As Defense Minister, Fahim had the task to unite the country's disparate armed groups. A daunting task, since Fahim's own troops had so far shied away from vast stretches of southern and eastern lawless lands under the sway of armed former Taliban warriors, most of them members of the dominant Pashtun ethnic group. Still, although a sometimes bumbling and awkward figure in public, and especially unpopular with the Uzbek minority, Fahim quietly had gained control of the Northern Alliance's fractious military commanders. He continued to hold this control, even when Abdul Rashid Dostum, the most powerful Uzbek warlord who had taken control of the city of Mazar-e-Sharif and who was very critical of the Bonn Agreement, was appointed his deputy. But the cooperation between the two strongmen didn't start easy, already after a month forces of Dostum were clashing with forces of Fahim over control of a district in Kunduz Province. The dispute erupted after his forces tried to disarm soldiers from a rival military unit. When those troops resisted, a firefight broke out, killing three soldiers.