Because the Lamanites had begun to harry supply lines, Helaman and his men take on the appearance of just such a supply line. They are not destined for Antiparah, which was a city in Lamanite hands, but rather for an unnamed city beyond Antiparah, simply noted as being “in the borders by the seashore." The route to this unnamed city would require them to pass dangerously close to Antiparah, and it is upon this city that Antipus desires to spring his trap.
Historical: We have seen Moroni execute maneuvers where he drew an army into a situation where they could be ambushed. Antipus attempts the same strategy here. In Mesoamerican combat the combatants were fairly equally matched with arms. The strength of numbers would typically win the day, and in most of the cases in the Book of Mormon, that advantage always lay with the Lamanites. By using various strategies to lure the opposing army into tactically compromised situations, the numerical odds were not only evened, but the advantage could be shifted to the Nephites. The Nephites were not alone in their use of this type of strategy to improve their military odds. The most effective and powerful Mesoamerican military was the Aztec army. Note the description of some of their more important battle tactics:
“Ambushes were among the most successful and skillfully executed of the Aztec tactical maneuvers. They included simple attacks at physically disabling times and locations, such as at narrow mountain passes, where the advantage lay overwhelmingly with the attacker, or from seemingly deserted houses. The most spectacular ambushes, however, were executed in battle and involved use of a feint in which the Aztec forces retreated as if the enemy were winning the struggle. If the feint was executed convincingly, the enemy advanced to press home its advantage. Once the enemy forces had been drawn into a compromised position, the Aztecs turned on them with additional troops, attacked them from behind, or used these troops to cut them off from tactical and logistical support.” (Ross Hassig. Aztec Warfare. University of Oklahoma Press, 1988, p. 103).
The Book of Mormon describes precisely the type of feints and ambushes that were to be later used to great effect by the Aztec military. The descriptions of the battles in the Book of Mormon are quite at home in the Mesoamerican cultural area.