The Navy Leaders 2024 Christmas and New Year Quiz

With the end of 2024 approaching fast and the festive season almost upon us, the staff at Navy Leaders and its sister site Defence Leaders are winding down operations.

We’d like to take this opportunity to extend our gratitude to everyone who has helped make this year such a resounding success.

Thanks to the hundreds of speakers who have graced our six events this year, and to the many thousands who have attended them. We have very much enjoyed organising and hosting them, and we hope you found attending them as rewarding and useful as we did.

Thanks, too, to the thousands of visitors reading our news updates on our websites: we’ll strive to continue to keep you fully abreast of industry news as it happens in 2025.

All that remains is for us to wish you a safe and fun-filled Christmas and a happy New Year. We’ll be resuming normal operations from Monday, January 6. 

We’ve also put together 30 defence-themed festive brainteasers for you below to try your hand at: no prizes, it’s just for fun. You can follow the link at the bottom of the quiz for the answers once you’ve had a go.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Round 1: Name the war movie from the clue

Below are ten cryptic clues to the names of war movies, with the number of letters [or figures] in each answer in brackets. How many can you solve? (If you’re struggling, Round 2 may help)

1. Finished with Scottish church? (7)

2. Descending primes (4)

3. Cell fault make JT confused: poor Private Pyle! (4,5,6)

4. Land of… (4,3,5)

5. It won’t be the end of the world tomorrow! (10,3)

6. Launch two dozen but only drop a couple? (5-2)

7. Change a Depeche Mode classic? (2,11)

8. Vapes in gravy train, confused (6,7,4)

9. Sounds like a decent funeral, followed by vigour around Italian mount (4,7,7)

10. Marge saw mixed results (8)

Round 2: Name the war movie from the quote

Below are quotes from ten war movies: the answers are the same as the solutions to Round 1 (but not in the same order)

1. “What is your major malfunction, numbnuts? Didn't mommy and daddy show you enough attention when you were a child?”

2. “It's better to live on your feet than to die on your knees. I know.”
   “How do you know?”
   “Because I am 107 years old. How old are you?”
   “I’ll be 20 in January.”
   “If you live.”

3.  “I love the smell of napalm in the morning.”

4. “All we did is survive.”
   “That’s enough.”

5. “It's 0600 What's the "0" stand for? Oh, my God, it's early.”

6. “I hoped today might be a good day. Hope is a dangerous thing.”

7. “It was a stray bomb. Thank you, Adolf!”

8. “The only winning move is not to play.”

9. “He'd better go home, cure some disease, or invent a longer-lasting light bulb or something.”

10. “Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room.”

Round 3: Name the common denominator

All the answers are types of military air, sea or land assets (and the solutions are in alphabetical order)

What links the following?

1. Rossini overture; Mick Ford character in Scum movie; Sagittarius

2. Simon and Garfunkel track; flat-four internal combustion engine; short-haired German mastiff

3. Boxing underdog; lesser-known Conan Doyle protagonist; ill-fated space vehicle

4. Nigel Benn; Hindu God Shiva; Oppenheimer’s Bhagavad Gita quote

5. Erne; U.K. defence procurement minister; lunar landing module

6. Ronny Jordan jazz hit; Frederick Forsyth novel; canid native to Africa and Eurasia related to dogs and wolves

7. Opel cars; Sith Lord weapon; Grease cars

8. Digital Audio Workstation; farm machinery; subject of Blue Oyster Cult’s advice

9. Poseidon, Aquaman and Satan

10. Kiefer Sutherland, Gary Oldman and Tom Cruise; Oliver Rodrigo and Sinead O’Connor; Desmodontinae

• Click here for the Christmas and New Year Quiz Answers