Aum Supreme Truth: The Terrorist Cult from Japan: Part 1

Chizuo Matsumoto wanted to get everything out of life that he did not have as a poor child growing up in Japan.  He would change his name to Shoko Asahara, and he would become the leader for one of the most powerful cults in the world.  This terrorist cult would perpetrate one of the largest domestic terrorist attacks in Japan's history.

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Transcript

Chizuo Matsumoto only wanted one thing, even as a small child, to be rich.  I believe that this is a dream for many children who grew up with very little, just as Chizuo had.  He was born in Kyushu, located in southern Japan, in 1955.  He was the fourth son in a very poor family.  Chizuo’s family made a meager living weaving Tatami mats, a luxury they could not even afford for themselves, the small shack the family lived in only had hard earthen floors.  On top of being quite poor, Chizuo was also stricken with infantile glaucoma, causing him to be completely blind in his left eye and partially blind in his right eye.

Because of this disability and Chizuo’s timid manner, he was quite often teased in school.  His parents decided to enroll him in a government funded school for the blind.  At this school Chizuo discovered that here he had the advantage, being the only student with only partial blindness.  And with that he began to turn the tables and Chizuo became the bully himself.  He would often bully his classmates into doing anything he wanted them to.  Tired of living life as a poor person, money became Chizuo’s only focus, if any of his blind classmates needed a favor, he would extract some form of payment from them first.

As Chizuo grew, his reputation grew with him.  People came to know the boy as a one who would do anything to gain notoriety and affluence.  He ran for student body president several times, but he was always bested, it was beyond his grasp that his classmates feared him, rather than respecting him.  By Chizuo’s senior year he had developed both his mind and his body and his grades were pretty good.  He had also earned a black belt in Judo.

Chizuo was so creative in his money making abilities that by the time he graduated he had amassed over $30,000 USD.  He told his friends that he had every intention to join Japan’s ruling political party and that he would eventually become Prime Minister.  As part of his master plan, Chizuo enrolled in prep school in Tokyo, hoping this would lead to his admission into Tokyo University, but this school is quite elite and despite his good grades and prep school education, Tokyo University did not accept him into their program.

After not gaining admission to Tokyo University, Chizuo traveled back to Kyushu a bitter and angry man.  Not long after he had moved back to his hometown, he was arrested for assault, following an argument at a message parlor.  After being home for a few months, he traveled back to Tokyo where he met a bright young college student and quickly married the girl.  His new wife, Tomoko, quickly bore their first child, their first of six.  Tomoko was a calming influence in Chizuo’s life and she convinced her parents to invest in a clinic that her husband wanted to open.

The Matsumoto Acupuncture Clinic was a great success right from the beginning, but Chizuo was serving up some questionable herbal remedies to the public, the remedies were sold as a package, that included a 3-month course of acupuncture treatments and yoga exercises for a grand total of $7,000 USD.  One of these miracle cures was nothing more than a tangerine peel soaked in alcohol.  After Chizuo gained complaints for selling his remedies to rich elderly people in some exclusive Tokyo hotels, the police were contacted, he was fined $1,000 USD, which was a small price to pay for the nearly $200,000 USD he had already made with is scam.

Chizuo Matsumoto was doing what he had dreamed of as a child, he was getting rich, or at least richer.  Despite the complaints and the fines imposed on him, his reputation was also growing.  He was known as a healer, albeit a dubious one.  Chizuo told Tomoko that he long for something more out of his life, he needed a purpose for being.

Chizuo then began exploring the worlds of geomancy and Chinese fortune telling.  He began taking part in strange religious rituals and he spent longs periods of time in deep meditation.  It was during one of these meditative states when Chizuo received a rush of psychic energy which surged through his entire body.  After this surge of energy enveloped him, he claimed to have gained the ability to see the auras surrounding evil people.  Chizuo knew that this new found spirituality was his way of seeking the greatness he was destined for.

