Wartime streak, Day 6: Draw (1569-1569)

It's a surreal situation in Jerusalem where one moment air raid sirens and explosions send everyone running for cover and the next moment the city is back to normal like nothing happened. At the hospital yesterday for my long-awaited postop appointment, the surgery ward had been moved four stories below ground. My surgeon, meanwhile, after a brief examination, cleared me to return to an active lifestyle.

For today's game Chess.com matched me with one MADANION, rated 1565 out of Moldova. He played a frustrating combination of fast and defensive, reacting with confidence to my threats but never countering with threats of his own. As in the previous game, I had a decisive advantage in the middlegame; but even though I didn't blunder any pieces, I still failed to convert and the game ended in a draw. This puts my wartime record at 3-1-2.

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Position 1: White to move

Assigned the white pieces, I opened 1.d4, and after 1...d5 2.c4 dxc4 we were in a Queen's Gambit Accepted. I continued 3.e4 and Black's 3...e6 allowed me an easy recapture with 4.Bxc4. Black spent the next two moves pushing pawns, such that 4...a6 5.Nf3 and 5...b5 were played and I had two pieces deployed while Black had none. My bish was under attack; and remembering my 2026-02-13 game where I played Bc4-b3 and the engine wanted Bc4-d3, I retreated the bish with 6.Bd3 -- but here the engine wanted 6.Bb3. With 6...Bb7 Black finally developed a piece, I castled with 7.0-0, and Black's 7...h6 gave me an advantage of +1.40 -- but that dropped to +0.71 after 8.e5.

1. Why did I choose 8.e5?
8.e5 gained me space and took away the most natural square for Black's knight. Moreover, it opened up the b1-h7 diag for my light-square bish.

2. Why is my move not ideal?
On Sunday at the chess club we studied the 1945 game "Ruda Wakening" between Smyslov and Iosif Rudakovsky, where the weakness of Black's backward d-pawn proved fatal. I think that by advancing my e-pawn when the d-file was semiopen for Black I was creating an analagous weakness vis-a-vis my d4-pawn.

3. Why is the better move better than my chosen move?
8.a4 threatens to leave Black with three pawn islands if 8...bxa4; and if 8...b4 then Black renounces his claim to the c4-square.

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Position 2: White to move

Black's reply to my e-pawn advance was 8...Bxf3, and after 9.Qxf3 Black again had no pieces deployed. As my queen was attacking Black's rook on a8, 9...Nd7 was a disco defense from Black's queen. I developed with 10.Nc3, and Black instead of developing another piece moved his knight again with 10...Nb6. I was starting to get a sense that my position was meaningfully better -- Black's king wasn't castled, he only controlled one central square, my light-square bish was actively positioned, and I was way ahead in piece development.

Whereas 11.Be3 was both a development move and a defense of my weak d4-pawn, 11...Nd5 was Black's third straight move with his knight. 12.Nxd5 again left Black with no developed pieces, and 12...exd5, although it worsened my dark-square bish, solved the problem of my d4-pawn. 13.Rac1 activated a rook to control the semiopen c-file and targeted Black's weak c7-pawn, and with 13...Bb4 Black deployed his dark-square bish to the most active square available. 14.Rc6 was my attempt to stack on the c-file and go after Black's c7-pawn, but 14...Ne7 negated that idea. Retreating with 15.Rc2, Black added defense to c7 with 15...Ba5. I stacked with 16.Rfc1, and Black's reply of 16...Ng6 was an invitation to exchange with 17.Bxg6 fxg6. Now I had control of two files, Black couldn't castle, and his kingside pawn structure was damaged. The engine evaluates my position as +5.20, but here was where failing to find the best move gradually eroded my advantage. I continued 18.Rc5, and my advantage slipped to +3.93.

1. Why did I choose 18.Rc5?
18.Rc5 mobilized a second attacker against Black's d5-pawn. The only second defender he could summon was his pawn on c7, but 18...c6 would lose the c-pawn to 19.Rxc6.

2. Why is my move not ideal?
My e-pawn was a connected passer thanks to its companion on the d4-square. Chopping on d5 would reopen the d-file for Black, potentially making my d-pawn a target again. In addition, with Black having failed to castle and lagging in development, the pressure was on him. In that situation, my queen was a more valuable piece than Black's and trading them off for the d5-pawn relieved some of the pressure on Black.

3. Why is the better move better than my chosen move?
The top engine move is not 18.Rc5 but 18.Rc6, attacking Black's pawn on g6. I had considered this, but it seemed a waste of time due to 18...g5. What I had failed to appreciate was that after 18...g5, 19.Re6+ is devastating. If 19...Kd7 then 20.Qxd5+ is a fork and Black loses a rook.

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Position 3: White to move

Black attacked my queen with 18...Rf8, and since I was double attacking Black's d5-pawn I chopped with 19.Qxd5. What the engine wanted here was 19.Qg4, daring Black to reply 19...g5 after which 20.Qh5+ would cause Black all manner of problems. Black and I exchanged queens with 19...Qxd5 and 20.Rxd5, after which the rooks were exchanged with 20...Rd8 21.Rxd8 Kxd8. Here I missed 22.Rc6 restricting Black's king and blockading his c-pawn. Instead I played 22.a3, and after 22...Bb6 23.b4 e7 24.Rc3 Ke6 25.Rc6+ Black's king marched boldly around my passed e-pawn with 25...Kf5. I advanced 26.h3 to support a g-pawn push, but it was the wrong pawn. Black pushed 26...g5, boosting my advantage to +6.51, but after 27.g4+ my advantage collapsed to a mere +0.84.

1. Why did I choose 27.g4+?
There was an opportunity to give check and I took it.

2. Why is my move not ideal?
27.g4+ allowed Black's king to find refuge on e4, where my own army shielded him from attack.

3. Why is the better move better than my chosen move?
The move I needed to find, 27.f3, would have trapped Black's king on f5 and threatened mate with 28.g4#. Black would have to give up his rook with 27...Rf6 or his bish with 27...Bxd4 in order to stay alive.