He became one of the prominent military commanders of Mehmed II and a lala – the sultan's advisor, mentor, tutor, councillor, protector, all at once.

He removed his rival, the previous Grand Vizier Çandarlı Halil Pasha the Younger, amid the fall of Constantinople.

The regular European troops, stretched out along the entire length of the walls, were commanded by Karadja Pasha.

The regular troops from Anatolia under Ishak Pasha were stationed south of the Lycus down to the Sea of Marmara.

Mehmed himself erected his red-and-gold tent near the Mesoteichion, where the guns and the elite regiments, the Janissaries, were positioned.

[11] After the inconclusive frontal offensives, the Ottomans sought to break through the walls by constructing tunnels in an effort to mine them from mid-May to 25 May.

Constantine XI accepted to pay higher tributes to the sultan and recognized the status of all the conquered castles and lands in the hands of the Turks as Ottoman possession.

Here he encountered some resistance; one of his Viziers, the veteran Halil Pasha, who had always disapproved of Mehmed's plans to conquer the city, now admonished him to abandon the siege in the face of recent adversity.

[13] Mehmed planned to overpower the walls by sheer force, expecting that the weakened Byzantine defense by the prolonged siege would now be worn out before he ran out of troops and started preparations for a final all-out offensive.

[6] In 1459, Zaganos returned and became kapudan pasha of the fast-growing Ottoman navy, and the next year he was the governor of Thessaly and Macedonia.

He had three wives: He had at least four sons: He had at least two daughters: His, as well as his family's, mausoleum is located in his endowment (1454), Zagan Pasha Mosque, in Balıkesir.