operational area, noun phrase

Forms:
Also with initial capitals.
Military
The official designation of any area of the country in which control is vested not in the police force but in the defence forces. See also Border sense 3 a.
1977 Rand Daily Mail 17 June 1A shooting accident in the operational area.
1978 A.P. Brink Rumours of Rain 291One day a group of Top Brass arrived to look around the ‘operational area’. We slaved away to make everything shine and then they arrived in their helicopters.
1978 Fair Lady 8 Nov. (Suppl.) 8The fighting soldier sees service in the operational area as the culmination of his training.
1979 Sunday Post 8 July 7‘..challenged the validity of young South Africans fighting against blacks in the operational area.’...I’d always thought both the soldiers and the guerillas were South Africans.
1980 Fair Lady 3 Dec. 63The ignorance of people who don’t know what life in the operational area, on the border, is like.
1981 E. Prov. Herald 9 July 3At least 700 people have died this year in the bush war in the operational area in northern South West Africa.
1982 Sunday Times 18 July 2The South African Defence Force will open an operational area in the buffer zone between South Africa and Mozambique and eliminate incursions.
1985 Weekly Mail 12 July 13In March, the Government slapped a three-month ban on all meetings. Cradock was declared an operational area and journalists were barred.
1987 Star 30 Oct. 3Defining an operational area as one where the SAP was no longer in control, Commandant Rose said only the State President could proclaim such an area.
The official designation of any area of the country in which control is vested not in the police force but in the defence forces.
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19771987

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open, verbv.Operation Mayibuye, noun phrasen. phr.
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