Khalid Bin Al-Waleed: A Military Genius
Posted on Sunday, April 11 @ 06:58:37 EDT
Topic: Intelligence of the Sahaba
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 It was two months after Khalid Bin Al-Waleed had embraced the holy religion of Islam that he participated in his first battle, the battle of Mo?ta. The Muslim army was only about 3,000 troops, many of whom were well known sa7aba. They did not anticipate that they were about to face 100,000 Roman troops.
As the battle proceeded, the Muslim army lost the three commanders that had been appointed by the Prophet (pbuh). The Muslims overwhelmingly chose Khalid Bin Al-Waleed as army commander..
Khalid took command and did what was best done in such a situation: safe retreat. His plan showed his tactical military brilliance. First he made the enemy believe that the Muslims were not planning on surrendering, but on attacking. And indeed the Muslim army withstood the opponent till nightfall. During the darkness of the night, Khalid, with his brilliance, swapped the right division of the army with the left, and the left division with the right. And he exchanged the rear battalions of the army with the front and vice versa. He then detached part of the army so that they could raise dust at the back of the Muslim troops and create commotion at sunrise. At the time of sunrise, the Roman soldiers set eyes on new soldiers facing them, and the dust and noise were flooding the Muslim army so they thought the Muslims had been receiving troop re-enforcement. Khalid then started his tactical retreat into the desert. The Romans did not follow the Muslims in their retreat in fear of a trap that was set for them in the barren desert.
That day Khalid Bin Al-Waleed was the last to retreat as he protected the backs of his soldiers and in doing so, he broke 9 swords fending off Roman attackers.
When the Muslim army reached Al-Medina, the people met them with accusations of fleeing the battle against the enemy but the Prophet (pbuh), realizing that this was the best any commander could have done, declared the army as courageous faithful soldiers who retreated to re-group and fight the once enemy again.
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