In 1958, he chaired the joint military meeting where he became involved with heated discussion with Admiral M. S. Choudri. He reportedly complained against Admiral Choudri to President Mirza and criticized Admiral Choudri for "neither having the brain, imagination or depth of thought to understand such (defence) problems nor the vision or the ability to make any contribution". The impasse was broken with Admiral Choudhri resigning from the navy in protest as result of having differences with the navy's plans of expansion and modernization. In 1958, Vice-Admiral Afzal Rahman Khan, who was known to be confident of General Ayub Khan, was appointed as naval chief by President Mirza.