Kritik am Buch „The Shadow Of The Dalai Lama ... - Neues von Shi De

a small devotional shrine which according to Asahara housed some of the bones of the historical
Buddha. He had brought them back with him from Sri Lanka to Japan. The room in which a wide
variety of tinctures for the production of poisonous gases were stored was referred to as the “Room of
Genesis”. Things were more matter of fact on the ground floor, there were tanks, extruders, reactors,
ducting systems, circulating pumps. The main hall was called Satian 7, which meant “Truth 7". But it
also had a nickname. The young scientists referred to it simply as “the magician”. In the last days
before the fateful attack on the underground a gigantic statue of Buddha was erected there.
The Song of Sarin
Since it is not difficult to manufacture and the ingredients were easy for AUM to obtain, research and
production were concentrated upon a highly effective nerve gas by the name of Sarin. This poison had
been developed by the German national socialists in the Second World War. Asahara’s relation to the
deadly substance proved to be very multi-layered. It followed a fiendish three-stage cycle. At first
there was constant talk of how the sect itself was the victim of poison gas attacks. “Wherever I go,”
the Guru announced, “I have been sprayed from helicopters or planes. The hour of my death has been
foretold. The gas phenomenon has already happened. Next time it might be an atomic bomb” (Kaplan
and Marshall, 1996, p. 125). As a consequence of this paranoia it was decided to hit back with the
same weapon. In the third phase the poison became independent and developed into a quasi-divine
substance. It was given half-ironic names like “Magic, Witch, and Sally” (Kaplan and Marshall, 1996,
p. 121) and sung about in the following hymn:
It came from Nazi Germany, a dangerous little chemical weapon,
Sarin! Sarin!
If you inhale the mysterious vapor, you will fall with bloody vomit
from your mouth,
Sarin! Sarin! Sarin — the chemical weapon.
Song of Sarin, the brave.
In the peaceful night of Matsumoto City
People can be killed, even with our own hands,
Everywhere there are dead bodies,
There! Inhale Sarin, Sarin,
Prepare Sarin! Prepare Sarin! Immediately poisonous gas weapons
will fill the place.
Spray! Spray! Sarin, the brave Sarin
(Kaplan and Marshall, 1996, pp. 212-213)
The original plan was to spray the poison gas over the parliament and government buildings with a
helicopter so as to paralyze the Japanese apparatus of state. The attack on the underground system
was therefore regarded as only a preparatory exercise.
Interestingly, 60 years before the events in Tokyo the Russian whom we have already portrayed in
detail, Nicholas Roerich, had linked the Shambhala myth to poison gases. He was convinced that the
wonderland was protected from invaders by a gaseous substance that he called “sur”. Here is his
story, told to him on his travels through Central Asia in search of Shambhala by a Buddhist monk: “A
lama, leader of a caravan, covers his mouth and nose with a scarf. He is asked why, since it is not
cold. He reports: 'Caution is needed now. We are approaching the forbidden zone of Shambhala. We
shall soon notice 'sur', the poisonous gas that protects the border of Shambhala. Konchok, our