USA vs. USSR radio chess match 1945

The USA vs. USSR radio chess match 1945 was a chess match between the United States and the USSR that was conducted over the radio from September 1 to September 4, 1945.[1] The ten leading masters of the United States played the ten leading masters of the Soviet Union (except for Paul Keres) for chess supremacy. The match was played by radio and was a two-game head-to-head match between the teams. The time control was 40 moves in 2+1⁄2 hours and 16 moves per hour after that. Moves were transmitted using the Uedemann Code.[2] It took an average of 5 minutes to transmit a move. The US team played at the Henry Hudson Hotel in New York. The Soviet team met at the Central Club of Art Masters in Moscow. The USSR team won the match 15+1⁄2–4+1⁄2.

This result was met with astonishment around the chess world, since the USA had won four straight Chess Olympiads from 1931 to 1937; however, the Soviet Union had not competed in those tournaments. The Soviet program for producing a new generation of chess masters, originated and supervised by Nikolai Krylenko from the early 1930s, clearly was paying dividends. From 1945 onwards, Soviet players would dominate international chess for most of the rest of the 20th century. The radio match proved a watershed and a changing of the guard in the chess world (Hooper & Whyld 1992:330).

Other radio matches took place around this time.