Vocabulary WAR and PEACE (Lesson 20)

[Music]

So today we're looking at War and Peace

firstly you can make an alliance with

someone a sovereign state could make an

alliance with another sovereign state

and this simply means that they become

um allies which is another word for it

which is obviously from Alliance and

your allies are the people who are on

your side it's a treaty it's a type of

treaty a type of contract where two

Nations agree to be on the same side and

the same for make aact with a pact a

type of treaty because a treaty really

means an international contract between

sovereign states a pact is an agreement

it's normally non-aggression towards

each other and it's perhaps also the

agreement to um to act together if

you're if there's any kind of attack on

one of the states the states have to act

together and um this is again a type of

treaty which is perhaps why NATO is the

North Atlantic Treaty Organization so

they also have the word treaty in NATO

now you can also make a truce the a

truce is a type of ceasefire really a

truce is an agreement to stop fighting

the same for an Armistice it's an

agreement to lay down your weapons and

stop fighting so a truce might last

three days it might last a week but then

it it may the ceasefire may not be

maintained and the um hostilities or

violence could break out once again um

so yeah um an Armistice a ceasefire and

a truce or very similar a peace treaty

perhaps it should be up here really

because this is a type of contract and

obviously it's a contract aimed at peace

in some kind of way um okay um if

violence erupts it breaks out very

quickly really erupt is very similar to

break out and remember that other bad

things can erupt like hostilities War um

uh all of these collocate with these two

uh nouns collocate with all of these

verbs so please remember those are

useful

collocations um to go on the offensive

simply means that a a um one of the two

armies who are fighting um that if they

go on the offensive they stop defending

and they start attacking um okay so

perhaps you could also say they launch a

counter attack perhaps the enemy is um

attacking and then you launch a

Counterattack it means you fight back

back in some kind of way you go on the

offensive suddenly you can also launch

surgical strikes which usually means air

strikes and I better put that here air

strikes um and the word surgical is used

to it's kind of a euphemism I suppose um

I don't know if you remember this word

it was in my vocabulary lesson on books

and literature um so euphemism what I

mean is uh there's nothing there's no

surgery involved in air strikes they're

very destructive processes obviously a

lot of there are a lot of casualties in

an air strike but the word surgical is

to try and show how precise the air

strikes are it's supposed to give the

impression perhaps that there are there

is very little collateral damage what I

mean here is that there are very uh

there are very few casualties as well

very few

casualties um because if something is

surgical it's only getting the enemy

soldiers it's not hitting civilians in

any kind of way and so this is a

euphemism really I think most air

strikes are not as surgical as perhaps

this word might make you believe and

perhaps very often there's collateral

damage which just means slaughtered

civilians um you can also launch a

preemptive strike a preemptive anything

means something you do in anticipation

of another action so it's something you

do to prevent another action so when you

launch a preemptive strike you're

hitting the opponent before he hits you

that's the whole point you you're you're

attacking them because you're absolutely

certain that they're going to attack you

and so you launch a preemptive strike to

make sure that uh they don't attack you

in the first place again it's a kind of

euphemism because this is or it's a way

of justifying aggression because this is

a way of justifying in attacking your

opponent first you're not attacking him

first actually you're attacking him

because he was going to attack you so

preemptive Strike It it means um it's an

attempt to justify making the first

attack I suppose you're saying that he

was going to attack anyway okay um two

more Expressions to be under siege a

Siege is the type of attack when an army

surrounds a town or city and and um very

often they cut off supplies to the city

so there could be starvation in the city

because there's no food coming in and

there could be all sorts of other

problems like looting and rioting

looting is when there's no law an order

and a lot of people are stealing things

from each other and rioting is similar

it's usually when they're setting fire

to shops and stealing things from the

shops and there's no Law and Order um so

a city could be under siege for one

month 6 months 3 years um you can also

lay Siege to a city which is the

opposite you can say that uh the Army

are laying Siege to Madrid and I'm just

giving that as an example but um I'm I'm

sure they're not and I'm sure they won't

be but um to lay Siege to it's always

plus City so if you read classical uh

literature and you you perhaps

interested in history of Greece or Rome

you'll hear about the Army laying Siege

to the city the Barbarian City or the um

whatever okay a military coup is when um

one particular group of people sees

power basically um when it's military C

it sounds like it's somebody connected

to the military and they use the Army to

seize power from from the government or

from whoever's in power at the time and

so it's a type of Uprising it's a type

of rebellion and it's when power changes

in the state it goes from one group to

another group um and it's involving the

military obviously so there could be a

Civil War when there's a military coup

there could be a war in one state

between two different powers two

different sides that's what we call a

civil war it's not like a an

international conflict it's a war in one

particular State um now some army terms

I suppose or some military terms to

Ambush it means to wait to set up a trap

for the enemy um and to wait for them to

walk into their trap where they will be

slaughtered and you can also say to be

caught in an ambush because it's a noun

and verb okay to shell means to use

