...it is "insane" to believe that a military approach can work...

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Des Moines Register article

 

Peace answer seen in 40,000

 

By JANE NORMAN

Register Washington Bureau

09/29/2001

 

Washington, D.C. - World peace could be achieved through establishing a

group of 40,000 experts in India practicing transcendental meditation

techniques, the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi said in a press conference here Friday

relayed via satellite from Holland.

 

"This is the solution," said the maharishi, who has not made a public

appearance for seven years but claimed that he was compelled to speak out

after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. "This is the time in the long, long

history of man that total knowledge is available to us."

 

He said he wants to "stop, completely stop, all the wild gestures of this

most important country" to retaliate against the attacks, as President Bush

mobilizes the nation's military to strike back at Osama bin Laden, the Saudi

billionaire living in Afghanistan and suspected to be the mastermind behind

the attacks.

 

The Maharishi said it is "insane" to believe that such an approach can work.

"This man, this president of America, is not an educated man - he doesn't

know science," he said. "Who is this man who can say, 'I can stop crime"?"

 

If the proposal for 40,000 meditators succeeds, there will be "a happy,

affluent world without negativity, without problems," the maharishi said.

 

The Maharishi introduced transcendental meditation more than 40 years ago,

and founded Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Ia., which

enrolls about 650 full-time students.

 

His latest proposal is for a billionaire or group of wealthy people to

establish an endowment of $1 billion, the interest from which would be used

to support the 40,000 meditation practitioners in India. The young men are

from families in India that traditionally have practiced the technique and

would each need about $200 a month to sustain them.

 

John Hagelin of Fairfield, the Natural Law Party presidential candidate in

2000, said Bush deserves everyone's support in the fight against terrorism,

but at the same time it is "vitally important we do something that can

disarm terrorism."

 

The group of 40,000 meditators would be large enough to create an "upsurge

in positivity," initiate global harmony and unity, and deter terrorism,

Hagelin said.

 

He said construction of a facility in India that would accommodate 16,000

meditators is already under way.

 

 

 

 

 

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