kamikaze
(during World War II) a member of a special corps in the Japanese air force charged with the suicidal mission of crashing an aircraft laden with explosives into an enemy target, especially a warship.
an airplane used for this purpose.
a person or thing that behaves in a wildly reckless or destructive manner: We were nearly run down by a kamikaze on a motorcycle.
of, pertaining to, undertaken by, or characteristic of a kamikaze: a kamikaze pilot; a kamikaze attack.
Origin of kamikaze
1Words Nearby kamikaze
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use kamikaze in a sentence
The idea is that the drones carry explosive warheads for kamikaze attacks, making them into miniature cruise missiles.
The US Navy wants swarms of thousands of small drones | David Hambling | October 24, 2022 | MIT Technology ReviewWilliams describes them as a “gabby seditious lot, in the worst of health but with kamikaze hearts, an army of the aged and ill, determined to refresh, through crackpot violence, a plundered earth.”
Joy Williams’s ‘Harrow’ Takes a Jab at Climate Activism | smurguia | December 14, 2021 | Outside OnlineRubio blew it with immigration, and as for Cruz, I think even most Republicans see that that would be a kamikaze mission.
Expecting people to watch gay men not do that much for half an hour is oddly kamikaze television-making.
Yes, ‘Looking’ Is Boring. It’s the Drama Gays Deserve. | Tim Teeman | January 24, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTThe ship was hurried into action and survived multiple kamikaze attacks as well as being torpedoed.
U.S. Not Ready for Cyberwar Hostile Hackers Could Launch | Michael Daly | February 21, 2013 | THE DAILY BEAST
One can only dream, then, of the kamikaze damage Newt can inflict if he keeps his promise to continue fighting to the convention.
Florida Primary: Why Liberals Should Cheer for Newt Gingrich | Michelle Goldberg | February 1, 2012 | THE DAILY BEASTFollowing the debate, the Romney campaign blasted Gingrich for his vengeful “kamikaze mission.”
‘Bad Newt’ Is Back at Sunday’s New Hampshire Debate | Kirsten Powers | January 8, 2012 | THE DAILY BEASTIt had been kamikaze stuff, though there'd been a theoretical chance of the thirty men escaping, to justify sending them out.
A Matter of Proportion | Anne WalkerHe had some of the characteristics of a kamikaze pilot, too, because there was no telling if he'd get back from his mission.
The Inhabited | Richard Wilson
British Dictionary definitions for kamikaze
/ (ˌkæmɪˈkɑːzɪ) /
(in World War II) one of a group of Japanese pilots who performed suicidal missions by crashing their aircraft, loaded with explosives, into an enemy target, esp a ship
an aircraft used for such a mission
(modifier) (of an action) undertaken or (of a person) undertaking an action in the knowledge that it will result in the death of the person performing it in order that maximum damage may be inflicted on an enemy: a kamikaze attack; a kamikaze bomber
(modifier) extremely foolhardy and possibly self-defeating: kamikaze pricing
Origin of kamikaze
1Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Cultural definitions for kamikaze
[ (kah-muh-kah-zee) ]
Japanese fighter pilots in World War II, trained to make suicide crashes into Allied ships.
The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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