garrison state

noun

: a state organized to serve primarily its own need for military security

also : a state maintained by military power

Example Sentences

Recent Examples on the Web

With minor variations, these policies have been a matter of bipartisan consensus since the George W. Bush administration embarked on the path of turning the country into a garrison state after 9/11. —Jacob Silverman, The New Republic, 13 Apr. 2021

This elaborate garrison state was put in place to allow the federal government to function after a nuclear attack. —Ed Burmila, The New Republic, 13 June 2019

With no domestic pressure on the generals to reform, Pakistan will remain what the Singaporean scholar Tan Tai Yong calls a garrison state dominated by the army. —Sadanand Dhume, WSJ, 30 July 2017

Word History

First Known Use

1937, in the meaning defined above