countermove

noun

coun·​ter·​move ˈkau̇n-tər-ˌmüv 

variants or counter-move

plural countermoves or counter-moves

: a move designed to check, offset, or counter another move

Chess-playing programs, for instance, were … instructed to look ahead and try to calculate all possible moves and countermoves.

—Tom Alexander

… had seen … a linebacker drift out and line up nose to nose on a wide receiver. It surprised them, and they had come up with a countermove.

—Mark Bowden

… wanted to play out the long-term implications of possible U.S. moves and Iranian countermoves.

—James Fallows

"Their kidnapping of Miss Tuppence is the counter-move to your escape."

—Agatha Christie

Examples of countermove in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Canada and China have already retaliated: The countermoves signal new trade conflicts with the U.S.'s top three trading partners and threatened to upend nearly $2.2 trillion in two-way annual trade. —Nicole Fallert, USA TODAY, 4 Mar. 2025

The challenges facing China’s economy are all but certain to increase as growth slows, leaving Beijing with far fewer potential countermoves in its toolbox against a second Trump term. —John Liu, CNN, 20 Feb. 2025

Trump signed more executive orders in 10 days than any of his recent predecessors did in their first 100, leaving his opponents questioning which countermoves to make. —Josh Feldman, NBC News, 9 Feb. 2025

Court countermoves so far this week: A federal judge in Boston extended his block on the Trump administration’s deadline for more than 2 million federal employees to accept a controversial buyout. —Nicole Fallert, USA TODAY, 11 Feb. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1858, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for countermove

• disapprove
• approve
• disprove
• improve
• remove
• reprove
• groove
• move
• prove