 He seems to have been the first of the Assyrian kings to have institutionalized the conduct of annual military campaigns, some of which appear to be little more than livestock-rustling expeditions, as the chronicle mentions “a hundred head of sheep and goats and a hundred head of their cattle [...] he brought to Aššur.”

Arik-den-ili’s first victories were against his eastern neighbours (the Pre-Iranic inhabitants of what was to become Persia), Turukku and Nigimhi, and all the chiefs of the (Zagros) mountains and highlands in the broad tracts of the Gutians to subdue the nomadic tribes on Assyria's northern and eastern frontiers.The Gutians had been vassals of the Kassites who ruled in Babylon and may have acted as their agents.Nigimhi’s ruler was Esini.