On this day - 18 August

Two United Nations Command officers were murdered on August 18th 1976 by North Korean soldiers. They were part of a group pruning down a tree in the Joint Security Area in the Korean Demilitarized Zone. The North Korean soldiers used axes dropped by the group pruning the tree to kill the two individuals when they refused to stop pruning the tree as they had commanded. Following the incident, the United Nations Command decided to return and cut down the tree entirely.

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