Now we are in the 1980’s and Chizuo Matsumoto is on his journey of discovery for his new-found spirituality.  Japan was in the throes of a healthy economy and the nation’s need to explore religious freedom.  Chizuo wished to align himself with an established religion so he could receive more spiritual training, he needed to validate himself and the spiritual gift he believed he had received.

At this time there were hundreds of sects of obscure cults all over Japan and Chizuo decided to pursue one called Agonshu Fundamentally Buddhist, this sect had embraced modern technology and they beamed their message via their own satellite TV station.  Chizuo decided to join this cult in early 1981 and he began training to gain admission.  Training consisted of periods of meditation every day for a thousand days.  After completing this process Chizuo felt that the process had robbed him of his piece of mind and he immediately turned his back on Agonshu and began developing his own plans to start a sect.

In 1984 he registered a company named Aum Incorporated, which soon became known as the Aum Association of Mountain Wizards, the company’s sole income was derived from selling questionable health drinks.  Soon after opening for business some followers signed up for a yoga school, Chizuo was the chief instructor for these classes.  Chizuo once again came to public light after a photo appeared of him in a Twilight Zone magazine.  In this photo he was supposedly levitating while in a yoga pose.  This of course was an often used trick, simply performed by flexing one’s thigh muscles to imitate levitation.  But Chizuo used this photo as publicity and soon his yoga school was flooded with new members, this provided him with the capital to open several more schools across Japan.

Chizuo was known in public as a gentle, caring and charismatic leader, his influence had grown to the point where he appointed deputies to run his schools while he went off to spiritual retreats in the mountains and on the beaches across Japan.  While away on one of these retreats, Chizuo met a student who informed the man that Armageddon was coming and that only the people with the purest spirits would survive.  Chizuo listened intently to this man’s words and he considered his own spiritual calling.  After consideration, he believed that he was to become the anointed leader of such a race of people, and that he was going to single-handedly save the world.

After returning from this trip of enlightenment, Chizuo declared to his followers that he would reshape the world and that they were all an important part of it.  Chizuo began wearing flowing robes of pure white and he let his hair grow out long.  To complete his transformation from regular Chizuo Matsumoto to an acclaimed cult leader, he changed his name and he would from then on be known as Shoko Asahara.

The newly-minted Shoko Asahara believed in his mission with a strong fervor.  He gave daily lectures to his rapidly growing number of followers, they quickly began to share Asahara’s vision for the future.  Money was now coming in quickly as more and more people signed up for classes at his multiple schools, and Asahara brought in speaking fees for his personal appearances as well.  Asahara began traveling to other countries outside of Japan, and he did this with two purposes in mind, to spread the word of Aum around the globe and to align himself with other spiritual groups.

In 1987, Asahara traveled to Dharmsala, a small village nestled inside of India’s Himalayan Mountains.  He arrived with a large entourage in tow and he arrived in time to take part in the new-year celebrations, while there he also received a personal blessing from the Dalai Lama.  This so called blessing consisted of a personal photo opportunity, but Asahara turned this photo moment, blessing into something much bigger.  Asahara claimed that he was given a divine mission to show the Japanese people the true teachings of Buddha and he insisted that the Dalai Lama had personally selected him for the task because he possessed the mind of a Buddha.

When Asahara returned to Japan he was bolstered by his new enlightenment.  He wrote his first book entitled Secrets of Developing Your Spiritual Powers.  This book proved to be a heavily self-indulgent book that promised to reveal secrets of how to read minds, levitate, see into the future and even develop x-ray vision, this book sold extremely well.  The sales of his book spurred on a lucrative speaking tour.  Tickets were $350 per person but each person was promised to be injected with Asahara’s divine energy as he laid his hands on the recipient’s forehead.

Many of Asahara’s students claimed amazing results from these sessions, they had out-of-body experiences, miraculous recovery from injuries and illnesses and even their skills at board games were elevated.  After several months had gone by since Asahara received his divine mission, he told his followers that the Aum Association of Mountain Wizards was no more.  They would now be known as Aum Supreme Truth and this group was not a simple yoga school, but instead it was to be the beginning of a new world-wide religion.

