Thesaurus results for OPERATIVES

operatives

noun

plural of operative

as in spies

a person who tries secretly to obtain information for one country in the territory of another usually unfriendly country CIA operatives take terrible risks to find out the secrets of foreign countries

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as in detectives

a person not on the police force who investigates criminal or illicit activity or searches for missing persons set in the 1930s, the novel is about a washed-out operative working for a third-rate detective agency

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Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Recent Examples of operatives Henry Cavill, Jake Gyllenhaal and Eiza González star in the film about a team of elite operatives on an impossible mission. —

ABC News, 17 May 2026 Republican Kandiss Taylor has filed to run for the seat, but her past political runs have led operatives to rule her out as a serious candidate. —

Claire Carter, The Washington Examiner, 16 May 2026 With the success of 2025 in the rear view, operatives from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) are zeroing in on the financial services industry, CrowdStrike found. —

Amanda Gerut, Fortune, 14 May 2026 And Democratic operatives have begun informal discussions about recruiting a new chair, even as most believe that Martin’s job isn’t in serious jeopardy ahead of the midterm elections. —

Steve Peoples, Twin Cities, 13 May 2026 There are few places on Earth where the Israeli intelligence operatives know more about than the internal dynamics of Iran. —

CBS News, 10 May 2026 The arrest of two Israeli air force personnel on allegations of espionage has underscored Iran’s expanding efforts to penetrate Israel’s military by recruiting operatives from within. —

Amelie Botbol, FOXNews.com, 8 May 2026 These wagers raise concerns about how campaign operatives might exploit private information for quick financial gain amid an unsettled legal landscape. —

Brittney Melton, NPR, 7 May 2026 Multiple assassination plots have been disrupted in recent months across Lithuania, Germany, Poland, France and Spain, with Russia increasingly using cheap foreign proxies rather than its own operatives. —

Emma Burrows, Los Angeles Times, 7 May 2026

Recent Examples of Synonyms for operatives

Noun

Despite the summer heat, the windows were often closed to keep out horseflies and the long ears of loyalist spies, so the air inside was stifling and pungent.

— Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 13 May 2026
According to the ministry, foreign spies are infiltrating everything from mapping apps to weather stations.

— Sylvie Zhuang, CNN Money, 7 May 2026