heavy artillery um shells are the he the

the the bombs basically which are fired

by Heavy Artillery guns so we're talking

really big guns not the kind of guns you

carry but the kind of guns which are

very very big and you wheel to different

places and you could shell Frontline

positions you could shell their

headquarters it's another

word um but yeah you shell the enemy you

it means you fire heavy artillery at the

enemy so collateral damage we've done

it's a kind of euphemism for slaughtered

civilians it's it's people who are

killed um accidentally by the military

when they perhaps launch an air strike

or or when they fire heavy artillery it

would still be collateral damage to be

caught in a crossfire it's like it

sounds it's when there is uh there's um

fire coming from the left and Fire

coming from the right there's lots of

bullets flying from the left and right

and so you are caught in the

crossfire a position nobody wants to be

in I'm sure so loot is when people steal

from uh private property and from shops

rioting tends to be in the middle of the

city and so it tends to be less private

property it seems to me and more shops

when when there was the uh hurricane

when there was natural disasters very

often there's looting afterwards because

there's no Law and Order and it means

people are stealing from houses but

riots normally some kind of political

demonstration usually or something like

that and then um violence erupts in the

middle of the city and shops are smashed

and that kind of thing plunder and

pillage are a little bit different

because they're usually used for for

soldiers and when soldiers plunder or

pillage somewhere it means that they um

have taken over a new um area or

territory and they are stealing things

from the area they're pillaging things

they're they're stealing all sorts of

possessions from any of the from the

private property around them um so we

use the word declare with war declare

war seize power or you could even seize

the city you could even capture a city

you can say the enemy has captured

London or whatever it is um you can

capture enemy troops and remember this

word for soldiers it's another good word

you can defeat the rebels which means

you are victorious the victory is yours

you beat them you defeat the Rebels

rebels are obviously a word for the

people who are rebelling the others the

other um the people who are resisting

very often the government but um it it's

word used as

very often the enemy really the people

you're fighting against okay Retreat or

withdraw they're a little bit different

actually I've put them together CU

they're very similar when you Retreat it

means you pull back you pull out of

wherever you are it means you as a

soldier you're going in the other

direction you're not attacking the enemy

you're running away You're retreating or

you're trying to get as much distance as

possible shouldn't say Run Away really

but you're you're coming back from your

position um if you withdraw it's the

same thing but you can also use this

word kind of the opposite way and you

can say the general withdrew his troops

okay uh you wouldn't say the general

retreated his troops you would say the

troops retreated or the G General

withdrew his

troops okay troops can surrender which

means give up means they don't want to

fight anymore they wave the White

Flag um that you can also invade a

foreign power which is when you put your

army into another Sovereign Nation um

after the battle has finished you may

decide to evacuate the wounded you may

decide to evacuate civilians or you may

decide to evacuate refugees evacuate

just means pull people out of an area um

but this is not like a with treat or

withdrawal because it's not involving

troops re really it could involve troops

cuz they're wounded troops but evacuate

just means get people out of one area

and put them in another and so during

the war a lot of people in London a lot

of young kids in London and the areas

around London were evacuated and they

were civilians they were evacuated they

were taken away from the city because

there was a bombing campaign on the city

um you can Annex a disputed territory

very similar to invade this word um and

it it it's slightly different though

because anex it sounds like it's a part

of land which is right next to your

country you can even use this word for

when you build something on the side of

your house and so it's got a similar

meaning to that just take a um a

disputed territory and claim it as your

own um to stockpile means stock up if

you've seen one of my phrasal verb

videos I mentioned this word stock up

means um uh keep collecting and building

building up your supply of something and

so if you're building up your supply of

weapons you're stocking up on weapons

you're building up that supply and of of

course um if somebody's planning on

going to war they need to stockpile some

weapons first now deploy troops or heavy

artillery or helicopters um it simply

means put those troops into battle into

action it's kind of the opposite of

withdraw withdraw your troops means take

them away from action and deploy them

means put them into battle

you can sustain heavy casualties you can

suffer from heavy casual sorry suffer

heavy

casualties um this means that a lot of

your men or your troops um are wounded

in battle they're injured in some kind

of way you will probably want to disarm

any soldiers who you've captured as soon

as possible disarm them take away their

weapons but maybe there has been a

ceasefire for a week maybe there's been

a truce for a week and you have decided

to rearm because you don't think that

the truce will hold so you this means

get get weapons back again um stock up

on weapons once more um last one I did

was armored car um armor I just wanted

to show this was similar to the word arm

and arm and nuclear arms arms are

obviously a type of weapon and armor is

what the knights used to wear in battle

and we also use it for when you armor

some kind of modern equipment like an

armored tank an armored car it just

means protection around the um piece of

equipment okay thanks for uh watching

please ask any questions under the video

and I'll try and answer them as soon as

possible um yeah thanks very much and

I'll see you all soon