by Ray Black
After leaving school in 1977, the ambitious Matsumoto attempted to gain a place at university, but was rejected. Furious at not being granted a place that he felt he deserved, he was arrested for assault shortly afterwards. He decided to move to Tokyo to focus his attention on another goal: a career in Chinese medicine and acupuncture. Here he met and married his wife, Tomoko, who persuaded her family to fund a business. This venture was a success, but wasn’t without its controversy. It was alleged that the remedies offered by Matsumoto were dubious and he was charged for a related offence in 1981. Despite this minor setback, his reputation was growing and he was achieving his lifelong ambition of acquiring wealth, but this was seemingly not enough for him as he suddenly sought a new direction. He turned to spiritualism and spent vast periods of time studying a diverse range of beliefs and ideologies. One account of this part of his life tells of how he claimed to have experienced a strong energy while meditating that enabled him to see the auras of evil people. His enthusiasm for spiritualism, coupled perhaps with an inherent desire to have power over others, resulted in the formation of a so-called religious group in 1984.
REINCARNATION OF SHIVA
After a pilgrimage to the Himalayas in 1987, Matsumoto changed his name to Shoko Asahara and that of his cult to Aum Shinrikyo – Aum is a sacred Hindu symbol while Shinrikyo means ‘supreme truth’. The cult combined Hindu and Buddhist beliefs and the writings of the sixteenth-century French prophet Nostradamus. During his trip, he had briefly met the Dalai Lama for a photo opportunity. He would later claim that the great religious leader told him that he had the mind of a Buddha and was destined for a divine mission to bring to the Japanese the true teachings of Buddhism. Clearly believing himself to be a messiah figure, Asahara’s teachings were apocalyptic; the world was soon to be consumed by evil, he said, but those who followed him would be saved. He even claimed to be a reincarnation of the Hindu god Shiva and a Christ figure. By the mid 1980s, he had grown a straggly beard and was regularly seen in white robes. In contrast to the peaceful associations of this look, though, there were disturbing activities taking place under his guidance. Followers could drink his blood – for a price, of course – while the teachings included chemical-induced survival training. Some Aum members reportedly died during some of his severe rituals while others were allegedly murdered for attempting to challenge its authority or escape its control. The majority of its 10,000 army of followers across the nation were from stable family backgrounds and had no history of violence. It has been speculated that this made them easy targets for Asahara, who exploited the naivety by duping them into believing that they were helping to improve the world by joining his organisation.
Following the alleged murders of two dissenting members in 1989, the suspicion of one missing man’s family was aroused. Lawyer Tsutsumi Sakamoto became involved, offering his services and publicly criticising Aum. The cult leader’s response was to distribute defamatory leaflets about the legal representative who, in turn, increased legal pressure. Asahara’s answer to this was shocking and brutal. He sent a handful of his men to Sakamoto’s home armed with syringes of potassium chloride. The men broke in, waking Sakamoto’s baby son, Tatsuhiko, who they immediately injected with the deadly toxin. Sakamoto himself was then struck over the head with a hammer. His wife, Satoko, was woken by this and, after a struggle, strangled. Both adults were then injected with the same substance before Sakamoto was strangled as he continued to fight for his life. The depravity of the attack wasn’t over, however. The bodies were taken to three different locations and disposed of, but not before their teeth were smashed beyond recognition to obstruct their speedy identification. Asahara told his returning thugs that they had carried out holy work and, despite media and police interest, seemingly got away with murder.
CHEMICAL ATTACKS
After visiting Russia in 1992 to initiate a new branch of the cult, it was evident that Asahara’s reputation was mounting overseas as well as in Japan; by now there were 30,000 Aum followers in Russia alone. His growing influence enabled him to buy arms from the Russian military, setting in motion a chain of events that would ultimately result in the attacks on the Tokyo underground three years later. His thirst for power, meanwhile, saw him run for election, but his overtures and underhand tactics failed spectacularly with the public showing little interest. Aum as a whole was beginning to be the subject of great scrutiny and it was this pressure, combined with his anger at the electorate for shunning him, that seemed to motivate the sect leader to teach the world a shocking lesson. He had his chief scientists devote their time to developing chemical weapons. As the dangerous fruit of their labours was refined and with suspicion of Asahara’s doomsday cult continuing, Aum purchased property in a remote part of western Australia in 1996. There it established a sarin factory, testing the deadly product – some of the ingredients of which were allegedly smuggled into the country in sake bottles – on sheep. The results were the twisted success that the evil leader was hoping for and, the following year, he ordered sarin to be used against human subjects. After a failed attempt to trial it on the leader of a rival religious group, the deadly nerve gas was used on three judges who, it seemed, were about to deliver an unfavourable verdict to Asahara in a property dispute. The gas was released and, aided by the wind, spread quickly through the neighbourhood in which the judges’ dormitory was located. Although the targets survived with minor symptoms, seven others died and hundreds more were hospitalized. Despite the failure to eliminate Asahara’s targets, the operation was considered a success and, amazingly, the cult escaped prosecution again.