Asahara realized that he needed to begin expanding his empire of disciples further, so he asked them to make cash donations to the group in order to aid in their own spiritual development.  The followers began to distribute leaflets and literature about their group, as well as selling copies of Asahara’s book.  Aum Supreme Truth started to become an eclectic mixture of eastern religion and mysticism, with a heaping side dish of Buddhism, Zen and Hindu teachings.

Of all the religions that Asahara studied, he held the most adoration for the Christian prophecy of Armageddon.  Asahara took his rudimentary understanding of the Book of Revelations and coupled this with influences from the Hindu god Shiva and the prophecies of Nostradamus, and this became Asahara’s principle doctrine.  Soon his lectures became speckled with prophecies of impending doom, claiming that the earth would explode during a nuclear holocaust in the year 2003.  The only people who would be saved where those who chose to follow his examples and attain spiritual enlightenment through the teachings of Aum.

Now you or I may think this sounds a bit far-fetched, however; hundreds of Japanese citizens responded to his apocalyptic prophesies and paid millions of yen to listen to his teachings and take part in varios rituals he supervised.   As each month passed, Aum Supreme Truth’s numbers grew, as did Asahara’s influence.

One of the bazar rituals Aum members could participate in was the ritual of blood initiation.  For this ritual, members would drink a small portion of the master’s blood, the master being Asahara himself.  They had been told the blood of Shoko Asahara contained magical properties.  In return for the great honor of participating in this ritual, each member paid $7,000.  Asahara’s bath water was bottled and sold for $800 a quart.  His beard clippings could be boiled in water and ingested as a tea, this could be purchased for the meager price of $375 per half-inch.

By the end of 1987 there were over 1,500 members of the Aum in Japan alone.  In 1988 the first international branch of the group was opened in New York under the name Aum USA. Those who responded and joined Aum found an atmosphere not unlike the Japanese public school system, with a period of initiation followed by grading up to higher levels of enlightenment. Those that didn't have the time to undertake the two-year, $2,000 full-time training course were offered the training by correspondence.

Besides the cost of the courses, applicants had to pay a fee of $700 just to join.  If you could afford to pay the $2,000.00 you were given a gift of 2 gallons of Asahara’s bath water.  New members of the group told their friends and families about the incredible changes to their lives after partaking in various rituals, they told of the divine inspiration of Shoko Asahara and Aum, which had changed their lives within minutes of hearing their new master speak.  And as Aum grew financially they purchased land and buildingins for what was to become a temple and live-in headquarters for Aum Supreme Truth.

If you are a frequent listener of this podcast, which we hope you are, you undoubtedly have heard me speak about Mt. Fuji, it is the instant iconography when westerners think about Japan.  Well, in 1988 Aum purchased several building which laid in the shadow of the sleeping giant, and these buildings would unleash a deadly force on the world, much like an erupting volcano.

This area was initially just a few shacks, trailers and warehouses surrounded by a high fence.  But inside of these dilapidated buildings Asahara began building his empire.  People would travel here from far and wide, they slept on bare floors for weeks and received one meal per day consisting of steamed veggies, all while they sat through endless lectures and they were taught to cut ties with their non-believing family and friends.  For this service, members paid $2,000 per week.

The many followers who believed in blind faith gave up jobs, family and friends to join Aum.  After being welcomed into the group, they gave away all of their earthly possessions and savings to the group.  Members who wanted to elevate their status within the group would become nuns and monks, to show their loyalty, they would be required to donate all of their money, savings, securities, real estate holdings, jewelry and anything else that held value.  After donating all of this they made a pledge: I entrust my spiritual and physical self and all assets to Aum.

Entire families joined the sect, young and old, poor and wealthy joined the sect.  By 1990, 15% of Aum followers under the age of 20.  Once again, as membership grew so did the group’s profits.  The increased profits brought an additional problem to the group, taxes. After speaking to legal experts, Asahara applied for official religious status for Aum.  Under Japanese Religious Corporations Laws, any religious group could apply for this status, which included generous tax breaks, so long as they adhered to certain guidelines.

