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Subject: Re: Was Mao Tse Tung a great chess player.......????

Author: Torstein Hall

Date: 08:37:02 02/05/01

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On February 04, 2001 at 18:25:06, Laurence Chen wrote:

>On February 04, 2001 at 15:58:54, Albert Silver wrote:
>
>>On February 04, 2001 at 14:42:38, Torstein Hall wrote:
>>
>>>On February 04, 2001 at 14:19:21, Tim OConnor wrote:
>>>
>>>>quite true
>>>
>>>And how easy do you find to adapt Sun Tzus book to chess?
>>>
>>>I have not read the book, but can you come up with some great examples for
>>>chess? Something I easily could adopt to to improve my play?
>>>I remember spesially well the advice from one "Chess Manual". It sounded like
>>>this in my free translation from Norwegian. " First and foremost, do no
>>>mistakes!" I hope Sun Tzu is a bit more to the point!
>>
>>MUCH more to the point. He had a general decapitated as far as I recall for
>>ineptness (making a mistake) in a battle _simulation_. So his advice would be
>>more along the lines of: "Don't make a mistake... OR ELSE!"
>>
>>Seriously though, his advice applies to any form of conflict. His most
>>revolutionary concept as far as I could gather was undoubtedly on the importance
>>of gathering intelligence (i.e. Espionage), but for chess, it would be basic
>>ideas such as not attacking where your opponent is strongest, etc.
>>
>>
>>                                    Albert
>In the so called simulation, Sun Tzu used the Emperor's concubines to
>demonstrate his philosophy of warfare, the appointed woman desobeyed his order
>and he had the woman decapitated because to make sure that the remaining women
>would take seriously his orders.  This was necessary in order to bring
>discipline and obedience among the women.  Afterwards, the women followed his
>order without any errors.
>Regards,
>
>Laurence

It do not sound so subtle to me this Sun Tzu, but I guess the teaching
principles was a bit different at that time. :-)

To me it sounds like Mao was one of the readers of his book. Great general,
horrible teacher! And I do not think Mao played chess.

Torstein



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