Asahara could now carry out the large-scale attack he had been planning and so it was that, during an ordinary morning rush hour, the assault took place. The spark for what proved to be his final act of terror came after a former member had reported the kidnap and murder of her brother, who had helped her to escape Aum. Asahara received a tip off and decided to strike first. He gathered together around one hundred cult members and told them that he was likely to be captured as a result of what was to follow, imploring them to sacrifice themselves for the greater good of his corrupt cause – to overthrow the government and to start a world war.
Parcels of liquid sarin were then given to five of the megalomaniac’s trusted followers – who were also given antidotes for themselves – and taken onto crowded trains within the government district for maximum devastation. The lethal packages were punctured with umbrellas and the horrific results that ensued were instantaneous. As the fumes spread, frightened commuters began to experience nausea and coughing fits. People began to panic and, within a few minutes, there was a scene of carnage as they began to collapse. In all, a dozen innocent commuters were killed and around 5,500 were choked and blinded.
After a prolonged pursuit, one of Asahara’s predictions came true – he was captured, along with over one hundred of his followers. His subsequent trial began in 1996 and, due to the number of charges against him and his uncooperative behaviour as he deliberately delayed proceedings, it lasted eight years. He was finally sentenced to death in February 2004. Two years later, his final appeal was thrown out and he is now awaiting execution.
PART FIVE: TYRANTS
Adolf Hitler
Ask somebody to name history’s true personification of evil and the vast majority will instantly give the name Adolf Hitler without a moment’s thought. Accountable for the deaths of millions, among them over six million Jews during the Holocaust, Hitler’s legacy is one of brutality, hatred and some of the most heinous acts ever to be experienced by the human race.
UNHAPPY EARLY YEARS
Born in Austria in 1889, Hitler’s early years were unhappy at best. His father, Alois, regularly beat him and there was friction between father and son in later years when the former wanted the latter to follow his career path as a customs officer. He left school without any qualifications at the age of sixteen before moving to Vienna where he attempted to make a living as a painter. Rejected twi
ce by the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, he found himself living in a shelter for the homeless for a while until his inheritance from his father’s death in 1903 enabled him to move to Munich in 1913. During his time in Vienna, where there was a large Jewish community, Hitler became anti-Semitic. After previously being rejected by the Austrian army due to being deemed unfit for service, Hitler eventually served as a volunteer in World War I when he was accepted into Germany’s 16th Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment. He was a dedicated and enthusiastic soldier during the conflict and was promoted to the rank of Corporal. Despite being shot and gassed, he emerged a decorated hero, being awarded both the Iron Cross Second Class and First Class medals.
JOINING THE NAZI PARTY
In September 1919, Hitler joined the German Workers’ Party in Munich. The following year, he was handed the responsibility of propaganda and publicity and soon left the army to concentrate fully on his role within the organisation. The party was then renamed the National-sozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei which, in turn, became abbreviated to ‘Nazi Party’. During his first two years within the party, Hitler became a formidable speaker and was well respected by his peers. He chose the swastika – originally a Hindu sign meaning ‘good luck’ – as the party’s logo in 1920 and had become its leader by the following year. He used his new-found power and the party itself as a means of communicating his hatred for other races – Jews in particular. He believed that it was other creeds that were to blame for Germany’s humiliation after World War I and the subsequent Treaty of Versailles.
In November 1923, Hitler led an uprising that became known as the Munich Beer Hall Putsch. His attempts to overthrow the government failed and he was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment. He only served nine months before being released, during which he wrote his autobiography Mein Kampf – My Struggle – outlining his ideology. After his release in 1924, Hitler was forbidden to speak publically and the Nazi Party had slumped in popularity without his leadership. However, in spite of dismal election results throughout Germany in the following years, the Nazis steadily gained new members and grew in the north of the country as a result of an alliance with Gregor Strasser. A key factor in aiding Hitler’s rise to power was the Wall Street Crash in 1929 and the Great Depression that followed as a result. The German economy that had been slowly recovering was hit as loans from other countries were withdrawn; production withered and unemployment soared. An election was called for September 1930 and Hitler hit the campaign trail, promising the electorate a way out of the economic misery. The Nazis received more than eighteen percent of the vote, making it the second largest party in the Reichstag. Buoyed by this success, Hitler stood against President Paul von Hindenburg in the 1932 presidential election. After two rounds of voting, the President had retained his position, but support for the Nazis was considerable. Hindenburg was then pressured into appointing Hitler as Chancellor in January 1933. One month later, a fire that gutted the Reichstag – which was almost certainly the Nazis’ doing – was blamed on Communists; Hitler used this as an opportunity to suppress the right of free speech to the extreme left and increase what would ultimately become his stranglehold of German politics. The Enabling Act followed next, effectively transferring all legislative power to the Nazis. Within months, it was illegal for rival political parties to exist.
BECOMING FÜHRER AND CHANCELLOR
With the dictatorship now secured, Hitler wasted little time in eliminating those who, he believed, would hinder his progress in any way. On the Night of the Long Knives, several of those who had aided his rise to power were arrested and executed without trial. These included Ernst Röhm – along with several other SA officials – Gregor Strasser and former Chancellor, Kurt von Schleicher. The removal of the SA contingent in particular was welcomed by the German military which, as a result, agreed to Hitler’s proposal of merging the roles of Chancellor and President upon the death of Hindenburg in 1934. Hitler became Führer and Chancellor and demanded that soldiers in the German army swore an oath of allegiance to him personally.
