Trimming the tree in one of the world's most fraught DMZ, is still going to affect sight lines, so framing it as an "innocent gardening job" elides the truth.
Accroding to wikipedia, he was in South Korean Special Forces at the time. Here's what the wikipedia article about the south korean special forces involvement in the Korean axe murder incident
> In addition, a 64-man task force of the South Korean Special Forces accompanied them, armed with clubs and trained in taekwondo, supposedly without firearms. However, once they parked their trucks near the Bridge of No Return, they started throwing out the sandbags that lined the truck bottoms, and handing out M16 rifles and M79 grenade launchers that had been concealed below.[3] Several of the commandos also had M18 Claymore mines strapped to their chests with the firing mechanism in their hands, and were shouting at the North Koreans to cross the bridge.[12][13]
Fun fact: Many many South Korean college students who actively agitated for democracy around that era were specifically sent to the very front area of the DMZ or tougher assignments. So Moon did not volunteer for the special forces, but was volunteered.
The idea was to help educate the naive young kids about the realities of North Korea facing off with South Korea by stationing them right on the DMZ.
Also, Moon was not one of the few dozen troops that were on scene with claymore mines. The entire armed forces of S Korea was put on alert at the time and he was in uniform at the time.
I recommend the DMZ tour as one of the touristy things to do in SK. Depending on your guide, you’ll hear about all the ridiculous times NK has broken the armistice agreement. Also blasting KPop lol
Second this. I've been nearly a hundred countries, and the DMZ was one of the most interesting sites I've seen anywhere. It's pretty different than most sites a tourist can see, because it's an active militarized zone where history is still unfolding.
Definitely recommend researching the best tour companies online, because it makes a big difference.
It is very strange that the article doesn't establish if "mutual consent" was needed to trim shrubs or not. Seems like a core element to contextualize the whole event.
I did a little digging but even I cannot figure it out. The JSA was created via the Military Armistice Commission under the The Korean War Armistice Agreement. But I cannot find the documentation that actually establishes the JSA itself.
This article is a rather poor re-telling of the situation and glosses over contextual information. In addition to the wikipedia article on this specific incident (which is itself a much more accurate record of the event), here's a truncated list of other issues at the DMZ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_border_incidents_invol...
Not at all. The line of sight is described as being required for legitimate military purposes.
And in international relations, it's generally very much a case of give-an-inch-and-they'll-take-a-mile. Seemingly disproportionate importance must be given to the tiniest things, because the enemy will be constantly testing you looking for weakness.
In a case like this, if the US and South Korea aren't hyper-vigilant about every single thing, it's an indication that political or popular support may be waning, and an indication to North Korea that it might be possible to reinvade and take over the entire peninsula.
If you don't believe this, it's a big part of what allowed Germany to take over Europe in WWII -- that vigilance wasn't taken seriously. Germany pushed what was "acceptable" more and more until it was too late.
It's not about the tree -- it's about fundamental legitimacy being upheld.
It’s not about ::this relatively insignificant thing that can be logically addressed without violence:: —- it’s about ::a set of assumed moral values and forced respect to their integrity::: is how dumb wars get started and paper work sends a nations childrens off to die.
It was a stupid dick measuring contest that got two people killed and almost much more.
Well, with the current President and the unprovoked murder of two US service people, I doubt we’d see such restraint. Carter is much different than most other US Presidents.
It's difficult to speculate about someone who is mentally unwell. Who knows; he actually seems to like Kim Jong Un, and dislikes people like, say, the prime minister of Denmark, but by and large it's just talk and tweets and not much action either way. Advisers are all over the place too.
We aren't at war with Iran right now, which we very well could be if Trump had reacted differently to them shooting down our drone earlier this summer.
Oops, you are correct, Carter started the next year. I'm a bit too young to remember Ford, I do remember seeing Chevy Chase make fun of him once I got older.
> Two US officers were bludgeoned to death with axes and clubs.
It’s really amazing to me what North Korea “gets away with”. It reminds of that kid we all knew in school who gets into trouble so much that they simply stop punishing him in any material way.
It's no different than the crazy person I walk by every morning on the way to work. They have nothing to lose. I have everything. It's not worth it for me to get involved.
