Boots on the ground

[PussyCat]

Military phrase meaning troops in place. Slang usage is when you are referring to going somewhere or being somewhere or someplace.

[Rihanna]

To put boots on the ground means to have soldiers invade an area in order to determine what and who is actually present in that area, since using remote methods does not always provide reliable results. Having boots on the ground in an area means to have soldiers there in order to control what is happening in that area, especially to prevent opposing forces from carrying out and launching operations from there.

[Mark Zuckerberg]

Grunts, infantry. A military cliche which uses four words as a euphemism for gound troops. It is a politically useful, 1984-style cliche since boots do not bleed and die nor kill people, children, civilians. Media people like this rif because it makes them sound like military strategists.
Boots-on-the-ground is the kind of thinking that got wrong Viet Nam where sandals from tunnels stomped the boots on the ground.

[Luis Fok]

A term for remembering the men and women who have died in the Armed Forces. The Army conducts ceremonies to which boots belonging to a fallen soldier are laid on the ground, to memorialize them.

[Greta]

soldiers, police, etc. who are physically present somewhere in a military or police operation: