x.com/AISafetyMemes/status/2110228697131495894
1 correction found
Aum Shinrikyo spent $30m and spent years in Africa trying to cause human extinction with Ebola.
This conflates two different Aum activities. Records describe a single 1992 trip to Zaire to seek Ebola, while the oft-cited "$30m" figure refers to Aum's separate Satyan 7 sarin production plant, not an Ebola campaign in Africa.
Full reasoning
Available historical sources do not describe Aum Shinrikyo spending years in Africa on an Ebola effort.
- A 1995 staff statement from the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations says Aum documents confirmed that "in October of 1992 Asahara and 40 followers traveled to Zaire for 'medical assistance'" and that press reports alleged they were trying to obtain an Ebola sample. That is a specific trip in October 1992, not a years-long Africa campaign.
- RAND's case study likewise describes "a delegation of Aum members traveled to Zaire" in 1992 and notes there were no Ebola outbreaks around the time of the visit.
The "$30m" figure is also misattributed here.
- A CNAS case study explains that a subsequent UN report estimated Aum's Satyan 7 sarin production facility and its contents at 30 million dollars. That number refers to the group's chemical weapons plant in Japan, not to its Ebola trip to Zaire.
So the sentence bundles together a real but much more limited 1992 Zaire trip with a separate $30 million sarin-facility cost, making the Ebola effort sound much longer and more heavily funded than the documentary record supports.
3 sources
- IV. The Operation of the Aum - A Case Study on the Aum Shinrikyo
The Staff has confirmed from Aum documents that in October of 1992 Asahara and 40 followers traveled to Zaire for "medical assistance" to that country.
- Aptitude for Destruction, Volume 2: Case Studies of Organizational Learning in Five Terrorist Groups
In 1992, a delegation of Aum members traveled to Zaire ... to obtain a culture of the Ebola virus ... there were none [outbreaks] around the time of the visit.
- Aum Shinrikyo: Insights Into How Terrorists Develop Biological and Chemical Weapons
A subsequent United Nations report estimated that the building and its contents cost 30 million dollars.