half-colonel

noun

noun

UK, Colloquial lieutenant colonel

'Yep. Lieutenant one day; major by the end of the week: lieutenant-colonel the week after. That's what it's like.' He snuffed down his nose in self-contempt. 'The office in Cairo is full of bogus half-colonels like me.'1965, Olivia Manning, Friends and Heroes (The Balkan Trilogy; 3), Bath: Chivers, page 895 (in series):

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