strike one's flag
verb1
Government, Military, Naval, Navy, Politics, War Especially To take down one's national or other representative flag in order to indicate surrender.
- At length, having lost her fore and main-top-masts, and her mizzen-mast having been shot away to the deck, . . . the English frigate was reduced to the last extremity. Captain Cardan ordered his signal quarter-master to strike the flag.1850, Herman Melville, chapter 74, in White Jacket:
- An Austro-Prussian army of 120.000 men . . . is of itself so imposing a spectacle that one is tempted to believe the little Kingdom of Denmark will strike its flag without firing a shot.1864 February 7, “Very Latest Per Edinburgh”, in New York Times, retrieved 02 Jul 2015:
1 more example
- The enemy having yielded to our mercy and struck their flag, we ceased our fire, and thinking the worst over and done, I watched where Belvedere conned the ship with voice and gesture.1921, Jeffery Farnol, chapter 12, in Martin Conisby's Vengeance:
2
Broadly, Idiomatic To yield, give up, or surrender.
- The point of this exercise wouldn't be to cause one side of the argument to see that the other is correct and strike their flag.2014, David Berreby, “What If We Start Talking About Race Like We Talk About Religion?”, in bigthink.com, retrieved 02 Jul 2015: