The militant police firing at / on (upon) the civilians

Question

Hi teachers,I'd like to know the difference.  ThanksTN

Mr Wordy · Accepted Answer

There's not a great difference between "at" and "on", and they may often be interchangeable. A couple of nuances that randomly come to mind...

"on" seems more likely to be used of an organised military exercise (as in your example), rather than, say a street criminal brandishing a gun. It can also tend to suggest that a lot of people are being targeted. "at" seems more likely if the meaning is "firing in the general direction of" rather than specifically "firing to hit".

To me, "upon" means exactly the same as "on" here, but is less common and sounds slightly more literary.

CalifJim · Answer

The property of certain verbs of being able to use either a direct object or an oblique object after at is called the "conative alternation".

Paul struck the boy. / Paul struck at the boy.
Marian sawed the boards. / Marian sawed at the boards.
The pony kicked the fence. / The pony kicked at the fence.

The version with at describes an attempt, so that in the examples above the first of each pair is a successful action, but the second version is only an attempt: the boy might not have been struck, the boards might not have been sawed all the way through; the fence might not have been kicked. Nothing is said in the second version that indicates whether the attempt was successful or not.

________

The verb fire is not used transitively (in the meaning relevant here), so it has to have either on or at. Similar to what is described above, the version with at signals something closer to a mere attempt. The difference here is not at all as obvious as in the examples above:

The police fired on the crowd. / The police fired at the crowd.

But it does leave the native speaker with the thought that firing on a crowd is quite purposeful, very likely having an intent to injure or even kill, whereas firing at a crowd, though perhaps just as dangerous for the crowd, may be only an attempt to scare them into dispersing.

[upon is simply a more formal form of on.]

CJ

Tinanam0102 · Answer

Hi Mr. Wordy and CJ,

Thank you for very detailed and exciting explanation for the usage of "on" and "at".

TN

The militant police firing at / on (upon) the civilians

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