Since when has the U.S. government and the media started using the word troops to represent individual soldiers? As in "5 troops were killed" meaning 5 soldiers? I thought a troop was a group of soldiers or a cavalry unit or even a Girl Scout troop. I don't remember this from the last Gulf
war. What gives?
Dunno, but it seems to me to be of a piece with using the word staff as a countable noun representing employess. I've seen, to my mind nonsense, sentences talking about "15 staffs" being in such and such a place when a bomb went off.
More evidence of the Decline and Fall of the Western Empire?
It might be correct to say "Five troopers were killed", but your suspicions about the use of "troop" instead are correct. It's just plain wrong.
Both definitions are accepted by AHD4:
http://www.bartleby.com/61/73/T0377300.htmlCan any of our etymologists tell us which came first?
I'm with Capfka. I also am inclined to believe it probably (*incorrectly) morphed from 'troopers' into 'troop' through calling them 'troops' for short.
It's the 'armed forces' way of morphing by shortening.
It's also an example of some rhetorical device that I can never remember the name of. Perhaps a search of the Forest would yield the answer:
http://humanities.byu.edu/rhetoric/FOREST.HTMGood hunting.
Troop is definitely an interesting word. A troop is like a herd, a host, or a company, but in its plural form it's come to mean soldiers plain and simple, or is that collectively? I can only assume that some have analysed the troops as in "Support our troops" as meaning individual soldiers rather than soldiers collectively. Etymologically, French troop is related to German Dorf and English thorp.
Troupe is also derived from Latin troppus, according to my dictionary (Concise Oxford French).
Interestingly,Brits refer to soldiers, Boy Scouts or similar organisations as "A troop of ...", but bands of artistes are always "troupes of ..."
Yes, Middle French tro(u)pe comes from a presumed (reconstructed) Latin *troppus, but the English word troop comes from the French. The Latin word was a Germanic borrowing. Hence the Dorf/thorp cognates.
Interesting. The eastern Dutch call Germans "dorfers", meaning "villagers" and implying "uncultured peasants". Can't think why!
individual soldiers rather than soldiers collectively I recall having encountered this use even in older sources. Could it be a formation in analogy to "people" ("five people were present")?