In 1990, he joined the Democratic Party of Russia and became increasingly outspoken in favor of human rights, representative democracy, and limited government. Kasparov joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1984 but was critical of the regime during that decade. 'I could immediately see the quality of life….It was different and it was more natural.' Beyond the Iron Curtain, he encountered the anti-communist works of George Orwell and was able to read exiled dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn's suppressed indictments of totalitarianism. The casual 'abundance' of what used to be called 'the free world' 'just felt different,' he says. Because of his chess prowess-which he emphasizes was greatly nurtured by the same government that immiserated and imprisoned so many of his countrymen-he was able to travel abroad for competitions, and he describes youthful trips to France and Germany as nothing short of revelatory. Born in 1963 to parents who were Jewish and Armenian, two minorities regarded as suspect, and raised in the relatively provincial city of Baku, Azerbaijan, he grew up feeling alienated from the Soviet Union's cultural and political centers in St. Yet Kasparov was never a pliant supporter of the system that produced him-far from it.

Widely considered the greatest chess player in modern history, he held the global top ranking for a total of 255 months between 1984 and his retirement in 2005. None was better than Garry Kasparov, who became world champion in 1985 at the tender, record-setting age of 22 and held the title until 2000.

From the end of World War II until the Evil Empire dissolved in 1991, all but one world champion-the American Bobby Fischer, who claimed the title in 1972 from one Soviet and surrendered it to another in 1975 when he refused to defend his crown-represented the USSR.

If the Soviet Union was notoriously incapable of producing blue jeans, smokeable cigarettes, and durable cars in the numbers its citizens craved, it was unrivaled at producing world-class chess grandmasters.

This story is part of our exploration of the global legacy of that evil empire, and our effort to be certain that the dire consequences of communism are not forgotten. Reason 's December special issue marks the 30th anniversary of the collapse of the Soviet Union. :15 :15 Download Garry Kasparov: Greatest Soviet Chess Champion on the Awful System That Created Him

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