially f6. Which is too strategically deep for the likes of me. Fischer also sometimes played KIA against the French, for the same reason, before he turned to taking on the Winawer variation to prove it unsound. But either way he wasn't avoiding sharp and theoretical lines, though you and I might well want to. 

crisy exactly what u r saying is perfect....i do fully agree, if u recall i said u take that line whenever u feal UNCOMFORTABLE with the black reply , thats exactly what fischer used to do....there are other KIA heroes who take it as a lifestyle , they dont even think of 1.e4 at all

dear kepler , let me quote for u here a paragraph from emms book in the introduction:

"choosing a KIA repertoire

 KIA repertoire can be formed in two quite different ways. the traditional way of playing KIA via a flank opening where white usually plays 1 Nf3 followed by g2-g3, Bg2,0-0,d2-d3.Nbd2 and then e2-e4, playing in this manner, white can employ the KIA against virtualy any set-up that black chooses to adopt, and this is the way favoured by grandmasters such as vaganian and aronian.

the more modern way of using KIA is to integrate it as part of a complete repertoire with 1 e4 as recommended by the chess trainer mark dvoretzky, and taken up by the likes of morozevich....youll discover in this book that playing with 1 e4 the KIA is more effective against certain defences than it is against others. .....by using the KIA against other black defences to 1e4 the white player can still get pleasure from playing open games without having to learn the theory of the main lines of the french and sicilian defences........in this book i've indulged a bit more in these lines because the theory is relatively more developed and i've found that the positions are v rich in ideas for both players."

this was the essence of this book AN INTEGRATED REPERTOIRE IN 1e4

the other way round is in dunnington book , he encouraged the first type mentioned by emms.

NOW as far as the full annotated games i agree with u dunnington used plenty of examples starting with 1.e4 this is mainly because the rich pool of games among grandmasters starts that way so he couldnt make a full book that is based on the BARCZA setup only, but his annotation when discussing the move order he has the attitude towards the first system, trying to explain that we can reach the same pos with the following order ...etc

also emms included the first system move order in plenty of examples to show that we can reach the same setup with the other move order

BRIEFLY emms addopted the second system as the main THEME teaching u it as a repertoire inside 1.e4 with bit examples on the other....dunnington was trying the other way round

sorry for this long discussion, i was just trying highlight the different PHYLOSOPHIES which emms summarized it in his introduction .thanks for ur patience and i am glad to discuss such issues with respectable colleagues like u

besides glad to know that we r both members of the same team CHESSAHOLICS so we r both addicted not just to chess but to chess books also...lol