Hajjaj had put more care and planning into this campaign than the second campaign. Al-Hajjaj gave Muhammad command of the expedition between 708 and 711, when Muhammad was only 15–17 years old, apparently because two previous Umayyad commanders had not been successful in punishing Sindh's ruler Raja Dahir for his failure to prevent pirates from disrupting Muslim shipping off the coast of Sindh. Al-Hajjaj superintended this campaign from Kufa by maintaining close contact with Muhammad in the form of regular reports for which purpose special messengers were deputed between Basra and Sindh. The army which departed from Shiraz under Muhammad consisted of 6,000 Syrian cavalry and detachments of "mawali" (sing. "mawla"; non-Arab, Muslim freedmen) from Iraq. At the borders of Sindh he was joined by an advance guard and six thousand camel cavalry and later, reinforcements from the governor of Makran were transferred directly to Debal (Daybul), at the mouth of the Indus, by sea along with five "manjaniks" (catapults). The army that eventually captured Sindh would later be swelled by the Jats and Meds as well as other irregulars who heard of the Arab successes in Sindh. When Muhammad passed through the Makran desert while raising his forces, he had to subdue the restive towns of Fannazbur and Arman Belah (Lasbela), both of which had previously been conquered by the Arabs.