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The axe murder incident ((朝鮮語:판문점 도끼살인사건); Hanja: 板門店도끼殺人事件,도끼蠻行事件; literally, ''Panmunjom axe murder incident'') was the killing of two United States Army officers by North Korean soldiers on August 18, 1976, in the Joint Security Area (JSA) located in the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). The U.S. Army officers had been part of a work party cutting down a poplar tree in the JSA that was alleged to have been blocking the view of United Nations (U.N.) observers, when they were assaulted by the North Koreans and killed. Three days later, American and South Korean forces launched Operation Paul Bunyan, an operation that cut down the tree with a show of force to intimidate North Korea into backing down, which it did. North Korea then accepted responsibility for the earlier killings. The incident is also known alternatively as the hatchet incident, the poplar tree incident, and the tree trimming incident. == Background == In the Joint Security Area, near the Bridge of No Return, a poplar tree blocked the line of sight between a United Nations Command (UNC) checkpoint (CP No. 3) and an observation post (OP No. 5). Command Post No. 3, situated next to the Bridge of No Return, was the northernmost UNC checkpoint and only visible from OP No. 5 during the winter months. During the summer months, only the top of CP No. 3 was visible from one other UNC checkpoint (CP No. 2). Running across the middle of the bridge was the Military Demarcation Line between North Korean and South Korean territories. The North Korean Army (KPA) had made numerous attempts to grab UNC personnel from CP No. 3 and drag them across the bridge into North Korean territory. The Joint Security Area's close proximity to North Korean territory and North Korean checkpoints on all access routes, along with the repeated attempts to kidnap UNC personnel working there, led to CP No. 3 being referred to as the "loneliest outpost in the world". On one occasion before the incident, North Korean soldiers had held a group of U.S. troops at gunpoint, so Joint Security Force (JSF) company commander Captain Arthur Bonifas was sent to force the North Koreans to stand down and bring the Americans back to safety, which he did successfully.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Former commander honors victims of DMZ ax murders )〕 Bonifas would later be one of the two Americans killed in the axe murder. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Axe murder incident」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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