Military guard takes up soldier's negative response with the cloth (8)
I believe the answer is:
garrison
'up soldier's negative response with the cloth' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this defines the answer.
'military guard takes' is the wordplay.
'military' becomes 'garron' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'guard' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'takes' becomes 'is' (being is a kind of taking).
'garron' placed around 'is' is 'GARRISON'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for garrison that I've seen before include "(Soldiers guarding) fortified place" , "Soldiers in town" , "Body of troops guarding a stronghold" , "Fortified troop station" , "HQ" .)