The first skirmishes of the war were initiated by a chance encounter in the lowland rain forests of Borneo on February 19, 1970 (what is today the Bentuang Kerimun National Park) between a group of some thirty to forty-odd Indonesian Army personnel on a training exercise - mostly recruits - and a small Imperial recon party sent to scout Indonesian positions and assess their troop strength in the region. As the Philippine party (consisting of around fifteen or sixteen of their 'elite' recon personnel) were crossing a small rain forest clearing to access a mountain trail for a better vantage point, some of the Indonesian trainees sighted them, and thinking the Filipinos were a part of the exercise, opened fire, hitting and immobilizing three of the scouting team with stun rounds. The Imperia