2022 World Affairs Council of the Year
Network of Independent World Affairs Councils of America

“What in the World?” Quiz – Week of July 2-8, 2017

Note: Beginning in July the end of month quiz prize winner will be chosen from among the weekly winners who are members of the Tennessee World Affairs Council  — one more benefit of membership. To become a supporting member of the World Affairs Council visit TNWAC.org/join. Thanks!


Check your global affairs awareness with these ten questions taken from the week’s news reports provided via @TNWAC #TNWACquiz.

The only rule is to use the ‘honor system.’

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Keep up with global current events by following the World Affairs Council on Twitter @TNWAC. #TNWACquiz

QUIZ WINNERS FROM LAST WEEK

Patricia Miletich, Nashville, TN
Pete Griffin, Nashville, TN
Elaine Loughlin, Nashville, TN
Pratik Yedla, Huntsville, AL
Charles Bowers, Nashville, TN

JUNE “WHAT IN THE WORLD?” QUIZ PRIZE
WINNER: Patricia Paiva of Nashville, TN
  

Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World’s Oceans
by James Stavridis

More information and ordering


JULY “WHAT IN THE WORLD?” QUIZ PRIZE

More information and ordering

A dual biography of Winston Churchill and George Orwell, who preserved democracy from the threats of authoritarianism, from the left and right alike.

Both George Orwell and Winston Churchill came close to death in the mid-1930’s—Orwell shot in the neck in a trench line in the Spanish Civil War, and Churchill struck by a car in New York City. If they’d died then, history would scarcely remember them. At the time, Churchill was a politician on the outs, his loyalty to his class and party suspect. Orwell was a mildly successful novelist, to put it generously. No one would have predicted that by the end of the 20th century they would be considered two of the most important people in British history for having the vision and courage to campaign tirelessly, in words and in deeds, against the totalitarian threat from both the left and the right. In a crucial moment, they responded first by seeking the facts of the matter, seeing through the lies and obfuscations, and then they acted on their beliefs. Together, to an extent not sufficiently appreciated, they kept the West’s compass set toward freedom as its due north.

It’s not easy to recall now how lonely a position both men once occupied. By the late 1930’s, democracy was discredited in many circles, and authoritarian rulers were everywhere in the ascent. There were some who decried the scourge of communism, but saw in Hitler and Mussolini “men we could do business with,” if not in fact saviors. And there were others who saw the Nazi and fascist threat as malign, but tended to view communism as the path to salvation. Churchill and Orwell, on the other hand, had the foresight to see clearly that the issue was human freedom—that whatever its coloration, a government that denied its people basic freedoms was a totalitarian menace and had to be resisted.

In the end, Churchill and Orwell proved their age’s necessary men. The glorious climax of Churchill and Orwell is the work they both did in the decade of the 1940’s to triumph over freedom’s enemies. And though Churchill played the larger role in the defeat of Hitler and the Axis, Orwell’s reckoning with the menace of authoritarian rule in Animal Farm and 1984 would define the stakes of the Cold War for its 50-year course, and continues to give inspiration to fighters for freedom to this day. Taken together, in Thomas E. Ricks’s masterful hands, their lives are a beautiful testament to the power of moral conviction, and to the courage it can take to stay true to it, through thick and thin.

About the Author

Thomas E. Ricks is an adviser on national security at the New America Foundation, where he participates in its “Future of War” project. He was previously a fellow at the Center for a New American Security and is a contributing editor of Foreign Policy magazine, for which he writes the prizewinning blog The Best Defense. A member of two Pulitzer Prize-winning teams, he covered U.S. military activities in Somalia, Haiti, Korea, Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Kuwait, Turkey, Afghanistan, and Iraq. He is the author of several books, including The Generals, The Gamble, and the number one New York Times bestseller Fiasco, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.

More information and ordering


To get in on the quiz make sure you’re getting TNWAC emails (here’s the free subscription link: http://eepurl.com/gt6dn) and make sure you’re following @TNWAC on Twitter.

We’ll post the answers and the names of the winner(s) in next week’s quiz.