The Nazification of Germany was his next objective as he set about releasing the nation from some of the strictures of the Treaty of Versailles. He began preparing Germany for war from an early stage by making alliances with Italy and Japan and militarising the country. He also planned the territorial expansion that would spark World War Two. His plan to invade other countries went hand in hand with that of establishing a New Order, whereby an Aryan race would rule the continent. Meanwhile, all youth organisations were abolished and replaced with the Hitler Youth as he sought to cement his power for generations to come.
The persecution of Jews increased with Hitler decreeing via the Nuremberg Laws of 1935 that they were not German citizens and that they therefore did not have the same rights. Three years later, Hitler’s Nazis gave their clearest indication to date of their malevolent intent towards the Jews. ‘Kristallnacht’ – or ‘The Night of Broken Glass’ – saw Nazi storm troopers in civilian clothes embark on an outright assault of Jewish people and properties. Synagogues were burned down, while houses were broken into and ransacked throughout Germany and Austria. Men, women and children alike were beaten by the fascist thugs and ninety-one Jews were killed – although other reports suggest that there were many more fatalities than this – while 20,000 were arrested and taken to labour camps. The Jewish community was then ordered to pay the sum of one billion Reichsmarks for the damage.
EXTERMINATION CAMPS AND THE HOLOCAUST
On 1 September 1939, Hitler ordered the German invasion of Poland, prompting the start of World War Two. Two days later, both Britain and France declared war on Germany. After military successes in Scandinavia and Western Europe – but after failing to defeat Britain – in 1941, Hitler ordered an attack on the Soviet Union. In the same year, the true evil of the dictator became explicit with the start of the mass killings of the Holocaust. The existing concentration camps, where persecuted Jews had previously been sent as part of the Führer’s initial plans to expel them from Europe, were expanded to incorporate extermination camps as he aimed to completely eradicate the Jewish race. Between eleven and seventeen million people were exterminated, around six million of them Jews. Other victims included around two million ethnic Poles, while four million others deemed unworthy to live by the Nazis – including Romani, Soviet prisoners of war, Catholics, Jehovah’s witnesses, homosexuals, the disabled and the mentally ill – were also either brutally murdered or worked to death.
A large proportion of those killed in the death camps were executed in gas chambers immediately after their arrival. Prisoners were ordered to strip and go into what they were told were communal shower facilities. Once inside, hydrogen cyanide was released, killing everyone inside within twenty minutes. After their bodies were removed for burial or, later on, incineration, their teeth were examined for gold fillings; any that were found were removed. Shooting was also commonplace while medical experiments – including castration and sterilisation – were also carried out as part of Hitler’s evil regime of ethnic cleansing. In addition to the millions slaughtered in the extermination camps, the German army was followed into the territories of countries it invaded by an SS death squad which executed the resident Jewish populations.
HITLER’S DOWNFALL
Hitler’s increasing megalomania would ultimately be the cause of his downfall. With his armies fighting on more fronts than the nation’s dwindling resources could afford, the Allies were presented with the opportunity to exploit the Germans’ increasingly vulnerable position. On 6 June 1944 the D-Day landings, in which British and American forces stormed the northern beaches of Nazi-occupied France, proved a crucial turning point in the war. From this moment on, the odds were stacked heavily against the Nazis; Hitler, ailing after an assassination attempt left him with superficial wounds, fled to his bunker in Berlin in January 1945 where he stayed for the remainder of his life and, indeed, the war. Accepting the inevitability of defeat, he married his long-term m
istress Eva Braun on 29 April before saying farewell to his deputies and handing over power. On 30 April and with Soviet forces closing in on his Berlin bunker, Hitler shot himself and his bride took poison. At his command, their bodies were burned.
Although Hitler was dead and the war over, the aftermath of his empire of pure evil left Germany in crisis for many years to come. To this day, the mere mention of his name and the image of the swastika inspire feelings of revulsion, anger and fear underlining his status as the most despised and corrupt man in the history of the world.
Attila the Hun
One of history’s most ferocious leaders, Attila the Hun’s ruthless reign of terror in the first century was characterized by barbaric violence, looting and pillaging with his army essentially sweeping westwards destroying everything in its path.
THE SCOURGE OF GOD
He was so notorious, in fact, that even the Romans feared him; referring to him as ‘The Scourge of God’ and paying him an annual weight of 700 pounds of gold to keep him from attacking the eastern half of its own massive empire.
Attila’s empire – which covered large expanses of what are now Russia, Germany and Poland among a great many others – was centred in what we now know as Hungary, although the Huns, a group of nomadic herdsmen, originally came from central Asia. By the time he died in 453 ad at the age of around forty-seven, the mass of land taken by the Huns stretched from Baltic Sea in the north to the River Danube in the south and from Ural River in the east to the river Rhine in the west. The wealth he accumulated along the way from pillaging and extortion fed his power and influence, making his armies increasingly intimidating.