brushfire

plural brushfires · alternative brush fire · alternative brush-fire

1. A large fire in a scrubland or prairie, as opposed to a forest fire, which occurs in forests.
2. attributivefigurativelygovernmentA war that arises suddenly and is limited in scope or area.

   If a brushfire conflict does threaten superpower interests, or the general peace, a superpower may intervene in an unusual way.

   1963, Philip Van Slyck, Peace: the Control of National Power, page 14

   2 more examples

   It may be a brushfire operation or an operation on the scale of the Korean war; it will certainly not involve the home territories of the United States and Soviet Russia as theaters of hostilities.

   1958, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Ways and Means. Subcommittee on Foreign Trade Policy, Foreign Trade Policy: Hearings, Eighty-fifth Congress, page 651

   I grant you it may not be in the actual application of mechanical devices, but if you have the volume to have supremacy in a major war it is obvious you would have the volume to take care of a brushfire war.

   1959, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Appropriations, Financial statements of field commanders, page 251