belligerence
noun
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Belligerent, Belligerents, and Belligerence
Belligerent may function as either an adjective or a noun. As an adjective, it has two primary meanings, each of which corresponds to the two senses of its noun form.
The older sense (“waging war”) is generally used to refer to the actions or combatants of a nation at war, or to the nation itself ("belligerent operations"; "belligerent troops"; “the belligerent state”); it is paralleled by the earliest sense of the noun, “a nation at war” (“the belligerents assembled at the peace conference”). The second sense of belligerent (“inclined to or exhibiting assertiveness, hostility, or combativeness”), which usually applies to persons or animals, or to their attitudes or actions, likewise parallels the second sense of the noun (“a person taking part in a fight”). A related noun belligerence refers to “an aggressive or truculent attitude, atmosphere, or disposition” that can be either individual or global.
Examples of belligerence in a Sentence
Jonathon Keats, Forbes.com, 29 Apr. 2025
Wolff said Xi may not be ready to take Taiwan by force yet as there are other hotspots in the South China Sea where the U.S. potentially would be obliged to intervene against Chinese belligerence, such as the Philippines.
—John Feng, MSNBC Newsweek, 13 Apr. 2025
Emboldened by four years of appeasement policies, the CCP is on the march — escalating its military activities, conducting aggressive drills around Taiwan, and increasing its belligerence in the South China Sea.
—Arthur Herman, National Review, 3 Apr. 2025
The country has swung wildly in its hawkishness, from the isolationism of the 1930s to the belligerence of the early 1980s.
—Alexandra Chinchilla, Foreign Affairs, 20 Mar. 2025
See All Example Sentences for belligerence
Cite this Entry
“Belligerence.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/belligerence. Accessed 20 May. 2025.
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belligerence
noun
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