First of all, I would like to congratulate our team for scoring 7.5 points after playing the 3rd round of the world championship and winning the leading champion Ukraine by 2.5:1.5. The Armenian side currently gives way to the Russians with 8 points. Yesterday, our men had to play in the U.S. As a matter of fact, our team won in Georgia too.
Nothing happens by chance. We must agree with the fact that the countries which play major roles in the political chess world championship, including Armenia, Russia, the U.S., Ukraine and Georgia are surprisingly similar to present day political life. In any case, these countries are the most talked about in Armenian media. If we recall what Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the U.S. John Evans said during his last press conference in Armenia, that the U.S. was going to spend large amounts of money for the 2007/2008 state elections, then we can predict that we will witness a pretty serious and intensive struggle in the 2007 team championship (National Assembly elections) and 2008 individual championship (Armenian presidential elections). Perhaps we will have unexpected results. And since we will not see a shortage of players in both first and second games, we will try to discuss all the rounds of that tournament. Today, we will focus on the “Republic” and “Rule of Law” political parties. In this case, rounds refer to the tournament as a whole.
White team
King – Andranik Markaryan
Queen – Administrative wing of the “Republic” political party
Pawns – Strong structures
Bishops – Administrative resource of the local government
Horses – Mass media
Knights – Voters believing in the power of money
Black team
King – Artur Baghdasaryan
Queen – “Rule of Law” political party
Pawns – Cosmopolitan resources
Bishops – Some oppositionist political parties
Horses – Mass media
Knights – Voters believing in populism
Whites
The last couple of months proved that the “Republic” political party is not changing its strategy. By moving its knights forward, it made the white bishops stronger (local government’s resources). However, for some reason, it continues to neglect the horses (mass media).
Blacks
In contrast to the “Republic” political party, since “Rule of Law” doesn’t have a strong administrative resource, it keeps the horses (mass media) in strong positions and obviously plans on moving its pawns (cosmopolitan resources) in difficult moments. “Rule of Law” realizes that the non-administrative wing of the “Republic” political party is ready to leave the party at any given time.
Whites
It is clear that if the blacks do not fulfill their promise made in 2003 concerning the return of deposits by 2007, their knights will lose power. What’s more, they can even fill the posts of the white knights. Having this in mind, the white queen, under the leadership of the king, was doing the best it could to not fulfill that promise. As a matter of fact, a large amount of black figures would leave the team with pleasure, especially the so-called business sector. As soon as they feel that their business is in danger, they will forget about “Rule of Law” once and for all.
Blacks
The black king, considered to be one of the main players in the 2008 tournament, is trying to move his planned out strategy forward by taking advantage of the constitutional amendments. Besides that, recently the blacks are “playing games” with the help of their pawns-both outside (Artur Baghdasaryan’s visits to the U.S. and Russia) as well as inside (there were more than 80 foreign delegations present at the National Assembly’s 15th anniversary celebration and $200,000 dollars had been spent for the event).
Whites
However, the whites are not planning on “keeping silent”. Since they have strong ties, the whites know the black team’s weaknesses. They proved that during the event connected with “Rule of Law” and the police officers when they oppressed the black queen with their pawns in a matter of hours. As for the cosmopolitan forces, the whites know that even though they are known for their strength, however, they have not played a major role in Armenia.
Blacks
The black king, Artur Baghdasaryan, has also noticed that, however, being young (from the same generation as Sahakashvili and Yushchenko), he has also seen those cosmopolitan forces reign in Georgia and Ukraine. I must say that the black bishops (some oppositionist political parties) can play major roles. Artur Baghdasaryan is making interesting moves with the bishops (let’s recall the mutual reverences with Aram Sargsyan and Artashes Geghamyan). Of course, the white king also has good relations with the oppositionist political parties, including A. Sargsyan.
Chess interpreter-Karen Kocharyan
Only time will show which team’s figures play better. However, one thing is clear: it is hard to say that the trainer who had enlisted these two political chess players in the same team can do the same thing when it comes time for the next elections. Of course, we had not focused on the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), the “Popular MP” and other grosmeisters of 2008 in this round. In reality, all that must be observed coherently so that we get a clear image. I think that we will be able to study all the rounds in the upcoming months.