wire entanglement

noun

1. a barbed-wire obstacle, usually mounted on posts and zigzagged back and forth along a front, designed to channel, delay, or halt an advance by enemy foot soldiers.

wire entanglement

noun

1. a barrier or obstruction of barbed wire used in warfare

Word History and Origins

Origin of wire entanglement¹

First recorded in 1875–80

Example Sentences

The undertaking in this case was an extremely difficult and dangerous one, both on account of the numerical insufficiency of a single company for the task assigned it, and also because the attack entailed the negotiation of our own barbed wire entanglement.

From Project Gutenberg

We did not fire until they reached the wire entanglement which protected the front of the trench: and then——.

From Project Gutenberg

The wire entanglement was pretty well blown to pieces, curled up and rolled into heaps which were knocked right over the trenches, and sometimes into them, where it entangled our own men, and gave them much trouble.

From Project Gutenberg

Yet their plight was sometimes pitiable, particularly on occasions when, as a Scot described it, he had to take a barbed wire entanglement at “the double” and emerged “a bleeding mass, with his kilt hard a starboard, his kharki flap half left turn, and his sporran dangling on the wire.”

From Project Gutenberg

Wire entanglement may be added to this with advantage.

From Project Gutenberg