Although the group was very popular, a large portion of the Japanese population saw the group as an antisocial cult, proven through manipulations when parents tried to remove their children from the group, because of this, Aum’s application was denied.  This resulted in members of Aum harassing officials, they wrote threatening letters and picketed outside of their offices.  The group filed lawsuits against the Tokyo governor and out of fear of violating Japan’s religious freedom laws, the governor approved the group’s application and they received their tax concessions.

The Sunday Mainichi ran several articles criticizing Aum’s twisted doctrines and its unhealthy influence.  Asahara was angered by the articles and he went to the newspaper’s office with a trove of his followers demanding that they articles be withdrawn.

Editor Taro Maki refused, and Asahara approved a vicious campaign that saw Maki and his family harassed and belittled in public. Aum even went to the length of publishing a special book that criticized Maki and his paper and distributed it throughout Japan. Night and day, a barrage of abusive telephone calls besieged Maki and his family. Finally Maki had a massive stroke and the members of Aum gloated over what they perceived to be "heaven's vengeance."

The Japanese citizens who chose to join this cult included some highly talented men and women.  Hideo Murai was a brilliant astrophysicist and Murai turned his back on the corporate world after reading an Aum pamphlet in a public library.  Murai was a small and quiet young man and he was seemingly incapable of even a violent thought, however; after a meeting with Asahara, he found himself caught up in his new master’s apocalyptic vision and he became Aum’s chief scientist and the architect of the terror Aum was poised to unleash upon the world.

Seiichi Endo was a student at Kyoto University when he first heard of Aum.  He was a genetic engineer with a PH.D in molecular biology.  Endo’s time had manly been devoted to medical experiments in their Viral Research Center at the medical school.

Masami Tsuchiya walked away from his prosperous career in organic chemistry to join Aum and Fumihiro Joyu had an advanced degree in telecommunications, he was young scientist researching and developing artificial intelligence for the National Space Development Agency, he quit this prestigious job after only two weeks to join Aum.

One of Murai’s first inventions was a cloth cap fitted with a web of tiny electrodes, it was named the Perfect Salvation Initiation.  This cap would send bursts of electrical energy into the wearer’s scalp.  The purpose of this was to stimulate the brain and synchronize the brain waves with those of the master, Asahara.  The cap was powered by a six-volt battery and they were given, for free to full-time members.  Members who were not full-time could rent a cap for $7,000 per month, or they could purchase their own for a meager $70,000.  This first invention netted millions of dollars in profit for the group.

The next invention was the Astral Teleporter, this device was a system of wires, connected to Asahara’s meditation mat, and it was supposed to record the vibrations of the master’s mantras.  The vibrations were then sent to the mats of followers so they could clean their astral dimensions through the master’s vibrations.  

Just as everything has ebbs and flows, some followers became frustrated when they did not receive the promised changes to their lives and they began to rebel against the strict regimen of the group.  One young man, who was not discontented with the group chose to leave and he told his adviser of his decision.  Asahara was told of this man’s decent and the man was brought in front of the leader.  Asahara told the man that Aum was a lifelong commitment and if he wanted to leave, he must be mentally unstable and in need of guidance.  Asahara decided that the man’s mental instability was caused by heat in the head and he ordered the man’s head to be dunked into a vat of ice water repeatedly, the man went into hypothermic shock and later died as a result.

