"walk back the cat" meaning in English

See walk back the cat in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Forms: walks back the cat [present, singular, third-person], walking back the cat [participle, present], walked back the cat [participle, past], walked back the cat [past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|*}} walk back the cat (third-person singular simple present walks back the cat, present participle walking back the cat, simple past and past participle walked back the cat)
  1. (intelligence) To retrace events so as to determine where an operation went wrong and who was responsible.
    Sense id: en-walk_back_the_cat-en-verb-ueIg2BYh Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 90 10
  2. (diplomacy) To back down; to adopt a position where one is more willing to compromise. Categories (topical): Diplomacy
    Sense id: en-walk_back_the_cat-en-verb-7R1fF7sV Topics: diplomacy, government, politics

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for walk back the cat meaning in English (2.2kB)

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "walks back the cat",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "walking back the cat",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "walked back the cat",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "walked back the cat",
      "tags": [
        "past"
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  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "*"
      },
      "expansion": "walk back the cat (third-person singular simple present walks back the cat, present participle walking back the cat, simple past and past participle walked back the cat)",
      "name": "en-verb"
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
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          "_dis": "90 10",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
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            "Entry maintenance"
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          "source": "w+disamb"
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      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "2007, Ward Just, Forgetfulness, page 110",
          "text": "Bernhard had been called back to headquarters for a conference, a general review of current operations with special attention to methods and sources, connecting dots while they walked back the cat, a dispirited and dispiriting exercise.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To retrace events so as to determine where an operation went wrong and who was responsible."
      ],
      "id": "en-walk_back_the_cat-en-verb-ueIg2BYh",
      "links": [
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      "qualifier": "intelligence",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(intelligence) To retrace events so as to determine where an operation went wrong and who was responsible."
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Diplomacy",
          "orig": "en:Diplomacy",
          "parents": [
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            "Fundamental"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To back down; to adopt a position where one is more willing to compromise."
      ],
      "id": "en-walk_back_the_cat-en-verb-7R1fF7sV",
      "links": [
        [
          "diplomacy",
          "diplomacy"
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        [
          "back down",
          "back down"
        ],
        [
          "position",
          "position"
        ],
        [
          "compromise",
          "compromise"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(diplomacy) To back down; to adopt a position where one is more willing to compromise."
      ],
      "topics": [
        "diplomacy",
        "government",
        "politics"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "walk back the cat"
}
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    "English lemmas",
    "English multiword terms",
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  "forms": [
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      "form": "walks back the cat",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
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    {
      "form": "walking back the cat",
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    {
      "form": "walked back the cat",
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    {
      "form": "walked back the cat",
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  "head_templates": [
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      "args": {
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      "name": "en-verb"
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  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
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        "English terms with quotations",
        "Quotation templates to be cleaned"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "2007, Ward Just, Forgetfulness, page 110",
          "text": "Bernhard had been called back to headquarters for a conference, a general review of current operations with special attention to methods and sources, connecting dots while they walked back the cat, a dispirited and dispiriting exercise.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To retrace events so as to determine where an operation went wrong and who was responsible."
      ],
      "links": [
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          "retrace",
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        [
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      "raw_glosses": [
        "(intelligence) To retrace events so as to determine where an operation went wrong and who was responsible."
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    },
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      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To back down; to adopt a position where one is more willing to compromise."
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        "(diplomacy) To back down; to adopt a position where one is more willing to compromise."
      ],
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      ]
    }
  ],
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}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.