He and his army felt their cause was just, they enjoyed wide and popular support, were familiar with the countryside, and were therefore able to outmanoeuvre the enemy.
While you're taking it all in, you have to outmanoeuvre a fleet of motorised shipping carts -- big, scary dodgems that zoom through the narrow passageways.
But rather than apply the brakes to slow this vehicle we call progress, we continue speeding down the road, hoping to simply outmanoeuvre oncoming danger.