This man had been close friends with Shuji Taguchi and he voiced his disapproval over the handling of this man to other members of the sect.  In February of 1989, Taguchi was called to appear before Asahara to explain his grievances, after listening to the man, Asahara ordered conditioning, to clear the man’s mind.  Taguchi, feared that he would face the same fate as his friend and he refused the treatment.  Instead Taguchi was bound in ropes and taken to a small cell where he was questioned for hours on end.  After reaching the point of mental and physical exhaustion, Taguchi said that he hated the sect and he hated Asahara especially. Upon hearing this revelation, Asahara called six men into speak with him and he told these men that Taguchi could not be freed because he may go to authorities, but he could not stay in the group either, he needed to be elevated to a higher plane, the men understood what was meant.  The men returned to the man’s cell and gave him one more chance to change his mind about the sect.  When Taguchi remained steadfast in his beliefs, the men tied a rope around his neck, strangled him for a while before finally breaking the man’s neck, killing him instantly. 

His body was wrapped in a plastic sheet and taken to a courtyard where it was dumped in a drum and doused with gasoline. Shuji's body was set afire and burned for several hours. Asahara inspected the remains and ordered that they be burned again until only ashes remained.

Tsutsumi Sakamoto was a young and brilliant 33-year-old lawyer from Yokohama.  He had established a reputation as a hard-working human rights lawyer.  Sakamoto had agreed to represent one of the families seeking the release of their under-age daughter from Aum.  After he took this case, word quickly spread and soon many more families asked him for help as well.  By October, Sakamoto was preparing actions for 23 different families, all of them having lost family members to the cult.  And Sakamoto was not a stranger to the laws pertaining to these dangerous cults, he had taken on the Moonies cult several years earlier.  He organized all of the complaints into a group called the Society of Aum Supreme Truth Victims.  He then contact Aum officials to negotiate on behalf of the families.  Aum’s legal counsel, was Yoshinobu Aoyama, who was the youngest person to pass the bar exams at Kyoto University Law School.

Aoyama first offered a meeting between one of Sakamoto’s clients and her daughter, but Sakamoto presented his case for the release of all of the children in question.  The media soon leaned of Sakamoto’s dealings with the Aum and he stated on radio and television interviews that Aum was guilty of holding members against their will, fraud and unethical practices.  The group quickly made pamphlets attempting to discredit Sakamoto and they distributed them throughout Yokohama.  They then began making threatening phone calls to his home and office.  Sakamoto responded by increasing legal pressure on the group.

Asahara called a meeting with some of his men to discuss their Sakamoto problem.  His instructions were clear and straight to the point, something had to be done to silence Sakamoto.  Asahara knew that his religious group was still in the probationary stage with the government and any impropriety could lead to the loss of their religious status and tax advantages.  Asahara was told by his men that they had a drug which could kill the lawyer within 5 minutes.  They decided that they would drag Sakamoto into a car and inject him with the drug.  Dr. Nakagawa, one of the cult’s physicians was eager to carry out these orders from his master.  They scheduled the attack for the following day.

On November 3rd, 1989 a small group of members left the Aum compound and drove to Yokohama.  Among these men were Hideo Murai, the chief scientist, Satoro Hashimoto, an expert in martial arts and Dr. Nakagawa, who carried a pouch containing seven syringes filled with potassium chloride.  The men’s plan was to wait outside of the Yokohama station for Sakamoto to return from work, they would then drag him into their car, inject him and drive his body back to their compound to be disposed of in the fire.  The plan was going as planned, but Sakamoto was late getting home on this day.  The men waited several hours until they finally realized that it was a public holiday and Sakamoto would be at home with his family.  The group called Asahara to ask for instructions on what to do next, he instructed the men to wait until the early morning hours of the following morning, then they were to go to Sakamoto’s home and kill his entire family.

In the dark early morning, around 3AM, the group found an unlocked door into the man’s home and they made their way to the main bedroom.  As they entered the room, an infant baby awoke and began crying.  One of the men covered the baby boy’s mouth with his hand as Nakagawa injected the tiny baby with a massive dose of the lethal drug.  They then attacked Sakamoto with a hammer, beating the man about his head, this awoke his wife, Satoko who began screaming and fighting the men, until she too was beat into submission, both adults were then injected with the drug, but Sakamoto continued to fight until the men finally strangled him until all of the life had left his body.

