Thesaurus
operative
noun
Synonyms and Antonyms of OPERATIVE
1
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>
Related Words courier; counterspy, double agent, sleeper; infiltrator, informer, stool pigeon; spymaster, superspy
2
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>
Synonyms dick, gumshoe, hawkshaw, investigator, operative, private detective, private eye, private investigator, shamus [slang], sherlock, sleuth, sleuthhound
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