Elegant fellows who started flying on operations (4)
I believe the answer is:
fops
'elegant fellows' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both people as well as being plural nouns.
Perhaps you can see a link between them that I don't see?
'started flying on operations' is the wordplay.
'started' indicates taking the first letters.
'on' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other) (in a down clue, letters appear on others).
'operations' becomes 'ops' (abbreviation).
The initial letter of 'flying' is 'f'.
'f'+'ops'='FOPS'
'who' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for fops that I've seen before include "People concerned with appearance" , "Dandies, overdressed men" , "People affected" .)