The men wrapped the young family in their own bedding and transported them back to their compound.  There they disposed of the bodies, Asahara told the men, “Don’t feel guilty, the child will be born again in a higher world.”

When Sakamoto failed to arrive at his office the following week, his associates became worried. Anxious family members went to the family’s apartment to check on them. The sight that greeted them caused confusion. The rooms showed clear signs of recent occupation with all the families personal items intact. The only things missing, apart from the Sakamotos, were items of bedding.

One curious item was found that seemed definitely out of place. On the floor beside a cupboard, Sakamoto's mother found a badge inscribed with the insignia of Aum Supreme Truth. The police were called and made a rudimentary investigation, but seemed disinterested in the family's disappearance. When it was suggested that Aum was responsible, the police backed away from the suggestion, proposing that Sakamoto, who they saw as a trouble maker, had organized the whole thing to discredit Aum.

News of the event reached the media and soon Aum's name was being linked to the disappearance. The public pressure made it difficult for the police to continue to ignore the connection. Finally, 16 days after the disappearance, the police reluctantly approached Aum and requested an interview with Asahara. Asahara avoided the police for several days before leaving the country to travel to Germany, supposedly to oversee the European expansion of Aum.

While Asahara and his vast entourage toured Germany on a recruiting drive, the media interest in the Sakamoto case was increasing. The Sunday Mainichi, because of its previous exposure to Aum's antics, believed they were responsible and sent a reporter to Bonn, Germany to interview Asahara. This reporter was refused entry to the Aum residence and was subsequently dragged away by Asahara's men.

Soon after, a press conference was called by Asahara where he deny any involvement in the alleged Sakamoto kidnapping. When one reporter raised the question of the badge found at the scene, Asahara answered that anyone could get one because over 40,000 had been distributed, when in fact less than a hundred had been made. The police lost interest in the case and, eventually, the media did as well.  Seemingly, Aum had gotten away with murder, again.

Obviously bolstered by his ability to sidestep the law, Asahara began a bizarre campaign to run for the upcoming national parliamentary elections. His strategy was to have a select group of followers contest 25 seats in the Lower House.

Their campaigning was obscure. They preached of impending doom while at the same time promising, freedom, equality and benevolence for everyone. Their campaign budget ran into millions of dollars. At one stage, hundreds of followers marched in the streets wearing hideous papier-mâché masks bearing a distorted caricature of Asahara.

Like everything else that Aum did, its approach to campaigning was radical and unethical, with supporters and candidates breaking every electoral rule. Opposition party posters were torn down, phones were tapped and voters were intimidated.

Regardless of their high budget and extreme strategies, Aum's bid for political recognition failed miserably when all 25 candidates, including Asahara, were defeated. The election result wasn't the only bad news for the cult. Throughout Japan, Aum was coming under intense scrutiny. Asahara spoke of "extreme measures being required to educate the world about the power of Aum."

He talked of raising an army to fight anyone who opposed his teachings. The election defeat seemed to act as a catalyst to his maniacal plans as he urged his scientists to create hi-tech weapons for the coming war. At the beginning of 1990, Asahara's agenda could be summed up in one word -- revenge.

Aum’s chief scientists, Hideo Murai and Seiichi Endo set up a chemical laboratory and after weeks of researching they told Asahara that chemical weapons would be the best idea for their mission.  They set about testing and did trial runs, using one of the most infectious chemicals know to human beings at the time, Clostridium botulinum, which is the chemical basis for botulism.  Typically, this chemical is ingested by way of food and it is known to be one of the most poisonous substances in the natural world, it is 10,000 times more potent than Cobra venom.  One millionth of a gram could be a lethal dose to a human.

