David Edmonds - Bobby Fischer Goes to War

Whatever the degree of incredulity in Moscow over external tampering, backs had to be guarded, appropriate action seen to be taken. For instance, to investigate possible interference with Spassky’s food, a sample of the juice the Icelanders supplied to Spassky was carried to the Soviet capital for laboratory analysis.

The charge that the Americans were deploying psychological warfare was also examined. Spassky’s refusal to take a doctor to Reykjavik did not stop the Sports Committee from deciding on 10 August that certain specialists should go anyway. The Health Ministry was asked for help. So, somewhat to his surprise, an eminent psychiatrist, Professor Vartanian, received a request to meet Ivonin on 21 August at the committee’s offices. He was invited to travel to Iceland with a colleague of his choosing, make observations, and then report back. Discretion was the order of the day: they would go as Ambassador Astavin’s guests. “We didn’t want to upset Spassky,” says Ivonin, “so we arranged for the psychiatrists to go as the ambassador’s friends.” Their mission was to assess the personalities of each player and whether Spassky was being “influenced.”

The late professor Vartanian was then general director of the Mental Health Center. He approached Professor Zharikov, a psychiatrist at the Medical Institute, where today he is dean of the Department of Psychological Medicine. The bait was the trip to Iceland, an exotic location they might otherwise never visit. Professor Zharikov is a survivor of the epic tank battle of Kursk, where he was wounded. Above the entrance to his office is a plaque recording his status as a veteran of the Great Patriotic War. Inside, a picture of Lenin dominates the room.

On arrival, Vartanian and Zharikov were immediately briefed by embassy staff; the allegations were repeated about hypnosis, parapsychology, and interference from a device in Fischer’s chair. They leafed through the press, looking at cartoons of the match. Professor Zharikov was in a skeptical mood. He did not believe in parapsychology, and rumors were to be expected with so much at stake. Amusement flickers in the professor’s eyes as he remembers sitting in the hall, observing the players through binoculars. He regarded the episode as a joyride. The trip made few professional demands. He had no opportunity to get to know the subjects of his studies, and given the stress of the situation, diagnosing their characters and distinguishing normal from abnormal behavior was nearly impossible. “Each person involved in such a difficult psychological situation would respond differently,” Zharikov says. “There were no standards. You wouldn’t say such-and-such behavior is a problem and such-and-such behavior is not.”

He considered the champion to be balanced. Their only meeting with Spassky came at an embassy reception, and Zharikov was impressed: “A very clever young man, maybe a bit solemn—a person in whom psychosis would not develop easily. He was very self-possessed and liked to show off, like to talk.” The professors assured Ambassador Astavin there was nothing to worry about. They repeated that view in the official document to the Sports Committee: “We wrote a short report dismissing the speculations and confirming that the participants in the match were in an absolutely proper condition.”

Soviet paranoia was by no means one-sided. The second secretary at the Soviet embassy, Dmitri Vasil’iev, has a recollection of Fischer complaining of KGB men in the hall trying to hypnotize him. It was the expression of what Victor Jackovich described as Fischer’s anti-Soviet mind-set.

Fischer was convinced the Soviets were listening in, were watching somehow. He thought they were playing with him in a variety of ways—that there were people sitting in the front rows of the audience somehow affecting his concentration, perhaps with electronic devices. His paranoia was pervasive. It was part of the reason why going to the U.S. base at Keflavik was such a comfort for Fischer—part of our trying to make him feel more comfortable in terms of “Look, this is a military U.S., NATO base. You’re safe here.” If someone would say something about the Russians, he would perk up immediately and would shoot a question about it. I just had the sense that if you really wanted to get his attention, you just mentioned the Russians.

The tension was such that it even got to the New York lawyer Paul Marshall. He recalls how his and his wife’s passports were missing from their hotel desk and then suddenly appeared back in their room. “And we started to feel the same pressures, thinking, ‘That’s odd.’ This and several other things made us believe that Bobby’s idea of Russian trickery may have some merit.” However, the atmosphere could also be used to provide some wholesome American fun. He and his wife, Bette, were in the public entrance to the hall when Nikolai Krogius was passing. Bette called out: “‘Grandmaster Krogius, friends and contacts in America wanted me to give you these papers.’ And Krogius turned and ran.”

With the probability of a KGB watcher loitering there, who could blame him?

However, Spassky and Geller were not completely mistaken. Outsiders did try to influence the proceedings.

What we now know is that the KGB was active during the match—active in investigating possible attacks on the world champion, active in attempting a preemptive propaganda coup against the Americans, working with the connivance of the Moscow chess authorities, perhaps active too in spreading a rumor that Spassky was planning to defect.

Soviet grandmasters of the era assumed that the KGB was involved in chess, as in all pursuits deemed important by the state. Chess players sized up one another. Which of them had a role beyond chess? Which of them was receiving an extra stipend—had a so-called side job? Which of them was informing? Who was holding a chess position while actually a KGB officer?

To this day, many in the former Soviet Union will contend that the KGB’s work in defending the state was an honorable undertaking—so there was no dishonor in collaborating with them. The KGB was the real travel authority, lurking behind all the committees of Party faithful who had the task of initially vetting applications to travel. Through its informants, the KGB was tipped off as to what was going on in chess circles and would “suggest” to the authorities who should be encouraged, who should be discouraged, who should be banned from leaving the Soviet Union, who should be allowed to go abroad. It was a common practice to suggest to would-be travelers that their passports might be more readily available if they agreed to act as the eyes and ears of the organization.

Some even claim that the KGB had an office in the Central Chess Club in Moscow—though an officer is more likely. Yuri Averbakh professes ignorance of any such thing: “I had an office there, and if so, I did not know about it.” Nonetheless, he fully understood how the system operated, even if his deeply embedded instinct—or perhaps superstitious habit—is to avoid speaking directly of the KGB. “In the Stalin era, usually if a team were traveling, an obvious representative of this organization was sent along. This person would observe the participants. In 1952, I played in the Interzonal tournament, and there was such a person there. In 1953 at the Candidates tournament in Zurich, there was such a person. In 1955, when Spassky traveled to the World Junior Chess Championship—I was his coach at the time—there was also a representative of that organization with us. After 1956, for about three years, no one was sent. This was the time of the thaw. Then, at the beginning of the 1960s, such people began to appear again. In Curaçao, for example, a KGB person accompanied us.”