Question 1

NATO carried out air strikes against which former Soviet region in March 1999?

Accepted Answer

The 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia focused on the disputed region of Kosovo, which was occupied by Serbian forces who were responsible for ethnic cleansing and other war crimes against Muslims and ethnic Albanians. When member states of the United Nations wavered on strikes against the offending regime of Slobodan Milo?evi?, NATO undertook the task, with the United States at the helm. Within three months, Yugoslav leaders agreed to a peace plan and bombing stopped; Milo?evi? was ultimately jailed in The Hague for war crimes.

Question 2

This nation annually celebrates the anniversary of a failed, circa 1605 attempt to assassinate nearly every member of its government in an explosion:

Accepted Answer

Every year on November 5, England celebrates Guy Fawkes Day to commemorate the foiled attempt to assassinate King James I in an explosion that was to be ignited by a cache of gunpowder stashed under the House of Lords. The day is named in honor of the would-be assassin who was discovered guarding the gunpowder in the hours leading up to the planned attack, which was referred to as "the Gunpowder Plot." King James was the intended target, but the explosion, planned to take place during the state opening of Parliament, would have certainly destroyed all or nearly all of the British government.

Question 3

Which of the following political leaders was not assassinated?

Accepted Answer

Vladimir Lenin was not successfully assassinated, though two attempts were made on his life, both in 1918. He died in 1924 after a series of three strokes; the lingering damage from the assassination attempts is believed to have indirectly contributed to his death. His ability to twice elude assassination contributed to his mythic status among the Russian people. Trotsky, a Russian Marxist leader was killed in exile in 1940. Bhutto, the first female prime minister of an Islamic nation (Pakistan), was the targeted casualty in a 2007 suicide bombing. Sadat, the President of Egypt from 1970 to1981 and a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, was assassinated in a rare multi-assassin attack during a parade in Cairo in '81.

Question 4

Which of the following is not one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World?

Accepted Answer

The Great Sphinx of Giza is not one of the Seven Wonders of Ancient World. However, the Great Pyramid of Giza is one of the Seven Wonders, and is also the only ancient wonder that remains standing in the modern day. The other six wonders of the ancient world were: the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Colossus of Rhodes, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Statue of Zeus at Olympus, the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, and the Lighthouse of Alexandria.

Question 5

The final years of this Dynasty were marred by dual assassinations which claimed one regent, and less than 40 years later, claimed his grandson, the final member of the family to rule:

Accepted Answer

The Romanov Dynasty was the last imperial dynasty to rule Russia, and the final decades of that period included multiple assassinations. Alexander II, whose reign began in 1855, was viewed as one of the greatest reformers in Russian history alongside the likes of Peter the Great. He was assassinated in 1881 when a bomb was thrown into his closed carriage. His son and successor, Alexander III, was rather regressive and reversed many of his father's reforms. When he died in 1894, his son, Nicholas II ascended to the throne. Kind but unprepared to rule, Nicholas continued his father's conservative policies, which contributed to the mounting desire for revolution. The February Revolution of 1917 was successful in the first stage of ending the Romanov reign, when the revolutionaries forced Nicholas to abdicate the throne, effectively ending the Romanov Dynasty. The family was kept under house arrest for a year before Nicholas, his wife, all five of their children and several servants were executed. A day later, extended members of the family were executed, as well. Surviving members of the Romanov family fled the country and never attempted to regain power.

Question 6

Who was the first woman to venture into outer space?

Accepted Answer

Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Terehkova became the first woman to enter space on June 16, 1963. She was only 26 at the time, 10 years younger than the youngest American astronaut of the time, Gordo Cooper. Though the Americans and Soviets battled in "the Space Race" throughout the '60s and '70s, ultimately splitting the "firsts in space" honors, the Soviets bested the Americans significantly when it came to women in the space program. The first American woman to enter space, Sally Ride, did not fly until 1983.

Question 7

Napoleon Bonaparte was twice forced into island exile when his political career floundered, first in 1814, then again after a comeback that was squandered on a defeat at Waterloo in 1815. The two islands to which he was remanded were:

Accepted Answer

Napoleon was exiled to Elba, 20 kilometers off the coast of Tuscany, in 1814; he staged a comeback and regained control of the army, only to be exiled again the following year to the African island St. Helena, where he ultimately died. While in Elba he was allowed to retain the title of emperor and to rule the 12,000 island inhabitants. However, he lived for six years on St. Helena in conditions less refined than those that formal governmental agreements originally ordered.

Question 8

Which two nations were involved in the diplomatic debacle known as the XYZ Affair of 1798?

Accepted Answer

The United States and France were attempting to broker a deal in their strained relationship when three French negotiators to whom President John Adams referred as "X," "Y," and "Z," requested a list of bribes that the American delegation refused to consider. When accounts of the incident were released to the American public, a wave of anti-French sentiment overtook the nation, leading to an undeclared, unofficial war on the high seas. The entanglement lasted for about a year, until Napoleon Bonaparte's overthrow of the French government shifted the country's interest.

Question 9

Australia shares a colonial history similar to that of which U.S. state?

Accepted Answer

Australia and the U.S. state of Georgia share similar colonial histories, as both were originally penal colonies for Great Britain. Georgia was founded in 1732 as a place in which debtors could work off the money they owed in England. Australia was founded in 1788 to replace the pre-Revolutionary war natural resources and role in jurisprudence of the American colonies in the British Empire.

Question 10

Mohandas Gandhi cited The Kingdom of God Is Within You and A Letter to a Hindu by this Russian writer as integral to the formation of his personal ideology:

Accepted Answer

Two notable works by Russian author Leo Tolstoy were pivotal in the ideological development of Indian activist Mohandas Gandhi. Upon writing Tolstoy for permission to republish A Letter...in Gujarati for the benefit of the Indian people, the two began a correspondence that they maintained until the author's death.

Question 11

Which of the following documents encouraged President Franklin Roosevelt to begin the Manhattan Project and develop the first atom bomb, which ultimately featured into the final acts of World War II?

Accepted Answer

A letter written by German émigré scientists residing in the United States, including Albert Einstein, encouraged President Roosevelt to begin work on the atom bomb as soon as possible. The scientists were emphatic that Hitler was already attempting the feat and would not hesitate to use the bomb if he ever developed it. After the bomb was ultimately used to annihilate Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, Einstein said that signing the letter was the one great mistake of his life, given that Hitler never managed to develop the weapon for Nazi use.

Quiz 26: World History