Definition of shock troops in US English:
shock troops
plural nounˈSHäk ˌtro͞opsˈʃɑk ˌtrups
A group of soldiers trained specially for carrying out a sudden assault.
elite shock troops were sent in to contain the situation
figurative we've been taught that antibodies are the shock troops of our immune system
Example sentencesExamples
- He can no longer protect the terrorist shock troops.
- They pretty much took what they wanted in the first weeks of the war, when there was no organized opposition to the paramilitary death squads that were the shock troops of genocide.
- A lot of people, under the guise of the War Veterans Association, were used as the shock troops to remove the white commercial farmers from their land.
- Advantage must be taken of the summer to train these forces who can none the less play their part meanwhile as shock troops in home defence.
- They were also the shock troops who were used against separatist movements in West Papua, Aceh and other regions where tens of thousands of people ‘disappeared’.
- So we're taken in to this top secrete government building, and go through vigorous training to turn us into the perfect solider, the shock troops of third world countries.
- The story drives the game from mission to mission and moves logically through the arrival of government shock troops right up to the helicopter climax.
- During the social polarisation under the Weimar Republic, Hitler's shock troops had terrorised the streets and gained a reputation for their brutality.
- Rhino-mounted Bantu shock troops could have overthrown the Roman Empire.