Thirty years later, Aum Shinrikyo's horrors are ever-present

Japan Times

21-03-2025

Thirty years ago this week, a self-proclaimed messiah and his followers stunned Japan and the world with a brazen terror attack.
During the height of the morning rush hour, members of Aum Shinrikyo opened bags of sarin, a deadly nerve gas, on subway trains as they arrived at stations in the heart of Tokyo where central government offices were located. The attack killed over a dozen people and wounded thousands more.
While stunning, the attack did not bring the nation to its knees. It did expose the inability of the political and law enforcement authorities to deal with a group that had made clear its belief that it and its followers were above the law — and the appeal of that claim to many within the country.
Aum was started by Chizuo Matsumoto, a blind practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine, who took the name Shoko Asahara when he declared himself enlightened. He then claimed to be a guru so powerful that he could levitate while meditating.
He was by all accounts a magnetic personality whose claims to divinity, along with distinctive preachings about Indian religion and health practices, were readily accepted by followers. At its peak, the group reportedly had as many as 65,000 members worldwide, 50,000 in Japan. Subsequently, Aum was accused of using drugs to instill obedience — and credulity — as well as more mundane methods of enforcing compliance such as deception and violence.
The cult had compounds in Japan, as well as facilities in Australia and Russia, where the members lived together, studied and engaged in various illicit activities. Some of the group's practices, such as holding members against their will if they sought to leave, attracted the attention of Japanese legal authorities.
Believing that the Japanese government would soon move against the group, Asahara ordered the sarin attack. At the peak of morning rush hour on March 20, 1995, several members of the group punctured bags containing liquid sarin on five cars on the Chiyoda, Hibiya and Marunouchi subway lines. The toxic compound spread through the packed trains, killing 14 people and injured more than 6,000 others.
The attack confirmed the danger the group posed and the police raided their facilities soon after, discovering explosives, weapons caches and even a Russian military helicopter. Most disturbing were chemical stockpiles that could be used to make illegal drugs and were large enough to make enough weapons to kill several million people. Months later, police found chemical weapons in commuter stations that could have killed thousands.
A crackdown resulted in the arrest of cult members, although the leadership remained at large for some time. Asahara was arrested two months after the attack when he was found hiding at one of the group's compounds. He and several other senior leaders were tried, convicted and given death sentences. Seven were hanged in July 2018 after their appeals were exhausted.
Subsequent revelations about the cult proved even more alarming than the 1995 assault. It became clear that the authorities had been worried about the group for some time. There had been credible allegations of deception, kidnapping, abuse and other acts of violence against group members and critics.
Especially grievous was the case of Tsutsumi Sakamoto, a lawyer who had been threatening a lawsuit that could bankrupt the group. He went public with complaints in an interview with TBS, which showed it to the group prior to broadcast. After pressuring the station to cancel the show, several members broke into his apartment and murdered him, his wife, his infant son and hid the bodies in separate locations around the country to avoid discovery. While the group was suspected of involvement — there were anonymous tips and a cult pin was found in the apartment — nothing could be proven until after the subway attack.
Another grim episode was the release of sarin in the city of Matsumoto, near the homes of judges presiding over a case that the cult expected to lose. Eight people died in the incident and more than 500 others were injured. Aum's involvement was only discovered after the subway attacks.
The authorities' blind spot is inexplicable. Takashi Kakimi, then director-general of the Criminal Affairs Bureau of the National Police Agency, has conceded that his group was 'indecisive' about raiding Aum before the subway attacks. He blamed a lack of sufficient evidence, despite growing concerns after those two incidents. Some have asserted that the prospect of charges of religious persecution deterred action.
Thirty years on, Aum's dreadful legacy endures. Victims suffer still, dealing with the physical effects of the gas attack as well as with post-traumatic stress. The families of the 14 people who died live with their losses and the questions that surround the incident.
A second legacy is the warning to law enforcement and emergency responders that they must be prepared for mass casualty terror attacks. The sarin incident highlighted the vulnerability posed by mass transit systems that are integral to daily life in Japan. The authorities have worked continuously since then to upgrade and improve security, including removing garbage bins that could be used to store deadly devices, installing cameras and creating protocols for handling suspicious objects.
Sadly, authorities have also recognized that those measures cannot prevent attacks. Thus, there is constant training with police, fire departments and the Self-Defense Forces on how to respond to similar attacks. Particular attention is now given to protecting first responders so that they are not incapacitated and prevented from providing care in an emergency.
A final legacy is the lingering questions about why Aum appealed to some of Japan's best and brightest minds. Its members included graduates not only from top schools like the University of Tokyo and Waseda University but also from demanding fields such as medicine and physics. What drew these people in? How were they convinced to participate in terrorist acts?
These are not abstract questions. Aum exists today, with three successor groups — Aleph, Hikari no Wa and Yamada-ra no Shudan — 'still conducting activities under the absolute influence of Asahara,' warned Justice Minister Keisuke Suzuki this week. The group continues to attract adherents — there were roughly 1,600 members at the beginning of this year, estimates the Public Security Intelligence Agency — while engaging in legal tactics, such as changing names and changing legal representatives with alarming regularity, to avoid paying over ¥1 billion in compensation to victims of its crimes.
It is likely that many of these people have no idea of Aum's crimes. That is why it is ever more urgent that we as a country remember what happened 30 years ago, understand the sources of the group's appeal and ensure that such tragedies never happen again. As Suzuki warned, 'problems related to Aum Shinrikyo are never a thing of the past.'
The Japan Times Editorial Board