Here’s last week’s questions and answers:

WHAT IN THE WORLD? QUIZ

Week of June 25-July 1, 2017

1. Saudi King Salman changed his designated successor, naming his son, Mohammed bin Salman, to succeed him as Saudi Arabia’s head of state. King Salman had previously named Mohammed bin Nayef to the role. What is King Salman’s relationship to Mohammed bin Nayef?

A. Father
B. Grandfather
C. Uncle
D. Cousin
Correct answer: C. Uncle
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-succession-son-idUSKBN19C0AN

2. THIS NATO-member nation decided to double the one-year trial period for U.S. Marines to be stationed on its soil, drawing sharp criticism from Russian diplomats:

A. Latvia
B. Norway
C. Denmark
D. Estonia
Correct answer: B. Norway
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-norway-usa-russia-idUSKBN19F0AL

3. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson went against assessments of senior diplomats, established protocol, and the terms of the Child Soldiers Prevention Act of 2008 this week when he announced that both Iraq and THIS nation would be dropped from the U.S. list of nations considered the world’s worst offenders in the use of child soldiers:

A. Myanmar
B. South Sudan
C. North Korea
D. Syria
Correct answer: A. Myanmar
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trafficking-childsoldiers-exclusi-idUSKBN19E2JY

4. Just as the holy month of Ramadan is ending, Saudi Arabian officials foiled a suicide bombing plot that targeted THIS sacred site in the city of Mecca:

A. Masjid al-Haram Mosque
B. Zamzam Well
C. Hira Cave
D. Qu’ran Gate
Correct answer: A. Masjid al-Haram Mosque, which houses the Kaaba
http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/23/middleeast/grand-mosque-attack-foiled/index.html

5. Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos called June 23, 2017 a “historic day” for his country because of THIS event:

A. The settling of a long-term border dispute with neighboring Ecuador
B. A Colombian-brokered agreement between Venezuela’s government and groups protesting a proposal to rewrite that nation’s constitution
C. Colombia’s entry into OPEC
D. The disarmament of the FARC, Colombia’s largest rebel organization
Correct answer: D. The disarmament of the FARC, Colombia’s largest rebel organization
http://www.france24.com/en/f24-interview/20170623-colombia-president-santos-farc-disarmament-venezuela

6. Jerusalem’s Magistrate Court ruled this week that Israel’s El Al airline cannot accommodate THIS request from some of its passengers without engaging in discrimination:

A. Waiving extra baggage fees for those traveling on Jewish pilgrimages
B. Giving preferential seating to Israeli soldiers and their families
C. Asking female passengers to sit elsewhere
D. Requiring that all meals served on a flight be kosher
Correct answer: C. Asking female passengers to sit elsewhere
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/06/22/534003870/israeli-judge-says-airlines-can-t-reseat-women-at-request-of-men

7. In a move that surprised many last week, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates suspended air, land, and sea traffic with Qatar, in addition to imposing sanctions against it. This week, the four nations issued a list of demands with which Qatar must comply before relations are once again normalized. Which one of the following demands is NOT on that list?

A. Qatar must shut down the media network Al-Jazeera
B. Qatar must curb its business dealings with China
C. Qatar must sever relations with Hezbollah and the Muslim Brotherhood
D. Qatar must restrict its relations with Iran
Correct answer: B. Qatar must curb its business dealings with China
http://mobile.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSKBN19E0BB

8. THIS natural disaster in China’s Sichuan province has resulted in double-digit fatalities, with scores still missing and feared dead:

A. Flooding
B. Landslide
C. Wild fires
D. Earthquake
Correct answer: B. Landslide
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-40390642

9. THIS world governing body announced that it would change its name because, in the digital age, the resulting acronym has come to mean something quite different from what the organization represents:

A. League of Lacrosse (LOL)
B. Syndicate for Modern Handball (SMH)
C. World Taekwondo Federation (WTF)
D. Organization of Male Gymnasts (OMG)
Correct answer: C. World Taekwondo Federation (WTF)
http://www.bbc.com/sport/taekwondo/40391326

10. Members of THIS governing body were unable to access their email accounts after a cyberattack that resulted in their log-in credentials being sold online:

A. European Union
B. National Diet of Japan
C. British Parliament
D. Russian State Duma
Correct answer: C. British Parliament
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/24/world/europe/british-parliament-cyberattack-hacking-london.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Feurope


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