Triumph and Disaster: The 20th century saw a stupendous release of energies that had been pent up for the 250 years of Tokugawa isolation. By 1930 raw-material production had tripled the figure of 1900, manufactured goods had increased twelve-fold, and heavy industry was galloping towards maturity. Britain led the World War I Ailies in large orders for munitions, while Japan expanded sales of manufactured goods to Asian and other markets cut off from their usual European suppliers. Merchant shipping doubled in size and increased its income ten-fold as the European fleets were destroyed. Setbacks in the 1930s caused by the European postwar slump were only a spur to redouble efforts by diversifying heavy industry into the machine-making, metallurgical, and chemical sectors. Even the terrible 1923 Tokyo earthquake, which cost over 100,000 lives and billions of dollars, provided another stimulus due to the construction boom that followed. Riding the crest of this economic upsurge were the zaibatsu conglomeratesa dozen family-run combines, each involved in mining, manufacturing, marketing, shipping, and banking. These tightly controlled commercial pyramids were the true heirs to the old feudal structures. Japan's progress toward parliamentary democracy was halted in the 1930s by the growing nationalism being imposed on government by the generals and admirals. They proclaimed Japan's mission to bring progress to its backward Asian neighbors in language not so very different from that of the Europeans in Africa or the US in Latin America. After the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Soviet Union was regarded as a major threat to Japan's security, and the army felt it needed Manchuria and whatever other Chinese territory it could control as a buffer against Russian advances. In 1931 the Japanese occupied Manchuria. And then in 1937, with the popular support of ultra-right-wing groups, the army overrode parliamentary resistance in Tokyo and went to war against the Chinese Nationalists. By 1938, they held Nanking, Hankow, and Canton. Japanese expansionist policies were leading to direct confrontation with the West. Japan hoped that war in Europe would divert the Soviet Union from interference in East Asia, giving Japan a free hand both in China and, through its alliance with Germany, in French IndoChina after the defeat of France. The US responded to the Japanese invasion of IndoChina with a trade and fuel embargo, cutting off 90 percent of Japan's supplies. The result was the attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor (7 December 1941) and total war.
What question would one ask from this paragraph?
Answer: What country held possession of Nanking, Hankow, and Canton by 1938?

The Reconquest: The aim of the Crusades in Spain was the eviction of the Muslims. After the recovery of Jerusalem in 1099, it took four hundred years of sieges and battles, treaties, betrayals, and yet more battles, before Christian kings and warlords succeeded in subduing the Moors. On 10 September 1229, a Catalan army led by King Jaume I of Aragon and Catalunya took the Mallorcan shore near the present-day resort of Santa Ponca. The defenders retreated inside the walls of Palma, but on the last day of 1229 the city fell, and pockets of resistance throughout the island were also defeated. Jaume I proved to be an enlightened ruler who profited from the talents of the Moorsconverted by force to Christianityas well as of the island's large Jewish and Genoese trading communities. Mallorca prospered. The Moors on Menorca speedily agreed to pay an annual tribute to Aragon and were left in peace. The island's tranquility lasted until 1287, when Alfonso III of Aragon, smarting over a series of humiliations at the hands of his nobles, found a pretext for invasion. The Moors were defeated and expelled or killed. In contrast to Mallorca, Menorca's economy was devastated for decades. Jaume I died after reigning in Aragon for six decades, but he made the cardinal error of dividing between his sons the lands he had fought for so long to unite. At first this resulted in an Independent Kingdom of Mallorca, under Jaume II, followed by Sanc and Jaume III. But family rivalry triggered the overthrow of Jaume III by his cousin Pedro IV, who then seized the Balearics for Aragon. Attempting a comeback, Jaume was killed in battle near Llucmajor in 1349. A newly unified Christian Spain under the Catholic Monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella, completed the Reconquest, defeating the only Moorish enclave left on the Iberian peninsula, Granada, in 1492. However, the centralized kingdom failed to incorporate the Balearics politically or economically.
What question would one ask from this paragraph?
Answer: What did the moors try to do to keep the peace and this this keep them from being subdued?

On a busy Friday morning in Manhattan, nine pedestrians suffered bullet or fragment wounds after police unleashed a hail of gunfire at a man wielding a .45 caliber pistol who had just killed a former co-worker. The officers unloaded 16 rounds in the shadow of the Empire State Building at a disgruntled former apparel designer, killing him after he engaged in a gunbattle with police, authorities said. Three passersby sustained direct gunshot wounds, while the remaining six were hit by fragments, according to New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly. All injuries were caused by police, he said Saturday. One officer shot nine rounds and another shot seven. Police identified the gunman as Jeffrey Johnson, 58, who was apparently laid off from his job as a designer of women's accessories at Hazan Import Co. last year. Johnson, who served in the U.S. Coast Guard in the mid-1970s, had two rounds left in his pistol. It holds eight, Kelly said. Police identified the slain co-worker as Steven Ercolino, 41, who had apparently filed a prior complaint against his assailant, claiming that he thought Johnson would eventually try to kill him. Both men had filed harassment complaints against each other in April 2011, Kelly added. Ercolino was listed as a vice president of sales at Hazan Import Corp., according to his LinkedIn profile. "It's not something that should happen to a loving person like that," said his brother, Paul. "He's going to be so missed by everybody. He was a light of so many lives."
What question would one ask from this paragraph?
Answer: What type of weapon did Jeffery Johnson, the gunman, possess?

Do all plants live on the land? Some plants do live in the water. To do this, they have evolved special traits. Plants that live in water are called aquatic plants. Living in water has certain benefits. There is certainly plenty of water! The plant does not need special traits to absorb, transport, or conserve water. They do not need a large root system. They do not need a strong stem to hold up the plant. The plant uses the water for support. Dont think water plants have it easy, though. They also face challenges. Living in water isnt that easy. They do need some special traits to survive. It is tough for the plant to reproduce. Pollination by wind or animals cant happen under water. Sunlight cannot reach very far beneath the waters surface. Some aquatic plants have floating flowers and leaves.
What question would one ask from this paragraph?
Answer:
What are two things that make it tough for an aquatic plant to reproduce?