The problem with this compound, they discovered, was that when it was introduced to air it became neutralized.  The scientist’s next idea was to equip a truck with a special spraying device, so they could drive around Tokyo and spray it into the public, they wanted to focus on the Japanese parliament area, because Asahara wanted to teach the Japanese government a lesson.  Asahara and over a thousand of his followers were staying on the southern Japanese island of Okinawa while the scientist worked on this idea.  The overall idea was to kill off the entire Japanese government in one fell swoop, this way Shoko Asahara could step in to lead the nation.  The scientists were able to get the sprayers to work, but unfortunately for them, and fortunately for the Japanese public, the toxin did not work.  The scientist now knew that they needed to find a different substance for their attack.

As the work continued in the labs, Asahara took another trip aimed at expanding his ever-growing empire.  In March of 1992 Aum arrived in Moscow, and they were greeted with a lot of fanfare.  Many of the Russian people quickly followed the Aum group, as hundreds showed up to hear Asahara’s teachings and his predictions about the end of the world.  After several months of recruiting, Russians of all different social statuses had joined, including government officials.  Asahara had formed alliances with top Russian officials including Oleg Ivanovich Lobov, chairman of the Russian security council.  Aum made donations to the foreign country of computers, medical supplies and $14 million dollars in cash.  Because of this, Russian leaders opened their doors to the cult and made even their largest venues available to the group.   After this they began producing a weekly TV program showing the virtues of the Aum group.  As Asahara and his group left to travel back to Japan, they had grown their group by the thousands, while in Russia.

This trip to Russia had also given the Aum one great tool, access to the Russian scientific community and access to a treasure trove of post-Soviet weaponry.  One of Asahara’s trusted lieutenants was left in Russia to oversee the groups procurement of the weapons of mass destruction.  He was to gather as much information as he could about chemical weapons and other devices including nuclear warheads.

Asahara gathered his trusted group and told them that, “The time has come”.  He told them his secret plan for bringing about Armageddon.  Murai was tasked with overseeing production of the chemical weapons, while at the same time developing nuclear, laser and microwave technologies.  Tsuchiya was placed in charge of the facility that would produce a nerve gas suggested by Asahara, it was a chemical that had been used by the Nazi’s called sarin.  Hayakawa was in charge of the new plant’s infrastructure and was also in charge of procuring more conventional weapons like firearms, explosives, tanks and aircrafts. 

Former military solders who had joined the Aum were put in charge of training the other members in military tactics and techniques.  A special ops unit was formed from the members who showed the most promise at the military training.  A new building was constructed close to the group’s compound at the foot of Mt Fuji.  This building was three stories tall, but two floors were built underground, so from the surface it only looked like a one story-building, they called this building the Clear Stream Temple.  The group also had a weapons factory which they had built, it was opened for use in 1993, the members called this The Supreme Science Institute, here they produced Russian-designed AK-74s, an upgraded design of the AK-47.  Asahara wanted enough guns made to arm every single member of the Aum by 1995.

Because Japan was booming with technology in the 90’s Aum opened a chain of budget computer stores across the county, selling mostly American-made computers, this operation ran over 300 stores nationwide.  By this time, it was estimated that Aum’s wealth had grown to over $150 million dollars and by the end of 1995, Aum's financial officials would be boasting of net assets totaling in excess of one billion dollars.

While the cult continued to expand, it’s scientist continued to work on perfecting their chemical weapons.  Asahara was growing impatient, he wanted to launch his attack on Japan’s leadership and he thought the wedding of Japan’s Prince Naruhito would be the prime opportunity for an attack.  He wanted to also attack the royal palace and parliament at the same time with laser weapons.  Scientist for Aum informed Asahara that the laser weapons would not be ready by this time, so instead, he directed his men to organize the spraying of toxins throughout central Tokyo.  

The citizens of Japan prepared for the impending wedding of the prince, unaware that an attack on them was being organized.  The Aum group proceeded with their plans and they drove through the streets of Tokyo spreading chemicals they believed would create an epidemic in the city, but the wedding came and went with no casualties from this attack, in fact, the Japanese citizens did not even know that anything had happened, it was an absolute failure.

Later in 1993, a new plan was unveiled to unleash a different toxic substance all over Tokyo, the group owned a building on the east side of Tokyo.  This was an eight-story building that the group was using as a laboratory to produce a chemical known as anthrax.

