Aum Shinrikyo was founded in 1984 by the eccentric mystic Shoko Asahara. Asahara developed a relatively good reputation and a decent following, and he was even allowed to attend personal meditation sessions with the Dalai Lama.

That changed quickly and dramatically when Aum Shinrikyo was internationally discredited after the deadly sarin gas attack in Tokyo which killed 13 people.

Today, Aum is known as "Aleph" and they try to distance themselves as much as possible from Asahara and the early days of Aum.

Here's my question: was Aum really directly involved and did Shoko Asahara really order the attacks?

In one night, Aum went from a quirky cult to a universally hated terrorist organization (the Dalai Lama had to quickly distance himself from Asahara, obviously).

But is there more to the story? Of course, that's why I'm posting to /r/conspiracy!

There is evidence that Aum was beginning to dabble in some taboo areas of technology, mostly under the guidance of Hideo Murai, who was claimed by some to be one of the most intelligent men in Japan.

Aum was getting into some dangerous territory: none other than Nikola Tesla's electromagnetic weapons systems.

And if you think they were just in the "research" stage of this taboo technology, a bizarre seismic event occurred on May 28th, 1993 at the Banjawarn station in Western Australia, a site owned by Aum.

What happened at Banjawarn is eerily reminiscent of the Tunguska event which was rumored to have been caused by Tesla himself in an experiment gone wrong (...or right?). Earthquakes and a meteor were ruled out, and the event remains a mystery, but in light of Aum's interests, it isn't too hard to speculate what may have occurred.

After the 1995 attacks, Banjawarn station was raided, and when it was determined that Aum had tested sarin gas on sheep at the site, it wasn't long before the "evidence" was used to damn the entire cult, Asahara included.

Asahara and several other members are still on death row, almost 20 years later, as the defense claims that "new evidence" will turn up and exonerate them.

Was there any particular reason, other than their increasing independence and dabbling with devastating super weapons (not to mention their buddying up with Russia and the KGB...several individuals in the KGB were also Aum members), that Aum needed to be put out of the picture? I think there is!

The Great Hanshin (or Kobe) earthquake occurred on January 17th, 1995, killing over 6,000 people.

Here's where things get a bit fuzzy. The rumor is that eight days earlier, on a Tokyo radio broadcast on January 8th, Shoko Asahara predicted that a major quake would soon occur at Kobe and it would be initiated by a "foreign power" with an EM weapons system.

Eight days later, the earthquake happened!

Here's the tricky part: for the life of me I can't find a legitimate confirmation of the January 8th radio broadcast, but the internet is littered with that claim, so it must be based on something. Any help confirming or denying this would be greatly appreciated.

What can be confirmed, however, is Hideo Murai's immediate response, namely to come out publicly with his belief that the earthquake was actually an attack. After all, if Murai was dabbling in Tesla doom weapons, I'm sure he would recognize one if he saw it (and also their KGB connections may have tipped them off).

Regardless, Murai put his life on the line and made several high-profile appearances with the Japanese press regarding his claim. On April 23rd of that same year, literally during one of these press conferences, a Yakuza member stabbed Murai repeatedly in the presence of 10 police officers, who practically just watched.

So enter the Yakuza. Why were they silencing him and who were they doing it for? Some have also alleged that Aum's rival Buddhist sect (cult) Sōka Gakkai which had ties to the Yakuza and Japanese politicians was involved with framing them as well.

All in all, these are obviously wild-eyed speculations, but it's a conspiracy I rarely hear anyone talk about, even here.

Was Aum stepping on too many toes and did they have to be "put out of the picture" and discredited forever?

Or were they really psychopathic people under the deranged rule of Asahara who were ordered to carry out a murderous act of terrorism?

And finally, is there any correlation between these recent Aum arrests and the Umbra broadcasts, a mysterious "number station"-like series of encoded radio broadcasts that began on the anniversary of the sarin gas attack?