[narrator] Look at all you've built.
You've handcrafted a utopia
and groomed obedient souls for a journey to the afterlife.
But instead of lurking on the fringes of society,
wouldn't you rather be treated like a star?
Cult leaders want to let the world know, "Look how great we are."
They try to keep a good face to the public
even though all kinds of horrible and often criminal things are going on.
[narrator] Nobody worked harder
or more creatively at this task than Shoko Asahara,
leader of the Japanese cult Aum Shinrikyo.
[speaks Japanese]
[narrator] Before he became infamous for executing a poison gas attack
on the Tokyo subway,
Asahara spent a decade
cultivating a reputation as a spiritual guru,
TV personality,
and owner of a popular low-price bento box franchise.
He was quite active in proselytizing and publicizing himself.
Look, he's levitating!
[clapping]
Society in general,
we never thought Aum is that violent group.
We had no idea.
[narrator] Follow the master's methods and learn how much you can get away with
with the right PR plan.
Ready for your close-up?
Shoko Asahara founded Aum Shinrikyo in 1984
as a yoga and meditation group.
He exuded kindness and a paternal power. And, well…
[narrator] Years later,
he turned Aum into a deadly cult whose members would give their own lives,
and countless others, to purify the world.
Before you learn the secrets of his success,
let's get up to speed on the guru himself.
Asahara was born in 1955
in the southern island of Japan in Kyushu from a very poor family.
[Erica] He was almost blind in one eye and only had short sight on the other one.
So from very early on,
he was sent to a special boarding school for students with disabilities.
[Ian] Asahara felt he'd been abandoned by his family.
This being sent away
created a sense of resentment and abandonment in him.
[Ian] He trained as an acupuncturist and as an herbalist.
He was interested in Tibetan Buddhism.
[Ian] He went to India and did some meditating
and so on in the Himalayas.
And then it developed more into this idea
of finding a new path to save the world
and creating a kind of very utopian view of a new world.
His believers thought of Shoko Asahara
as the absolute wisest of wise men.
Actually, not even a man, more like a god, or something transcendent like that.
He was portrayed in some magazines as able to levitate.
[Erica] This was one of his supposed powers.
The other one was the ability to read people's minds.
His bathwater was sacred because it'd been in touch with his body.
[Ian] The same was true of his blood.
[narrator] Within a decade of its founding,
Aum had 10,000 members in Japan and an estimated 40,000 worldwide,
with Asahara himself becoming a minor celebrity,
and that was no accident.
If you want to burnish your own image in anti-cult world,
start where Asahara did and prepare to reap the rewards.
[cheering]
[narrator] As a cult leader,
your followers aren't just the human throne
upon which you sit,
they're your ambassadors.
Having elite or appealing followers is helpful to a cult and the cult leader
because it provides a marketing opportunity.
It presents the cult as something that is safe and legitimate
and something people would wanna be part of.
[narrator] Asahara wasn't the only one to know the value of an A-list crew.
Keith Raniere of NXIVM
offered special incentives to celebrities to lure them into his group,
including actress Allison Mack,
who ultimately received jail time
for her role in the cult's sex trafficking operation.
After the Symbionese Liberation Army
kidnapped and brainwashed heiress Patty Hearst,
she became the group's public face
and helped them rob a bank.
While Anne Hamilton-Byrne's cult, known as The Family,
took off after she enlisted respected physicist Raynor Johnson
to help her recruit among Australian high society.
When it came to drawing elite followers,
Asahara had the right message at the right time.
[Ian] Asahara comes out of the 1980s.
Japan has become very materialistic.
[reporter] The Japanese are in a hurry to spend their money.
[Ian] They're economically rich, but is it really satisfying?
Some of the members came from top university,
so highly educated young people.
Some of them were quite talented at computing.
[Erica] Aum offered something for young people
who didn't fit in this high-speed, consumerist society.
Young people tend to need guidance in their life, right?
[Atsushi] "Who I am?" You know? Those basic questions about themselves.
Aum Shinrikyo gave the answer.
[narrator] Targeting new disciples,
Asahara gives speeches at Japan's top universities,
where he delivers his promise of a simpler, more meaningful life,
along with some alluring assistance.
Before long, Asahara hooks a prize,
Hideo Murai,
a brilliant scientist
who becomes entranced by Asahara's spiritual vision…
[chanting]
…as well as by the guru's promise
that everyone who follows him will gain supernatural powers.
Soon Murai renounces the outside world
and moves in to a tiny cell to focus on his meditation.
Asahara takes full advantage of his new disciple,
harnessing Murai's high-tech background to build shortcuts to enlightenment…
including an electrode helmet
that supposedly helps Asahara
transmit his brain waves directly to followers.
Murai's scientific gifts help Asahara dream bigger…
and will ultimately fuel the guru's terrifying visions for the future.
