PANMUNJOM — It started with a tree.

It nearly ended in war.

On Aug. 18, 1976, a South Korean work party supervised by two U.S. Army officers was sent to prune a 100-foot poplar tree in the Joint Security Area along the Demilitarized Zone, which marks the border between North and South Korea.

As three of the workers chopped away at the branches, a small group of North Korean soldiers approached and demanded that the pruning be stopped. A few minutes later, 20 more North Korean soldiers appeared, armed with metal pipes and ax handles. Just four minutes after that, the two American officers — Capt. Arthur Bonifas and 1st Lt. Mark Barrett — were dead, beaten and hacked to death by the North Koreans.

The "Ax Murder Incident" led to one of the largest military build-ups on the peninsula by the United States since the end of the Korean War in 1953, and brought the peninsula to the brink of another war.

In the days that followed, the United States sent the aircraft carrier USS Midway to the waters off the Koreas, fighter jets and bombers were sent to South Korea from bases in Okinawa and the United States, and troops throughout the region were put on alert.

The United States retaliated on Aug. 21 with Operation Paul Bunyan, when U.S. Army engineers, flanked by a company of infantryman and protected by AH-1 Cobra helicopters, F-111 fighters and B-52 bombers in the air and nearby field artillery units on the ground, went back and cut down the tree.

The events led to new rules between the North and South along the DMZ, including the decision that the Bridge of No Return, which allowed passage between the northern and southern sides of the DMZ, would be closed.

Before that, there were North Korean checkpoints on the south side, and both sides regularly crossed back and forth.

The events of Aug. 18 to 21 were among a series of incidents along the DMZ in 1976.

At the time, I was stationed at Osan Air Base about 40 miles away. I lived downtown with my Korean wife and was free to come and go between the base and town during non-curfew hours. South Korea had a midnite to 6AM curfew. We knew nothing about the incident when it was happening. It always amazes me how people all over the world knew what was happening and we didn't. At some point in the day of 8-18-76 our commander gave all of the guys that lived in town a barracks key and two hours to get what we needed from our homes downtown. When we got back to the base we were restricted to base with our Korean wives still downtown. We were told that something was happening and it was not a practice drill. For the next three days we were under constant alert with alot of new troops and aircraft coming and going. We heard plenty of 'real' air raid sirens and had to take cover or go to shelter each time for the three days. Then it all ended and the stories started spreading about what had gone on.

When you are done here, return to my main Osan page and look at my 1975 and 1976 yearbooks. You will notice in the 1976 book that I am holding an axe in a couple pictures HERE and HERE. Now you know the story behind the axe. The pictures were taken after the incident.

Of course the whole thing was blamed on 'Operation Team Spirit'. Team Spirit is an annual field maneuver exercise initiated in 1976 in order to deter North Korean war provocations and fortify ROK-US security cooperation. Purely defensive in nature, Team Spirit is basically a combined exercise and is regularly held between the two allies. This is, then, quite different from what the North criticized the exercise as being-offensive training-and we have even invited the North to observe the training. Team Spirit is a mandatory exercise needed to evaluate the ROK-US alliance and to foster combined operations and military capabilities for defending South Korea.

The Team Spirit exercise began in 1976. The North Korean response to first Team Spirit exercise in 1976 was the proximate source of the "tree-cutting" incident that led to Operation Paul Bunyan. In 1991 the exercise was scaled down in light of the Persian Gulf War and US defense budget cuts. in 1992 Team Spirit was canceled in the interests of promoting North Korean cooperation on nuclear inspections. In late 1992, North Korea unilaterally withdrew from the South-North High-Level Talks on the pretext of the '93 Team Spirit Exercise, resulting in a complete suspension of inter-Korean dialogue until October 1993. The United States and South Korea offered to suspend the Team Spirit '94 military exercise on the premise that North Korea would full implement the IAEA inspection and exchange envoys with the South to discuss the nuclear issue. Subsequently, no Team Spirit exercises have been held since 1993. Team Spirit continued to be scheduled from 1994 to 1996 but was canceled each year as an incentive to improve relations. About 200,000 U.S. and South Korean servicemembers participted in Team Spirit.

On March 6, 1997 it was announced that the government of the Republic of Korea and the United States had decided not to hold the Team Spirit exercise in 1997. The decision was made taking into account the recent overall security situation on the Korean Peninsula. The cancellation will have no impact on the defense readiness of the ROK-U.S. forces on the Peninsula. The decision to cancel Team Spirit was part of efforts by our two governments to build confidence and to create an atmosphere conducive to the reduction of tensions on the peninsula.