paramilitaryadj.n.
/ˌparəˈmɪlᵻt(ə)ri/, U.S. /ˌpɛrəˈmɪləˌtɛri/ A. adj.
Designating, of, or relating to a force or unit whose function and organization are analogous or ancillary to those of a professional military force, but which is not regarded as having professional or legitimate status.
ΘΚΠ
society > armed hostility > warriors collectively > paramilitary groups spec. > [adjective]
paramilitary1934
1934 Yorks. Post 11 Jan. 8/5 Herr Hitler is evidently finding it difficult to provide arguments, convincing outside Germany, why his regime should retain the Nazi ‘paramilitary’ formations, as Geneva calls them, to which the French Memorandum doubtless took exception.
1936 Punch 1 Apr. 376/1 Let us at once impale the new and unnecessary mongrel ‘paramilitary’—‘paramilitary forces (S.A., S.S., Labour Corps and other organisations)’... Why not ‘semi-military’, ‘quasi-military’, or even ‘sub-military’?
1949 F. Maclean Eastern Approaches iii. xvii. 516 The military and paramilitary forces which they [sc. the quisling administrations] had raised had either surrendered or else were withdrawing northwards.
1958 Listener 14 Aug. 238/2 The Nazi storm-trooper is preceded by a hardly less ‘heroic’ communist in his paramilitary uniform.
1969 New Statesman 11 Apr. 499/2 The Israelis were to receive unofficial guarantees that a UN presence, or paramilitary force as it was termed, would be stationed on the Israeli-Egyptian border.
1974 J. White tr. N. Poulantzas Fascism & Dictatorship iii. ii. 102 Party representation was short-circuited by the formation of para-military organizations.
1982 A. MacLean Partisans (1984) v. 144 They were a scruffy and villainous-looking lot, dressed in vaguely paramilitary uniforms.
2000 J. Simpson Mad World, my Masters (2001) viii. 263 We drive for hours..looking at the torched houses and the paramilitary thugs lounging at the roadblocks.
B. n.
A member of a paramilitary organization, esp. in Northern Ireland.
ΘΚΠ
society > armed hostility > warrior > member of specific paramilitary group > [noun]
Sanfedist1842
squadrist1938
Sternist1944
werewolf1945
provisional1970
Provo1971
Razakar1971
Schutzbündler1974
paramilitary1975
Koevoet1983
1975 Economist (Nexis) 13 Sept. 35 The co-ordinating committee of the Loyalist paramilitaries..also supports Mr Craig.
1976 Listener 16 Sept. 325/3 To change the climate within which the paramilitaries operate.
1986 New Statesman 10 Oct. 8/2 Many people now remember the phrase often repeated by John Hume in the days before the rise of the Protestant paramilitaries.
1992 Economist 12 Sept. 52/1 The Serb paramilitaries who have begun ‘ethnic cleansing’ in Serbia proper.
2000 M. Fletcher Silver Linings (2001) iii. 42 As mothers, they lived in constant fear of a knock on the door and the paramilitaries ‘sorting out’ their sons.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2005; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
<
adj.n.1934