Modifies a noun

• rhetoric: Or will they sit out the fighting, despite their bellicose rhetoric, out of fear of choosing the wrong side?

• statement: Jafar did categorically rule out any return to war, thus distancing Renamo from bellicose statements by one of its coalition partners.

• threat: We must condemn the bellicose threats of the US and British governments against the DPRK and all other countries.

• noise: Many of those making bellicose noises for war now were silent then.

• attitude: Germany took a more bellicose attitude toward trying to break the deadlock on the Western Front.

• element: George Bush was supported by some of the most bellicose elements in American society.

Modifying Another Word

• increasingly: How do you reconcile what local people are saying with the increasingly bellicose noises out of America?

Used with adjective complement

• become: They will become more bellicose rather than diplomatic, more self-righteous and dismissive when criticized.