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Don't War Over the Meaning of Bellicose
Since bellicose describes an attitude that hopes for actual war, the word is generally applied to nations and their leaders. In the 20th century, it was commonly used to describe such figures as Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm, Italy's Benito Mussolini, and Japan's General Tojo, leaders who believed their countries had everything to gain by starting wars. The international relations of a nation with a bellicose foreign policy tend to be stormy and difficult, and bellicosity usually makes the rest of the world very uneasy.
Synonyms
Examples of bellicose in a Sentence
New Yorker, 24 June 1985
For three centuries Viking raiders haunted western Europe. The bellicose Charlemagne himself felt menaced.
—Daniel J. Boorstin, The Discoverers, 1983
His evident calm, which always infuriated the opposition, must have irritated the bellicose colonel to a point at which he could control himself no longer.
—Michael Pearson, Those Damned Rebels, 1972
bellicose hockey players who seem to spend more time fighting than playing
Stephen Hadley, Foreign Affairs, 1 Nov. 2024
In addition to this bellicose foreign policy and disregard for American warnings, at home, Putin began to abandon Russia’s reform trajectory, instead combining an open economic system with an authoritarian regime.
—Stephan Kieninger / Made By History, TIME, 30 Oct. 2024
In the song, Lamar does a self-callout for being too bellicose in his raps.
—Bethy Squires, Vulture, 11 Sep. 2024
But the Israeli military’s increasingly bellicose statements pointing to an imminent ground invasion have cooled as diplomats on the sidelines of the United General Assembly rushed to secure a pause in the fighting.
—NBC News, 28 Sep. 2024
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Cite this Entry
“Bellicose.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bellicose. Accessed 30 Nov. 2024.
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