Aum Shinrikyo set up Shadow government DAVID E. KAPLAN AND ANDREW MARSHALL MAGAZINE 07.01.96. THE CULT AT THE END OF THE WORLD

Aum Shinrikyo set up Shadow government DAVID E. KAPLAN AND ANDREW MARSHALL MAGAZINE  07.01.96. THE CULT AT THE END OF THE WORLD

To govern the republic, Aum set up 24 ministries that eerily reflected the Japanese state its members were so eager to destroy. The cult's chief scientist, Murai, became minister of science and technology. The other appointments were not without irony. Kiyohide Hayakawa, the engineer intent on giving Aum the means of mass destruction, was made minister of construction. Microbiologist Seiichi Endo, who spent his time culturing bacterial weapons, rose to minister of health and welfare.

Aum Supreme Truth, of course, was no democracy, nor was the state it sought to create. The millennial kingdom was from here on dubbed The Supreme State, leaving no doubt about who would inherit the world. And on top of the great empire, ruling serenely over the cosmos, sat Shoko Asahara, now deemed by law the Holy Monk Emperor.