Thanks to Asahara's top-flight recruiting,
Aum membership grew from 35 in 1986 to 1,300 just one year later.
But high-profile followers can lead to high-profile attention.
How do you make sure
people don't get the wrong idea about you and your circle?
To lead a spiritual movement,
you can't just talk about achieving perfection,
you have to show it in action.
It's very important to convince people
there is something sacred about you, about your character.
[Lola] There's something pure about you.
[narrator] Asahara did his part by crafting a pious image.
DECLARING MYSELF THE CHRIST
It was really important to Asahara to be seen as a proper religious leader.
[narrator] He even sought out and received the blessing of the Dalai Lama himself.
While Asahara was projecting his own purity to the outside world,
he demanded even more from his followers in private.
When they join,
one of the first things they were given to do
were ascetic training by sitting for hours
or being confined in dark spaces
or hanging upside down.
They would strive to do more practice
to become closer to Asahara.
They said, "He wants us to be enlightened, and therefore to be saved,
but he has to be harsh."
[narrator] Asahara stages his extreme spiritual boot camp
at the group's headquarters at the base of Mount Fuji.
The program,
extended meditation…
fasting,
sleep deprivation…
[rooster crowing]
…and electroshock therapy.
[grunting]
[narrator] Before long, things get out of control.
Follower Majima Teruyuki begins showing signs of distress.
[screaming and grunting]
[narrator] To calm him down,
Asahara orders disciples to douse Teruyuki with cold water.
It doesn't help.
Majima goes into cardiac arrest and dies.
Asahara and his inner circle decide on their next move,
protect the group at all costs.
Asahara has them destroy the body.
But despite a successful cover-up,
it creates a new dilemma within the group.
Asahara has ordered somebody to do this practice
in order to become more spiritually advanced.
This person has died because of this practice.
[Ian] What do you do?
It's gonna make Asahara look like he's failed.
[narrator] But as the playbook tells us,
necessity is the mother of reinvention.
[Ian] So a different type of explanation emerges.
It was the idea that Majima
could not attain enlightenment and the truth in this body.
He wasn't quite ready for it,
therefore he had to die
in order to re-enter the cycle of reincarnation and try again.
At least he died under the supervision of the guru,
and that'll help him to the next spiritual level.
[narrator] Do the devoted members accept Asahara's reasoning?
Of course they do.
But there is one notable exception.
A few months later,
one of the people who was involved in that cover-up has a crisis.
He tells those around him,
"I'm going to go to the police."
[narrator] That would be inconvenient.
How do you make sure a disciple doesn't put your program in jeopardy?
But it is true, Thomas. The Lord has risen.
I will not believe.
[narrator] Nothing is more dangerous to you as a cult leader
than people who know your secrets.
People who've been on the inside are the ultimate threat.
It just takes one person to start spreading doubt,
and doubt is the biggest nightmare for a cult leader.
[narrator] So that's why you need to stop potential leakers in their tracks…
like wavering Aum member Shuji Taguchi.
[Erica] Taguchi wanted to tell police
about the accidental death and the hiding of the corpse.
"If Taguchi leaves and goes to the police and denounces Aum,
it will damage the movement
and it will prevent us from saving the world."
[narrator] When Asahara learns of the young man's intentions,
he has a few of his true believers help "clear" Taguchi's mind.
[grunting]
[narrator] But it's not enough to do the trick.
Seeing no other path,
Asahara orders Taguchi killed.
Then his inner circle does something they're getting good at,
disposing of their victims.
Meanwhile, Asahara uses Taguchi's death for another teachable moment.
Asahara orders Taguchi's death
as a way of saving him, from the perspective of Aum.
[narrator] Need more explanation? All right then.
In Buddhism, every action someone takes, good or bad, affects their karma.
Do bad things
and your bad karma will stay with you,
come back at you…
and affect what you become in your next life.
Asahara convinced his followers that they were doing good
and Taguchi wanted to hurt them by spilling their secrets to the cops.
This would give him bad karma.
Therefore, Asahara was protecting Taguchi from getting bad karma
by killing him.
And ultimately
we get to the point where anybody who stands against Aum,
they become known as "shinri no teki," literally means "enemies of the truth."
It is a way that Asahara legitimated murder.
[narrator] For Asahara's followers,
that was good enough.
Of course, the larger public
can be less understanding when it comes to homicide.
Luckily, the playbook offers a way to regain control of your reputation,
with a smile.
The media is like a dog.
Neglected, it sniffs around and drags out your unmentionables.
Well-trained, it can be a cult leader's best friend.
Bark like a dog.
Groups like Aum,
they definitely need the media
to have a platform to express their doctrine.
[Erica] At the same time, the media can be their first enemies.
They can be the one criticizing them and attacking them.
[narrator] All the savviest gurus knew how to play this game.
