Word.ws English Dictionary

counter-combatant

counter-combatant is the alternative form of countercombatant.

Meaning of countercombatant

Adjective

countercombatant (not comparable)

  1. Targeting or countering combatants. (Describing, for example, a strike that targets enemy troop concentrations, as opposed to a counterindustrial strike that targets enemy industry.)
    • In this and other articles Russett advocated a countercombatant deterrent. The Russians are adequately deterred by a credible threat that the U.S. can and will wipe out their army on the Chinese border; there is no need to aim at[…]1979, Worldview, page 48
  2. Facing each other (like combattant animals), especially in on either side of a charge.
    • Arms. G. 2 lions countercombatant O. quartering A. on a pale B. 3—A.1790, Sir Egerton Brydges, The Topographer: Containing a Variety of Original Articles, Illustrative of the Local History and Antiquities of England, page 78

Questions about counter-combatant

What is counter-combatant the alternative form of?
Counter-combatant is the alternative form of countercombatant.

Words near counter-combatant in the dictionary

  1. counter-claim
  2. counter-claimed
  3. counter-claiming
  4. counter-claims
  5. counter-clockwise
  6. counter-combatant
  7. counter-commute
  8. counter-commuted
  9. counter-commutes
  10. counter-commuting
  11. counter-compony

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: counter-combatant (page history and authors); countercombatant (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “counter-combatant.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/counter-combatant. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.