Asserting their power projection over the DMZ, whether it is legitimate is irrelevant.
It's the same with the development of nuclear weapons. There is a near-zero probability that North Korea will engage in a first strike with nuclear weapons, but a very rational way of self-preservation.
The North Korean regime is reprehensible but their actions are rational, from a self-preservation perspective.
Yes. They have extracted concessions and aid from the western world for decades, and have essentially never kept any of their promises. They are excellent at the game.
Their single-minded pursuit of self-reliance has led to enormous suffering and, ironically, a strong dependence on a few other countries to keep them afloat. The extreme economic hardships mean they have a tough time deterring aggression (a quarter of their GDP goes to the military and, even so, the nukes are the only reason anyone takes them seriously).
Consider a world where they followed a similar path to countries like China and Vietnam. Their people would be a lot better off, they’d have a much stronger military, and they’d be able to be much more of an equal partner with their allies.
How does impact if the US has the moral high ground? If anything, the reason South Korea isn’t entirely a communist dictatorship is because of the US soldiers who died there defending it (amount a number of other western countries).
The view is that Korea could be one united country and the war entirely avoided if the US had not capitulated to the Soviet demands. US soldiers did die defending South Korea from the North Korean and Chinese invasion, and that is admirable, but don't forget that far more Koreans have died and continue to die.
There is another side to the "bludgeoned to death with axes and clubs". They took those implements from the american team. So the unarmed North Koreans disarmed several of the Americans, turning those weapons around to kill two officers. That is a massive humiliation, particularly for the types of people selected for DMZ duty at that time. That humiliation was a factor in the american response, but equally it was a point of pride for the North Koreans.
Leaders on both side saw this back-and-forth, realized the emotions involved, and pulled back. That makes the incident a learning experience that, ironically, increased faith and probably defused tensions in the long term. Similar dustups would occur throughout the cold war and continue to this day.
It happens all the time. Iran Air 655, for instance? You should be horrified that that or KAL-007 happened. But everyone kinda got away with both, and those were innocent civilians.
There's a pretty interesting account of this in the book The Long Grey Line, which is about the careers of the West Point class of '66. One of the men killed in this incident was a member of that class.
Having been on HackerNews for many years now and having got accustomed to strange headlines for Comp Sci stories, I was actually hoping this was about the Demilitarized Zone (Networking concept).
"Several US soldiers remember they and the South Korean special forces who accompanied them had sneaked heavy weapons into the area under sandbags on the floor of their trucks. Some South Koreans even strapped claymore mines to their chests and held the detonators in their hands, goading the North Koreans to attack."
The part about the claymore is so insane and just bad ass.
It's not common knowledge, but several other countries sent troops to fight in the Vietnam War - it wasn't just the US, but included Australia, New Zealand, Philippines and South Korea.
From what I've read, the reputation of the SK troops was something else - they elicited real fear in the VC and NVA troops. The claymores don't really surprise me.
South Korea rotated over 320,000 ground combat troops through Vietnam over 11+ year period, maintaining 2 Army Divisions and 1 Marine Brigade, to help US and South Vietnam.
edit: 320,000 is not a typo. Well over a quarter of a million S. Korean troops served 1 year tour of duty in Vietnam.
It means after end of WW2, S. Korea sent more combat troops abroad to help US in a semi-active/active armed conflict than any other allies such as UK, Australia, France etc. Kinda mind boggling.
I recommend vietvet.co.kr for anyone interested in reading about stories/battles/personal-recollection related to South Korean troops. The site has Korean and English versions. The English version is not a direct mirror of the Korean version but largely same stories.
You have to keep in mind the South Korean troops in Vietnam in 1960s - 1970 were very likely old enough to remember the Korean war, the war started by the communists of North Korea. Or they at least had immediate family members who experienced it and passed on the stories.
So there was a personal hatred of anything related to communists.
