How Russia lost chess. And why Vladimir Putin is to blame. Imagine a world where chess wasn’t just a game, but a weapon of ideology — that was the Soviet Union, where grandmasters became symbols of national pride and soft power. Legends like Botvinnik, Spassky, and Kasparov, Russia dominated the chessboard for most of the 20th century, crushing rivals and shaping the global game. But after the fall of the USSR, cracks began to show: corruption scandals, infighting at FIDE, and a new generation of stars rising outside Russia weakened its grip. Today, with Magnus Carlsen refusing to play under FIDE’s old rules and Russia banned from international competition over the war in Ukraine, the once-unshakable empire of Russian chess looks like a shadow of its former self. In this video,