[Barrin92]

Of course there was. There was a nationwide infrastructure of chess clubs, tournaments, state financing and training that no other country had. This created the large base from which gifted players could be recruited

"But the real basis of the Soviet school was its colossal infrastructure, creating a pool of millions. As the huge Soviet training campaign bore fruit, and literally hundreds of players achieved master or grandmaster strength between the 1940s and 1960s, a vast system of rewards and punishments was built up, with endless in-fighting and denunciations. The life of a chess professional was a privileged one: stipends were much higher than average wages, and foreign travel allowed. Botvinnik and his successor Vassily Smyslov were awarded the Order of Lenin, the highest civilian Soviet honour—no British professional has received so much as a knighthood."

https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/coldwarchess

[atemerev]

It is the same in any other country. There are state-sponsored chess clubs everywhere.

[rurban]

no, there are not. only in the ex-soviet states.

that's why they dominate chess forever. the talentpool is huge, and education is good. nobody else comes close, in infrastructure and level.

[ascar]

we have chess clubs in pretty much every village here in Germany. My ~10000 people birthplace had one. Doesn't make chess hugely popular tho. It's still a niche activity and I would argue that interest is the dmoniating factor here.

Also Russia isn't dominting chess anymore. They have a single player in the world top10 and 3 in the top20. [1]

[1] https://ratings.fide.com/top.phtml?list=men

[lupire]

They have a world championship contender, 6 in the top 24 and 22 in the top 100. (USA has 12, China and India have 8 each.) That's domination.

Except Magnus, the top 100 are 150pts apart, which is extremely close in ability. #100 could expect to beat #2 in 1 out of 3 games.

[atemerev]

Have you lived in an ex-Soviet state? Have you seen the USSR from the inside with your own eyes? I have, and I am so much tired from people glorifying it.

[sudosysgen]

There is glorification, and then there is simple truth. Nothing has to be all bad nor all good.