Fill in the blank: Lt. Padilla expects his orders ___ by his paratroopers.

Fill in the blank: Lt. Padilla expects his orders ___ by his paratroopers.

• A. to be followed
• B. to follow
• C. following
• D. follow

Answer: (A)

When a verb like expects is used, the pattern often is subject + to-infinitive to show what should happen to that subject or to what the subject is causing to happen to another thing. Here, the thing that’s supposed to happen is that the orders are acted upon by someone else, so the infinitive is in the passive form: to be followed. That gives the natural sense that the paratroopers will obey the orders. Saying to follow would imply the orders themselves perform the action, which isn’t the intended meaning, since it’s the paratroopers who follow the orders. Following or follow as alternatives don’t fit the grammar here because they don’t align with the expects + object + infinitive structure that expresses a planned action done to the object.

When a verb like expects is used, the pattern often is subject + to-infinitive to show what should happen to that subject or to what the subject is causing to happen to another thing. Here, the thing that’s supposed to happen is that the orders are acted upon by someone else, so the infinitive is in the passive form: to be followed. That gives the natural sense that the paratroopers will obey the orders. Saying to follow would imply the orders themselves perform the action, which isn’t the intended meaning, since it’s the paratroopers who follow the orders. Following or follow as alternatives don’t fit the grammar here because they don’t align with the expects + object + infinitive structure that expresses a planned action done to the object.