"will have" = "must have; did"

[Jonathan Lighter]

British meddling with hallowed verb tense at another site:

"One can go on about German or Belgian atrocities in Africa etc but we
weren't exactly lily-white handed ourselves. Not even going into how many
countless native Africans will have died at the hands of British troops...."


Have seen this construction before, but this ex. unusually clear-cut.

My mere impression, FWIW, is that it's rather recent and growing in
popularity.

JL

--
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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