Red moves and mates in 1
Mate in 1, proven against every defence.
Red is to move and forces mate in 1. Black is not helpless: there are nothing but the General still on the board, and every legal defence has been tried against this solution. All of them lose.
The position
Red attacks with 2 soldiers and a horse, and Black's General stands on d8. Black's defenders: nothing but the General.
- Mate in 1
- General finish
- Rating 1265
Red moves first. Find the move that forces mate whatever Black replies, then open the solution below.
Show the solution
帥 d1–e1 is the only move that wins. Look at what it does: it removes 1 escape point from the General.
The line
- Red帥 d1–e1Checkmate.
Mate is immediate: no flight square, no capture and no block.
Why it is mate
The Generals decide it. With the file between them clear, the enemy General cannot stay where it is and cannot legally move to where it would still face its opposite number. That is the flying general rule doing the work.
Read about this patternHow this puzzle was checked
Nothing here is an engine opinion. The position was solved by trying every legal defence to the full mate distance, so the claim that Red mates in 1 is a proof rather than an evaluation, and the first move shown is the only one that works. The defence in the line above is Black’s most stubborn try, not a convenient one.
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