65 comments
[ 2.2 ms ] story [ 132 ms ] thread> In addition, a 64-man task force of the South Korean Special Forces accompanied them, armed with clubs and trained in taekwondo, supposedly without firearms. However, once they parked their trucks near the Bridge of No Return, they started throwing out the sandbags that lined the truck bottoms, and handing out M16 rifles and M79 grenade launchers that had been concealed below.[3] Several of the commandos also had M18 Claymore mines strapped to their chests with the firing mechanism in their hands, and were shouting at the North Koreans to cross the bridge.[12][13]
The idea was to help educate the naive young kids about the realities of North Korea facing off with South Korea by stationing them right on the DMZ.
Also, Moon was not one of the few dozen troops that were on scene with claymore mines. The entire armed forces of S Korea was put on alert at the time and he was in uniform at the time.
Definitely recommend researching the best tour companies online, because it makes a big difference.
*It's really more a full military history / history of Korea museum, not focused on JUST the 1950's war.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_axe_murder_incident
I did a little digging but even I cannot figure it out. The JSA was created via the Military Armistice Commission under the The Korean War Armistice Agreement. But I cannot find the documentation that actually establishes the JSA itself.
PS - It is NOT this: https://peacemaker.un.org/koreadprk-militaryarmistice53 that's just the Korean War Armistice which doesn't define the JSA.
And in international relations, it's generally very much a case of give-an-inch-and-they'll-take-a-mile. Seemingly disproportionate importance must be given to the tiniest things, because the enemy will be constantly testing you looking for weakness.
In a case like this, if the US and South Korea aren't hyper-vigilant about every single thing, it's an indication that political or popular support may be waning, and an indication to North Korea that it might be possible to reinvade and take over the entire peninsula.
If you don't believe this, it's a big part of what allowed Germany to take over Europe in WWII -- that vigilance wasn't taken seriously. Germany pushed what was "acceptable" more and more until it was too late.
It's not about the tree -- it's about fundamental legitimacy being upheld.
It was a stupid dick measuring contest that got two people killed and almost much more.
https://imgur.com/YRXYQ
Edit: Actually, it was over a decade before. He was there in the early 60's. Here's some more pictures of that time: https://imgur.com/a/5mgrp
It’s really amazing to me what North Korea “gets away with”. It reminds of that kid we all knew in school who gets into trouble so much that they simply stop punishing him in any material way.
It's the same with the development of nuclear weapons. There is a near-zero probability that North Korea will engage in a first strike with nuclear weapons, but a very rational way of self-preservation.
The North Korean regime is reprehensible but their actions are rational, from a self-preservation perspective.
As the old saying goes, you're not crazy if everyone is actually out to get you.
Consider a world where they followed a similar path to countries like China and Vietnam. Their people would be a lot better off, they’d have a much stronger military, and they’d be able to be much more of an equal partner with their allies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%E2%80%93Pakistan_border_...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Order_No._1
The Soviets had declared war on Japan 9 days prior and were allowed control of half of Korea.
Leaders on both side saw this back-and-forth, realized the emotions involved, and pulled back. That makes the incident a learning experience that, ironically, increased faith and probably defused tensions in the long term. Similar dustups would occur throughout the cold war and continue to this day.
All because of the show of force. There was a MASSIVE show of force because of the killing.
Alas...
"NAH, LETS INTERVENE AND DO IT OUR WAY RIGHT NOW!!!!!"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status_Quo_(Jerusalem_and_Be...
The part about the claymore is so insane and just bad ass.
From what I've read, the reputation of the SK troops was something else - they elicited real fear in the VC and NVA troops. The claymores don't really surprise me.
edit: 320,000 is not a typo. Well over a quarter of a million S. Korean troops served 1 year tour of duty in Vietnam.
It means after end of WW2, S. Korea sent more combat troops abroad to help US in a semi-active/active armed conflict than any other allies such as UK, Australia, France etc. Kinda mind boggling.
I recommend vietvet.co.kr for anyone interested in reading about stories/battles/personal-recollection related to South Korean troops. The site has Korean and English versions. The English version is not a direct mirror of the Korean version but largely same stories.
You have to keep in mind the South Korean troops in Vietnam in 1960s - 1970 were very likely old enough to remember the Korean war, the war started by the communists of North Korea. Or they at least had immediate family members who experienced it and passed on the stories.
So there was a personal hatred of anything related to communists.