disarm Hear it!

disarm Definition

dis·arm (dis ärm′, dis′-)

transitive verb

  1. to take away weapons or armaments from
  2. to deprive of the ability to hurt; make harmless
  3. to overcome the hostility of; make friendly

Etymology: ME disarmen < OFr desarmer: see dis- & arm

intransitive verb

  1. to lay down arms
  2. to reduce or do away with armed forces and armaments

disarm Synonyms

disarm

v.

  1. To deprive of weapons

    disable, unarm, weaken, debilitate, render powerless, disqualify, incapacitate, invalidate, deaden, paralyze, muzzle, deprive of weapons, deprive of means of defense, demilitarize, demobilize, put out of combat, put out of action, pacify, conciliate, subdue, subjugate, occupy, bare, strip, tie the hands*, draw the teeth of*, clip the wings of*, spike one's guns*; see also defeat 1, 2, weaken 2.

    Antonyms arm*, outfit*, equip. *

  2. To reduce national armaments

    demobilize, disband, demilitarize, deactivate, de-escalate, lay down one's arms, unarm, neutralize, internationalize, remove nuclear competence, prevent nuclear competence; see also disband.

    Antonyms arm*, mobilize*, prepare. *

  3. To reconcile

    win over, charm, seduce; see reconcile 2, win 4.

disarm Usage Examples

Object

  • militia: There is now talk of sending troops to disarm the militia and help with relief efforts.
  • honesty: What comes over is a transparent and disarming honesty as well as a journalist's love of telling it like it is.
  • simplicity: It explores the claustrophobic mental topography of a civil war that can consume the lives of thousands and is told with a disarming simplicity.
  • smile: Nevertheless, armed with a notebook and what I hoped was a disarming smile, I ventured into foreign ( to me ) territories.
  • bomb: The team can also be used to secure hostages or disarm bombs, or you can do it yourself.
  • critic: Scarcely a harsh word was ever written about the Undertones, their genuine inability to pose or pontificate disarmed the most hardened critics.

Subject

force: And a material breach means Iraq must be disarmed by force.

Preposition: through

inspection: The Iraqi war shows that to allow disarming through inspection does not help avert a war but rather sparks it.

Modifying Another Word

  • peacefully: Saddam was given more than enough chances to disarm peacefully.
  • ideologically: The total subservience to the rule of capital leaves workers and their union leaders ideologically disarmed.
  • unilaterally: Unilaterally disarm farmer and rancher states along with if he does.
  • voluntarily: We wanted to try to avoid conflict by having him voluntarily disarm.
  • forcibly: Anderson said Kurdish patrols carrying weapons after 10 a.m. Monday will be forcibly disarmed.
  • politically: Putting forward socialism as the only immediate aim, it politically disarmed Polish revolutionaries.

Used with why or when

when: The force was reformed in 1970 and was about to be disarmed when the rise of the IRA put it under permanent siege.

Preposition: of

  • weapon: And at the very outset I was disarmed of the best weapon that was left to me.
  • force: One of these operations was Operation Schwarz ( black ), the military occupation of Italy and total disarming of Italian forces.
  • mass: For this task, the disarming of the masses was insufficient, their spirit had to be broken.

Preposition: by

force: And a material breach means Iraq must be disarmed by force.