warfare

I

(New American Roget's College Thesaurus)

Act of war

Nouns

1. warfare, state of war, fighting, hostilities, act of war; war, combat, aggression; arms, force of arms, the sword, dogs of war; appeal to arms; baptism of fire, ordeal of battle; general warfare, war to the death, global thermonuclear war, limited conventional or strategic warfare, ground war, open war, internecine war, civil war, broken-back war, brushfire war, controlled war; world or global war, total war; war to end war; revolutionary war, revolution, religious war, crusade; underground warfare; guerrilla warfare; peace offensive, violent peace; chemical, biological, spasm, germ, or bacteriological warfare; trench warfare, war of position, war of attrition; scorched-earth policy; aerial, naval, conventional, economic, electronic, psychological, nuclear, or atomic warfare; Mars, Ares, Odin, Bellona; cold or hot war; nuclear deterrent, first-strike capability; balance of power, deterrence; police action. See killing.

2. (military campaign) call to arms, mobilization, deployment; operation, campaigning], crusade, expedition, invasion; investment; siege; air raid, strike, or support, amphibious operation; battle, fighting (see contention); withdrawal, retreat; trumpet, clarion, bugle, pibroch; slogan; war cry, war whoop; rebel yell, battle cry; beat of drum; tom-tom; password, watchword; muster, rally; service, active service, action; inactive service; war games; friendly fire. See attack.

3. battlefield, battleground, field; theater [of war], front, battle line, beaten zone, combat zone; demilitarized zone, DMZ; camp, encampment, bivouac, billet, bunker, foxhole, laager; flank, center, salient, line; beachhead, airhead. See arena.

4. art of war, tactics, strategy, military science, generalship, soldiership; ballistics, ordnance, gunnery; chivalry; weapons (see arms); logistics.

5. warrior, soldier (see combatant); camp follower.

6. warlikeness, belligerence, bellicosity, combativeness, contentiousness; militarism; chauvinism, jingoism (see pride); warmonger.

Verbs

1. war, go to war; declare war, carry on or wage war, let slip the dogs of war; cry havoc; take the field, give or join battle; set or fall to, engage, measure swords with, cross swords; come to blows, come to close quarters; fight, combat; contend (see contention); battle with; fight it out, fight hand to hand; sell one's life dearly. Informal, flex one's muscles.

2. arm; raise troops, mobilize; enroll, enlist, sign up; draft, conscript, call to the colors, recruit; serve, be on active service; campaign; wield the sword, bear arms; live by the sword, die by the sword; take up arms; shoulder a musket, smell powder, be under fire; spill blood. Informal, join up. See compulsion.

Adjectives

1. warring, battling, contending, contentious; armed [to the teeth], sword in hand; in or under arms, up in arms; at war with; in battle array, in open arms, in the field; embattled, beleaguered, besieged.

2. warlike, belligerent, combative, bellicose, martial; military, militant; soldierlike, soldierly; chivalrous; strategic, tactical.

Adverbs — at war, in the thick of the fray, in the cannon's mouth; at swords' points; on the warpath.

Phrases — war will cease when men refuse to fight.

Quotations — We make war that we may live in peace (Aristotle), The sinews of war, unlimited money (Cicero), Wars begin when you will, but they do not end when you please (Machiavelli), There never was a good war, or a bad peace (Benjamin Franklin), War is nothing but a continuation of politics with the admixture of other means (von Clausewitz), It is well that war is so terrible. We should grow too fond of it (Robert E. Lee), I have a rendezvous with Death at some disputed barricade (Alan Seeger), War is too serious a matter to entrust to military men (Georges Clemenceau), The sword is the axis of the world and its power is absolute (Charles de Gaulle), Sometime they'll give a war and nobody will come (Carl Sandburg), Older men declare war. But it is youth who must fight and die (Herbert Hoover), Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind (/. F. Kennedy), History is littered with the wars which everybody knew would never happen (Enoch Powell).

Antonyms, see pacification.

II

(Roget's IV) n.

Syn. armed conflict, military operations, hostilities, armed struggle, combat, counterinsurgency; see also battle 1 , war .

III

(Roget's 3 Superthesaurus) n.

see war

IV

(Roget's Thesaurus II) noun 1. A vying with others for victory or supremacy: battle, competition, contest, corrivalry, race, rivalry, strife, striving, struggle, tug of war, war. See CONFLICT. 2. A state of open, prolonged fighting: belligerency, conflict, confrontation, hostility (used in plural), strife, struggle, war. See CONFLICT. 3. A state of disagreement and disharmony: clash, conflict, confrontation, contention, difference, difficulty, disaccord, discord, discordance, dissension, dissent, dissentience, dissidence, dissonance, faction, friction, inharmony, schism, strife, variance, war. See CONFLICT.