search and destroy mission
2
8.9
- noun
- /sɜːrʧ ənd dɪˈstrɔɪ ˈmɪʃən/
- Archaic
:
misión de búsqueda y destrucción
- Patrick said that they were running search-and-destroy missions.
Examples
-
They sometimes played concerts in a metropolitan area like Saigon during the day and undertook search-and-destroy missions in the surrounding countryside at night.
Academic text (2015) -
I took part in search and destroy missions, in the burning of villages.
Blog text (24) -
It's for a search and destroy mission.
-
A search and destroy mission on cocaine labs.
-
Well, I guess you could say we're on a search-and-destroy mission.
-
It's a search and destroy mission in the Kenobia System.
-
Dangerous, even deadly in the right situation, but no match for a Russian special forces team on a search-and-destroy mission.
Fiction book (2002) -
The, uh, military's doing search-and-destroy missions, just like in Vietnam.
-
During the Vietnam War, the soldiers were often involved in a search and destroy mission to root out enemy forces.
-
The general reported that the search and destroy mission successfully eliminated several enemy hideouts in the area.
Antonyms
7
4.1
A military operation where soldiers go to keep peace between fighting groups or countries under United Nations order
How Aggressive
1
7.3
- Specialized
423
6.9
- Archaic
2
8.9
- Specialized
5
6.8
7
4.1
Surface Forms
Morphology
search + and + destroy + mission
The meaning is directly and transparently derived from the constituents: 'search' (to look for) + 'destroy' (to eliminate) + 'mission' (a military operation) clearly conveys an operation to locate and eliminate enemy forces. This compositional pattern is literal and cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows the component words can infer the basic meaning without prior exposure.
Etymology
Search and destroy mission comes from a clear military image: soldiers move through an area to search for hidden enemy fighters and then destroy them. That's why it means 'a mission to find and remove or defeat enemies or threats in a place'.