confrontation

noun

Etymology: From Middle French. Morphologically confront + -ation.

1. The act of confronting or challenging another, especially face to face.

   “During the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s, this commitment brought him into frequent critical confrontation with entrenched forms of conservative thinking (in academic areas from history and social science to the more abstract domains of ethical and political philosophy)[…]”

2. A conflict between armed forces.