In 1967, he greatly aided towards troop redeployment of the Eastern Command in formulating a battle plan, codename: "Operation X-Sunderbans-1." The deployment, however, was non combative and it was only designed to form the basis for the operational combat plan. In 1969, he was later posted in GHQ Dhaka as a martial law officer under the government led by Governor Vice-Admiral Syed Mohammad Ahsan in 1969. During this stint, Arif reportedly relied a secretive message in his complied report in regards to the situation in East that ultimately warned off the consequences of the civil war. In March 1971, he witnessed the meeting with President Yahya Khan who decided the launch of the military operations against the rebels in the East should take place. Arif took over the situation himself to control the law and order.