Well, as rep for Western Japan, I think it's high time I pontificated on
the Aum Shinrikyo incident here. We've got a live one! As horrifying
as the gas attack was (I took the Subway in Osaka the next day and there
was no extra security or police presence), it revealed a unique brand of
Japanese terrorism; anonymous, no explosives or guns, no demands,
invisible..... If Aum Supreme Truth did it, then it is using the
incident two ways - to attack the government/security apparatus and to
rally their followers with the claim that the government is trying to
attack Aum with gas.
Aum's Russian connection is enormous. Five thousand members in the
Moscow area, two radio stations feeds (one in Moscow, in Russian,
another in Vladivostok, beaming an A.M. signal to Japan). An entire
Mi-17 heavy helicopter was bought there, shipped through Rotterdam and
reassembled in the back lot of Aum Supreme headquarters. It seems
likely that with the free market bazaar of East bloc weaponry there, the
temptation to acquire a cheap and deadly chemical weapon with
defensive/offensive capabilities may have been too much for Asahara.
Aum learned from that W.S.Burroughs essay in "Three-Fisted Tales of
'Bob'"-the first rule of any cult is to create enemies!" At first it
was the parents of cultees who wanted their children back. Then it was
a lawyer representing the parents who mysteriously disappeared with his
wife and child over five years ago. And now the Police and the
Government. Their organizing tactics are perfect-devotees give up all
possessions and wealth, live together communally, and go through group
sensory-derprivation training (lying on mattresses, listening to 'barely
audible music', overhead sprays emitting a water mist, all this from a
Russian who left the group). And although the raids by the police were
successful, Asahara is still at large, using the Russian radio
broadcasts and the groups computer network (they own three stores,
selling their own brand of PC/clones to the general public) to keep in
touch.
Why would Asahara order the gassings, if in fact he did so? Well,
here's the link to Jim Jones, Koresh and any other cult leader since the
beginning of time. HE GOT BORED! "Sure, the cult business is great,
plenty of money and followers, but nothing new has happened in the last
five years, some weaker cult wimps want to go home, donations are down,
there's petty bickering over meals in the cafeteria, SO WHY NOT STIR
THINGS UP? If my followers, think I am a God, why not prove it? Let's
call the police's bluff, let's see if the followers will really follow
my every order!! I can't die anyway, I'm (insert cult leader name
here)!" And so the logic goes.
Japan has not seen fanatics like this since the J.Red Army of the 70s.
The apparent spiritual vacuum of '90s Japan, all materialism and very
little else, has spawned a whole slew of new religions, so many that the
BBC called it "the Rush Hour of the Gods." So be careful! Only
J.R."Bob" Dobbs can sell you that all-important subway map to navigate
that rush hour and get you home safely.
The Shining Path of Least Resistance,
SubGenius Ministries, Osaka Japan
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* SLMR 2.1a * "I have a friend in Minsk, he has a friend in Pinsk, ..."
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