The word 老兵 (lǎobīng), meaning "veteran" or "old soldier", is a standard modifier-head compound noun in Chinese. It is formed by combining the adjective 老 (lǎo), meaning "old" or "veteran" in the sense of long-serving, with the noun 兵 (bīng), meaning "soldier". The first character 老 descriptively modifies the second character 兵, specifying the type of soldier as one with age and experience. This follows a common grammatical pattern in Mandarin similar to "adjective-noun" phrases in English, where the semantic meaning is directly and logically derived from the sum of its parts: an "old soldier".