Sun Myung Moon set himself up to get good headlines by purchasing
the long-standing news service United Press International
and starting the influential paper, The Washington Times.
Jim Jones's Peoples Temple
had a whole PR department to help control the leader's public image.
Turns out, they needed it.
While Heaven's Gate tried to control media coverage of their mass suicide
by sending out press releases
timed to coincide with the discovery of members' bodies.
TOKYO DISTRICT COURT (FEBRUARY 2004)
[narrator] Shoko Asahara also attempted to bring the media to heel,
especially as rumors about his less savory practices
began seeping out.
You start to see parents of young people who've left their families to join Aum
campaigning against Aum saying,
"You've kidnapped our kids."
More external criticism started.
-Look-- -[reporter] Pretty obvious, isn't it?
It was important for the organization to respond to it.
[narrator] Asahara's first step,
name an official spokesman.
They do not collect true or precise information.
[narrator] Step two, get himself into the spotlight.
They try to intensify Asahara's presence in the media.
-[TV host 1] Is that not good, by the way? -[Asahara] I used to like Akiyoshi-kun.
He was also quite funny and entertaining.
[TV host 2] So you can float for two or three days?
[Asahara] That's what scripture says, but it's not the case for me.
They invited the guru into a talk show.
Overnight,
"Maybe they're not so bad then."
"They're so strange. Maybe they are safe."
[narrator] Asahara gave regular interviews in yoga and meditation magazines,
not to mention the cartoons.
They made various manga of his teachings.
[Ian] They started making anime as well,
which depicted Asahara as this great guru figure
floating around doing levitation and so on.
[narrator] Amazingly,
these films weren't Aum's biggest cultural contribution to their time.
That would be this little earworm.
Master, Master
Master, Master, Master
Master Asahara
[narrator] Sonshi Ma-Chi, or "Guru's March,"
gained so much mainstream popularity
that children all over Japan would reportedly sing it in school.
Asahara also wrote a love song to sarin nerve gas.
That didn't quite catch on.
They want to be noticed.
They want to attract attention.
[narrator] Unfortunately, getting into the spotlight
also brings out the haters,
like Tsutsumi Sakamoto.
Sakamoto is an anti-cult lawyer
who's building a case against Aum Shinrikyo.
During an interview on a Tokyo news show,
Sakamoto claims he's had tests run on Shoko Asahara's blood
that disprove the guru's claims that it has supernatural properties.
Sakamoto says he's going to release the results publicly.
Fearing retribution from the guru,
an employee at the TV station tips off Aum leadership,
who kill the story.
Soon after,
Asahara sends his followers to Sakamoto's apartment.
Six men, led by Hideo Murai, enter…
and attack Sakamoto, his wife, and his baby son,
injecting them with fatal doses of potassium chloride.
They smuggle out the bodies,
hide the remains in metal drums,
bury them in different places across the country,
and drop the murder weapons in the ocean.
Aware that Sakamoto had been targeting Aum,
police immediately suspect the cult's involvement…
but their investigation hits a wall.
In Japan, there is very strict separation of religion and state in the Constitution.
You know, the police,
they are very hesitant to investigate in any religious group.
Whenever the police did come to Aum,
which they did from time to time because of complaints,
he would start immediately talking about,
"You're infringing our religious freedoms."
[narrator] That's right.
The police were afraid of bad press too.
Now that you've mastered media relations in all its forms,
your path to acceptability is well in sight.
Time to follow the playbook
and turn all this good will into something even more useful.
Politics, like leading a cult,
isn't always held in the highest regard.
[announcer] Deep fried butter on a stick.
Republicans who are running for president tried to butter up the crowd.
[narrator] But show me a better way to prove that you're legit.
[Diane] Cult leaders are addicted to power. They can't get enough.
So that's why often times they get involved in politics.
Cult leaders wanna have control,
so if they run for office
or get elected to various boards or whatever,
that's to their advantage
because they can start to control the outside community.
[narrator] All the savviest gurus knew how to play this game.
After Jim Jones's support
helped George Moscone become mayor of San Francisco,
he got himself appointed to the city housing commission,
which expanded his local power base and influence.
Bhagwan Rajneesh worked the system
by turning his cult's commune into an incorporated city.
It thrived
until his followers started trying to kill local government officials.
While fundamentalist Mormon leader Warren Jeffs
had so much power in his hometown that he hand-picked the city manager,
the police chief, and the mayor.
By getting into politics,
Shoko Asahara was seeking more than just power.
He wanted respect.
He was ambitious as anybody who thinks they're the messiah
is likely to be ambitious.
[Ian] He had visions for himself as doing something special.
He's got a message for the world.
TRUTH PARTY
[Asahara] If this is being used in the correct way, there is no issue.
He thought, "I'm gonna get more public coverage in an election."
