buy-and-bust operation

1. 1.

   an undercover operation by narcotics detectives to catch unsuspecting drug dealers

   Broaderundercover operation

Questions about buy-and-bust operation

What does buy-and-bust operation mean?

buy-and-bust operation means "an undercover operation by narcotics detectives to catch unsuspecting drug dealers".

Is buy-and-bust operation a common word?

buy-and-bust operation is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.