fall back
— phrasal verb with fall uk/fɔːl/us/fɑːl/verb fell, fallen
literary to move back suddenly from someone or something, often because you are frightened:
She fell back in horror/disgust.
If an army falls back, it moves away from an enemy army in order to avoid fighting:
The infantry fell back in disarray.
Thesaurus: synonyms and related words
Stopping fighting
- armistice
- beat/turn swords into ploughshares idiom
- ceasefire
- demilitarize
- disengage
- fall
- lay
- lay sth down
- pacify
- pullout
- surrender
- sword
- truce