Hello, everyone! Ciao, a tutti!
Welcome to my game.
As you always are, I’m playing my own game, too.
What is the difference between Koryu & Chess?
It goes without saying that Strategy and Tactics are prime concerns of both Koryu & Chess.
Then, is there something different here?
I think the difference is only how they look.
But I think it matters little, because on Koryu we often trick the opponent by how we look.
At least, Garry Kasparov shows us the words of Sun Tzu(孫子) “Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” and he continues, “Let us begin with the big picture, with strategy. The old chess saying “A bad plan is better than no plan at all” is more clever than true.”, in his book “How Life Imitates Chess”.
Before such words of Sun Tzu(孫子), what Kasparov shows us is like this, “The distinction between tactics and strategy will be important to us throughout this section(‘Strategy’). Whereas strategy is abstract and based on long-term goals, tactics are concrete and based on finding the best move right now. Tactics are conditional and opportunistic, all about threat and defense. No matter what pursuit you’re engaged in ― chess, business, the military, managing a sports team ― it takes both good tactics and wise strategy to be successful.”
Of course, what Sun Tzu(孫子) thought has been the very fundamentals of Koryu.
To get and keep our own strategy with tactics, we still study Koryu today.
But here, I want to share with you what GM Nigel Short mentions also about strategy and tactics, when he watches the game GM Sam Shankland (USA) vs GM Sergey Karjakin (RUS) with IM Almira Skripchenko in FIDE World Cup 2021 Quarterfinals – Game 1.
Nigel discusses the analyses of Almira what to move or what not to move with her, and mentions, “That’s typical one of these ideas. That is anti-positional, but completely justified by the tactics. This is why, I say this very often the people who fancy themselves being great strategists. You know, they have all mental images, “I’m a great strategist.” And they can’t calculate properly. The point is, you can’t calculate, you can’t maintain to grip on your position. They always say about Tigran Petrosian. He was a great positional player. But Boris Spassky said, “He was a great tactician.””
Then Almira agrees and says, “This is how to make your positional ideas work.”
And yes, in his book “The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played: 62 Masterpieces of Chess Strategy”, Irving Chernev shows us the game, T.Petrosian vs V.Smyslov at Moscow 1961 with titled ‘Dispatching the King’s Musketeers’ as follows:
“There is nothing prosaic in the way Petrosian handles a King-side attack. He can discover witty ideas in the most well-worn positions.
In this game, he finds an original means of breaking into the opponent’s territory. He begins by making three aggressive moves in a row with his Queen. These three moves up-root the three Pawns protecting the King in the Castled position. There still remains one strong defender of the King to be disposed of ― the enemy Queen! Petrosian lures the Queen away by an offer of his Bishop, and then storms the bastions.”
Now on the other hand, in Jujutsu(柔術) of Koryu, we often use our parts of body secretly to prepare the opponent’s almost all own weight on the own weakest point for our finish by our one more move without difficulty.
I think this is something similar to Petrosian’s playing style.
Especially in Jujutsu(柔術), to break into the opponent’s territory, we use some parts of the opponent’s body as like an extension combined with our body by touching or being touched.
And I think it is a really delicate sense of touch like those moves of Petrosian’s Queen e4, g4, h3.
Then, let me try to explain about how to use something as an extension combined with my body.
For example, by Tessen(鉄扇).
When I need some breeze in my room, I often use my Tessen(鉄扇) whose weight is 425g.
First of all, what is Tessen(鉄扇)?
Tessen(鉄扇) is a folding fan whose thin plates or only bones are made of iron.
Why iron?
Because the beginning of Tessen(鉄扇) was a tool of self-defense concealing like a usual belonging in battlefield or in even such a room like where everyone could not bring any weapon.
And there are several kinds of Tessen(鉄扇).
About my Tessen(鉄扇), the iron part is only 2 big bones, and other fine bones are bamboo.
But of course, there is a Tessen(鉄扇) all made of iron.
Anyway when I control my Tessen(鉄扇) gently swaying by my fingers, I feel the weight of Tessen(鉄扇) sustained by my stomach directly.
With swaying Tessen(鉄扇), my fingers are combined with my wrist, and my wrist is combined with my elbow, and my elbow is combined with my shoulder, and my shoulder is combined with my neck, and my neck is combined with my backbone, and my backbone is combined with my stomach and my back.
Of course, this is only my feeling, so, actually I must use some particular muscles of each part of my body.
And besides, Tessen(鉄扇) is just a tool, but I feel as if it is some extension of my body.
Tessen(鉄扇) is combined with my fingers as like a tip of my fingers.
Its weight is mainly sustained by my abdominal muscle, not only my fingers.
So, I can sway it gently without getting tired for half an hour.
This is a usual thing for me to use my other weapons in Koryu, too.
I think there is something similar to a combination in chess.
I hope I can tell you a bit of my feeling with breeze from my Tessen(鉄扇).
Thank you, best regards.
Grazie, buona partita.
