Anybody ever heard of the Chinese game of "Go?"

[Brigid]

On the History Channel, they're showing a fascinating documentary about Sun Tzu and "The Art of War." They mention a Chinese game of strategy called "Go.". The object of the game is less to defeat your opponent than to gain territory. This is in complete contrast to chess, in which the object, of course, is to kill the king. The Viet Nam War is discussed, in which NVA General Vo Nguyen Diag played the war as if it were "Go," while American General Westmoreland played chess. The Americans never actually lost on the battlefield,not even at Tet, but found themselves by the mid-seventies negotiating withdrawal from Viet Nam anyway. An exasperated Westmoreland pointed out as much to Diag. "That," replied Diag, "is irrelevant.". He might have added, "After all, you're leaving, aren't you?"

Now here we are, more than 35 years later, we still haven't learned. *sigh* I thought they studied Sun Tzu at West Point.

[ClarkUSA]

1. I have.

Not sure what analogy you're getting at, though.

[Adsos Letter]

4. whoops! Wrong place...

[howard112211]

2. Yes, and I am highly fascinated by that game.

An interesting fact is that there are no "Go" computers who play at comparable level to decent human players, in stark contrast to chess, due to the immense complexity of the game.

[Aerows]

3. Go is fun

It is a lot like Chess or Shogi. The objective is the same in all of them, to conquer the board and the key pieces and/or resources.

[backscatter712]

12. Rules are very simple, but strategy in Go is incredibly complex.

Fun game.

[Adsos Letter]

5. Diag? I think you mean Giap?

Vo Nguyen Giap?

[Brigid]

9. Yes, that's the one.

Sorry for the typo. :blush:

[Adsos Letter]

10. No need to blush!!! Just keeping things straight in my own mind.

An increasingly difficult task these days... :D :hi:

[ellenfl]

6. yes but I have never played nor seen it played. eom

[MadHound]

7. Quaint, but the thing is that wars such as Vietnam were never intended to be "won".

But rather Vietnam and other such wars since WWII were designed only to devour massive quantities of material, thus enriching the MIC. Oh, and to run up the body count.

What was the officially declared objective of the Vietnam War? One was never declared, and without such a declaration, you can't have victory.

Not to mention the simple fact that Vietnam, along with Korea, were designed wars, wars that were instigated at the behest of the power elite in order to continue reaping in the massive profits that they had gotten used to making during WWI and especially WWII.

In fact it is easy to trace the origins of the Vietnam War back to September 2, 1945. That's not only the day that Japan signed the famous surrender agreement on the deck of the USS Missouri, but also the day that a massive quantity of arms, munitions and war material, originally destined for use in a massive invasion of Japan, was loaded up on transport boats in Okinawa and shipped directly to Hanoi and Ho Chi Mihn. Ho proceeded to use these gifts given by the US first against the French, then against the US.

This pattern continues to this day. We either give, or in most cases sell, a dicey regime large quantities of our older generation weapons systems, then at some later date there is some excuse to go in and destroy that material, along with the men using it, all the while consuming tons of our own newer, expensive material in the process.

War these days is not about victory or winning, but rather about making obscene amounts of money for the few.

[Warren Stupidity]

8. hmmm - I always thought of this as a japanese game.

it is a wonderful game however

[backscatter712]

14. Go is very popular in Japan.

The game originated in China, IIRC, and was eventually brought to Japan.

[AsahinaKimi]

11. "Go" is also played in JAPAN!

[Aerows]

13. I am a chess player

and I have played GO a bit, but Shogi confuses me with the extra pieces LOL. It might be the preconceived ideas since I have played chess since I was small, but I have trouble with the strategy in it LOL.

[dixiegrrrrl]

16. I used to be a good chess player until I discoverd GO.

Which I liked so much better and played it a lot when I was in college ( back in the 70's).
Still have the original board and stones and 3 classic GO books.
It requires a whole new way of thinking, which was the point of the story about VietNam vs. America strategy.

[Aerows]

17. Dixiegirl (and I am a Dixiegirl, too)

We could play Go across the internet.

It would actually be fun.

I love to play strategy games :). I'm in MS LOL.

Send me an IM if you would like to :). I would enjoy it :D

Is there a way to open up the pool of players to all who are interested on DU?

I'm kind of boring and like cards too, though, so maybe that wouldn't go over well. If it did though, I'd love to take part if we could set up a time on one of the free places to play board games as a group.

[dixiegrrrrl]

18. Lovely idea.

I don't have the schedule for it, unfortunately.

but you do have a good idea for people that would be able to do it. Maybe post a request in the discussion forum???

I don't see a games group here on DU, come to think of it.

[peacebird]

15. my dad brought that game home with him from his tour in Vietnam

We played it all the time. Daddy passed away 23 years ago this month, and the mention of "go" has flooded me with many happy memories. Thank you!

[harun]

19. Yah, neat game. Can't say I am very good at it. One can see how the philosophy

of it would work well for the North Vietnamese. Lot's of soldiers who know and handle the territory well. Sort of a bend but don't break defense, like they call it in College Football.

[Hannah Bell]

20. "Go" is the japanese name. In chinese it's called something else, i think.

yes, -- Go, known as wéiqí in Chinese and baduk in Korean, is an ancient board game for two players that originated in China more than 2,000 years ago...

Go reached the West through Japan, which is why it is commonly known internationally by its Japanese name...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_(game)

[AsahinaKimi]

22. Its known as

wéiqí in Chinese and baduk in Korean.

Traditional Chinese= 圍棋
Simplified Chinese= 围棋
Kanji (Japanese)= 碁, 囲碁
Hangul(Korean)= 바둑

[agentS]

21. GO is also popular in Korea

They have a cable channel devoted to it, kinda like the Chess channel.

[stlsaxman]

23. Played in highschool quite a lot in the early '70's... there is a quicker faster version

call Gomoku (?) which involves surrounding 5 in a row.

Kinda like chess/checkers is to go/gomoku.

[Jim Lane]

24. Gomoku is not a version of go, although it uses the same equipment

In gomoku, as in go, you place your pieces (called stones) onto a 19x19 board, playing on the intersections of the lines (not within the squares as with many Western games). See the last photo in response #11, which depicts a game of go in progress. In both games, a stone once placed can't be moved to another spot. In gomoku it is there permanently, while in go it can be captured and removed by the other player.

Gomoku, unlike go, doesn't involve surrounding territory. The winner is the first player to get five in a row -- horizontally, vertically, or diagonally.

Gomoku is a much simpler game than go but still presents interesting problems. In that respect, your analogy of go/gomuku to chess/checkers is accurate.

[stlsaxman]

25. Thanks for the clarification!