"We're gonna be covered by the media. They're gonna listen to our message."
[narrator] Eighteen months before Japan's national elections,
Asahara founds a political party.
He and 25 other high-ranking Aum members run as candidates for Parliament.
Their political campaign was unique.
The election campaign
was a kind of parody of Japanese elections.
They showed a very strange dance
and music with some elephant masks
and it's just crazy.
[narrator] As for their platform, it's what you might expect.
It seemed to be mostly about the value of yoga and meditation
and telling people the world was going to end
unless they converted and joined Aum Shinrikyo.
[cheering]
[narrator] Believe it or not,
Aum lost in a landslide.
Asahara got less than 2,000 votes,
so he was a major failure.
It was meant to heighten their profile,
but of course what happened was the mass media made fun of them.
Now the election's over, it's over, right?
It's not like I can say whatever I want…
[narrator] Asahara wasn't going to just take the L lying down.
It was from that point onwards
that we really see Asahara in his sermons to his followers saying,
"The world has rejected us."
"It doesn't deserve to survive. It needs to be punished."
[narrator] Indeed.
Asahara was about to uncover a tactic hidden deep inside the playbook
that's favored by cult leaders with their backs against the wall.
If you can't join them,
beat them.
Keep away from me.
I hate you, you hear me? I hate you.
When you try everything to enhance your image,
and nothing seems to work,
you could decide to give up.
Maybe pursue a new line of work.
After getting crushed in the Japanese election,
Shoko Asahara chose a different approach.
Asahara was not someone very good in dealing with failure,
so in a sense,
the defeat was a turning point in the organization.
[narrator] First, Asahara creates a new narrative to explain his defeat.
He claims the election was stolen
by a massive international conspiracy dedicated to suppressing his movement.
It involves the United States, Great Britain, the Freemasons,
and an international Zionist conspiracy centered in Japan.
Okay.
He claims that these forces seek to destroy Aum Shinrikyo,
and there's only one way for Aum,
and ultimately humanity, to survive…
strike back.
The idea of the final war shifts from being a kind of metaphorical
spiritual battle between good and evil to a real battle.
[Ian] They say, "We've got to make the weapons to fight against evil."
[narrator] To outfit the coming battle,
Asahara deploys four of his most trusted disciples.
Former astrophysics student Hideo Murai
is charged with developing nuclear, microwave, and laser technologies.
Seiichi Endo was once a veterinary student,
but his new job is to develop bioweapons like Ebola and anthrax.
Kiyohide Hayakawa,
once an engineer working in construction,
jets off to Russia to try and purchase tanks, fighter planes,
and even nuclear warheads.
They all come up empty.
But it's Asahara's Fourth Horseman,
chemist Masami Tsuchiya,
who becomes the guru's breakout star…
perfecting homemade sarin nerve gas,
which the group tests on land they buy in the Australian outback.
With a working weapon of mass terror finally on the table,
all Asahara needs now is a target.
[siren wailing]
[reporter] For thousands of Tokyo commuters returning to work,
the unthinkable became a terrible reality on Monday morning,
poisoned by gas canisters left on several trains.
I'm a survivor of Tokyo subway's sarin gas attack in 1995.
[reporter] They staggered out of the subway,
eyes streaming, noses bleeding.
Others suffered convulsions and vomiting.
We didn't know what was going on.
The hospital was already like a war hospital.
[reporter] More 3,000 people were admitted to hospital throughout Tokyo.
Emergency departments struggled to cope with those affected by the nerve gas.
Yeah, I was pretty much ready to die at that moment.
In total, there were 14 people who lost their lives,
and thousands of people were injured.
[siren wailing]
[narrator] After hearing rumors Aum had been experimenting
with chemical weapons,
police raid the group's compound,
but Asahara evades capture.
Aum leadership denies any involvement.
We are very sorry for the event that happened in Tokyo,
but we've nothing to do with that.
[narrator] Even as police discover enough guns, explosives, and poison gas
at cult run facilities to kill four million people.
On May 5th, Aum attempts a second subway attack,
with Zyklon B.
This one fails.
Finally, on May 16th, police raid Aum's Mount Fuji headquarters again
and find the guru hiding inside a meditation chamber.
[speaking indistinctly]
[Ian] Ultimately, 13 members of Aum,
including Asahara,
are found guilty of conspiracy to murder and of murder.
And then in July 2018,
all 13 of them were executed.
[narrator] And so ends Asahara's attempt
to preserve his image and create a new world.
Neither really worked out.
But despite what you've seen so far,
your cult building experience does not need to end like this.
You can learn to play the long game and create a group that's built to last.
Your guide for the playbook's final chapter
is the former North Korean refugee who created
one of the 20th century's largest and most profitable religious movements…
[cheering and whistling]
…and whose influence endures to this day.