Principles of War: Mobility, part 1

“And thus shall ye eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the Lord’s passover.” —Exodus 12:11

“But God’s word is not chained.” —THE APOSTLE PAUL, 2 Timothy 2:9

After four hundred years, some of which had been spent in slavery, six hundred thousand men of Israel, besides women, children, and possessions, moved out of the land of Egypt in one night. That is mobility! If we undertook the same feat today, we would use trains, planes, trucks, and ships. We would have better equipment, but we might not prove as mobile.

Mobility as a principle of war is not absolute. It must not be measured against how fast we could move yesterday; rather it must be compared with the enemy’s mobility. We must move more quickly, farther, and for a greater period of time than the enemy. Mobility was defined in the statement of General Nathan Bedford Forrest, “I git thar fustest with the mostest.”

The French of World War II could move their armies, but they were not as mobile as the armies of Hitler. Hitler’s lightning warfare (Blitzkrieg) was mobility in action. The early successes of the Japanese in the same war were largely dependent upon the mobility of their striking and invasion forces. The political and military surprises of both Germany and Japan could not have been effected without military mobility.

The opposite of mobility is immobility. To be immobilized is to be at the mercy of the enemy. An army or any other unit that is immobilized is incapable of attacking, evading, or retreating. It can only defend until surrender or to the end. The American defense of Corregidor is an example of immobility.

In the Gulf War in Kuwait, the Iraqi army was effectively immobilized for three reasons:

• They were dug in.

• They were fearful.

• They were finally surrounded.

In Christian evangelism, the greatest cause of immobility is fear. Fear is not a principle of war, or it would get a long chapter in this book. Fear is not bad, if we are fearing the right one. “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matt. 10:28), and “Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!” (1 Cor. 9:16). It is fear of those who can kill only the body that immobilizes Christians.