1disengage (something or part of something) and remove it:he detached the front lamp from its bracket figurativea willingness to detach comment from political allegiance
[no object] be easily removable:the screen detaches from the keyboard
2 (detach oneself from) leave or separate oneself from (a group or place):a figure in brown detached itself from the shadows figurativethe newspaper detached itself from the political parties
(be detached) Military (of a group of soldiers or ships) be sent on a separate mission:our crew were detached to Tabuk for the exercise
