In Bohemia the month of December was occupied in mere skirmishes.

April 23, 1568 Battle of Rheindalen (Often regarded as a mere skirmish)

Microsoft had both money and patience, and the Xbox was the beginning of a war, not a mere skirmish.

Soon the gutters would run red with blood on a scale that made the French Revolution seem like a mere skirmish.

Every day seemed a mere skirmish in the long holy war.

Perhaps sent out to scout for Trelandarian flankers, the lines of battle here being "fluid", more now mere skirmishes than battles.

A mere skirmish in terms of the fight that lay ahead.

Moorish accounts describe the battle as a mere skirmish.

This was more than a mere skirmish along the border of the Neutral Zone.

The Kennedy and Johnson wars against poverty turned into mere skirmishes.