On May 30, between 12 and 35 heavily armed Islamist fighters arrived in two fishing boats from southern Somalia.

They were a group of the Islamic Courts Union personnel heading to travel on further out of the country.

Three members in a task force created by Tier 1 operators from multiple US Military branches (including Chris Vansant a Delta Force operator) who had been tracking the boats arrived in Bargal and with the help of a local warlord "Bashir" set up a patrol base and eventually confronted the fighters.

[2] On June 1, the Combat Controller in the 3 man US team contacted a United States Navy warship, the USS Chafee, and directed fire to the hills around Bargal where Islamist militants had set up a base.

The target of the shelling may have been an al-Qaeda operative who the United States believed was involved in the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.