The British had developed anthrax as a potential biological weapon during World War II. It was tested on the sheep of Gruinard Island off the coast of Scotland. As a biological weapon, anthrax is designed to be inhaled.  A few days after the victim has inhaled a sufficient quantity of anthrax spores, symptoms would begin to show.  Initially the victim would show cold or flu-like symptoms, followed by a high fever and vomiting. Eventually, the body would break out in huge, painful blisters, which would turn the skin black and hard. Finally the brain would expand and bleed and the body would turn blue from lack of oxygen as the victim lapsed into a coma and died a slow, painful death. Once the disease was established, it was almost always fatal, as the Russian bio-warfare experts learned in 1979 when an accident released anthrax into the city of Sverdlovsk, in this incident more than 60 people were killed.

Richard Manchee wrote in a letter to the New Scientist, on Sept.29, 2001 he wrote, "the sect's choice of anthrax as an agent of biological warfare was a logical one because anthrax produces resistant spores which remain alive for many years." The British could testify to this truth, their anthrax test on Gruinard Island rendered the island uninhabitable for more than 40 years.  They literally had to strip off all the vegetation on the island and treat the soil with formaldehyde and other chemicals to destroy the anthrax spores that still lived in the soil decades afterwards.

Japanese officials stated that a cult member who was a graduate student in biology had obtained the sample of anthrax through another member with medical credentials. Then Endo cultured the bacteria in large drums. Now, he had a choice of producing the anthrax in either liquid form to spray at intended victims or in powder form which could be inhaled. For some reason, Endo chose to produce the liquid form, which is less likely to establish itself in the victim's lungs.

On the roof of this building, an industrial sprayer had been set up to spray the spores from a sealed laboratory one floor below and, with the aid of a powerful fan, spread the bacteria all over the neighborhood. While dressed in a hazmat suit, Asahara watched as the bacteria was released. The device ran continuously for at least 24 hours and possibly as long as several days.

Local residents began to complain to authorities about a strange smell in the area.  Some said that plants began to wilt and pet became ill, some residents complained of mysterious stomach aches.  Even so, no one died as a result, they did not even show symptoms of anthrax poisoning. Police soon identified the source of this smell and they noted that the building belonged to Aum.  Police were reluctant to take action and they accepted Asahara’s explanation for the smell, he told them it was a combination of perfume and soybean oil.  Japan's religious protection laws stopped the police from searching the Aum building, but the police did take samples of fluid that was emanating from a pipe outside.

The sample taken from outside of the building was tested and it was discovered that the strand used by Endo was actually a veterinary vaccine strain that lacked the ability to cause the full-blown anthrax disease.  While things appeared to be under control in the sect, Endo and his scientific colleagues were wholly incompetent.  They had solved the problem of keeping the bacteria alive, which had been their main problem to begin with.  Asahara ordered Endo to double his efforts in finding a suitable virus.  A team was sent to Africa to study Ebola, but they did not return with any samples.

Hayakawa attempted to purchase an army helicopter, a MiG-29 fighter jet and an SL-13 Proton rocket launcher.  Of all these things, he was only successful in obtaining the helicopter.

The building within the Aum complex set at the foot of Mt Fuji soon became one of the most sophisticated chemical manufacturing facilities in the world.  This building, known as Satian 7, had been built for an estimated $10 million dollars.  Satian was derived from the ancient Sanskrit word for Truth.  Within the walls of this building, Aum scientist were producing one of the deadliest nerve toxins in the entire world, sarin gas.  The laboratory, which was completely computer controlled could produce around 18 pints, or two tons, of liquid sarin per day.  Asahara had ordered the production of 70 tons; this would be enough to kill every living thing on planet Earth.

Will the Aum Supreme Truth, succeed in its attempt at world domination?  Well, join us next week on The Secret Sits, as we finish our story about this terrifying cult, which seems to have its footing as a budding terrorist organization.