Good morning, gang! It’s me, Dr. Steve, your Patriot professor. I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. Grab your coffee, your tea, whatever you enjoy, pull up a chair, and let’s talk about yet another win for President Trump. While much of the world was fixated on the brand-new EU trade deal, where you’re completely and totally surrendered to Trump, I mean, the deal was about as lopsided as one side as you possibly could get. The EU’s agreed to open up its market completely to all US goods, drop all their tariffs, while at the same time, we get to continue to impose tariffs on their goods.

We get 10x more in revenue from tariffs on EU imports and $600 billion more in investment from the EU. I mean, it was one of the single most lopsided deals ever, but while all that was going on, President Trump forced Thailand and Cambodia to agree to an immediate and unconditional ceasefire. I’m sure many of you have been following, at least from afar, the tensions that have been escalating, the border conflict between Thailand and Cambodia. It’s the most violent confrontation between the two nations in decades. What began weeks ago as minor military incidents rapidly spiraled into a large-scale clash involving airstrikes, artillery exchanges, mass civilian displacement.

Well, it’s all over. As of today, the military escalation has stopped, and it’s all because of President Trump. It’s because of Trump and the economic power that he wields precisely through his use of tariffs. And again, what I think is so astonishing in all of this is it seems like everything our so-called expert class denigrates and dismisses, like they’ve been doing with Trump’s tariffs, or even Trump himself, ends up turning out to be the healthiest thing imaginable for a flourishing society. It’s absolutely… I mean, take any issue or any strategy that the credential class in DC denigrates, and you can be assured that that issue or strategy is the best thing imaginable for our social and political and economic flourishing.

So if you don’t know, the conflict between Thailand and Cambodia involves a border demarcation dispute. It dates back to the colonial era of the early 20th century. So the near 500-mile boundary between Thailand and Cambodia was partially drawn during the early 20th century using French colonial maps. The problem is that Thailand has long rejected parts of those maps, particularly concerning the land surrounding sacred temple sites such as Pravya, Prasattamun, and other ancient temples located around the Dangrek mountain range. And as part of that dispute, the International Court of Justice, this is back in 1962, they ruled in Cambodia’s favor in terms of Cambodia’s sovereignty in relation to the sacred temple of Pravya.

They reaffirmed that decision as recently as back as 2013. However, the areas adjacent to the temple and other borderlands, they remain contested by Thailand, particularly due to their cultural significance, their tourism value, as well as their strategic location. And so these border disputes have flared up into violence multiple times over the years in 2008, in 2011, border skirmishes around that Pravya temple result in dozens of casualties, prompted international intervention and all that. And all those ceasefires were signed, the root issues were never fully resolved. And so this year, literally just weeks back, tensions reignited following a deadly incident back on May 28th, when a Cambodian soldier was killed during a firefight near Chongbak in that province.

Each side accused the other, provoking the clash, both quickly escalating the military deployments along the border. And the situation further escalated. This must have back on July 16th, a landmine explosion, injured several Thai soldiers near the disputed frontier. Thailand accused Cambodia of planning the mines, which would be, of course, a violation of what’s called the 1997 Ottawa Treaty, which bans anti-personnel mines around the world. Cambodian officials said, we didn’t plan, I mean, they said it’s from wars decades ago. Their remnants from previous conflict, they had nothing to do with their current government or military.

But obviously, as I’m sure you could predict, the incident exacerbated the already growing mutual distrust and set the stage for larger confrontations. And that’s exactly what we saw just days later. That larger confrontation came on July 24th, when Thai authorities claimed that Cambodian troops and drones approached military positions near one of the disputed temple complexes. So according to Thai sources, Cambodia launched grenades and deployed surveillance drones into Thai territory. And so in response, the Thai military launched airstrikes using freaking F-16 fighter jets attacking Cambodian military positions. And Cambodia retaliated with BM-21 grad rocket systems and claimed that Thai strikes had hit civilian infrastructures, including a hospital access road, pagodas, areas near schools.

And so over the course of the next two days, basically a full fledged military fight broke out at multiple points along the border. Civilian areas were caught in the crossfire. It was pretty horrible stuff. Of course, there were a number of deaths, at least 60 people reported killed with most of the casualties on the Thai side. Hundreds of thousands of civilians, 120,000 of our people were displaced, estimate 100,000 from Thai provinces, over 20,000 from Cambodia. Thai authorities declared martial law. They sealed all these land crossings. They expelled Cambodia’s ambassador. So we were watching in real time the very real beginnings of a bona fide military conflict between Thailand and Cambodia.

Enter one Donald J. Trump. Trump got on the phone with leaders from both countries, and he basically told them, daddy’s home, if you don’t stop fighting immediately, I’m going to slap each of you with a permanent 36% tariff on all your goods. In other words, he pressured both countries with the weapon of trade in tariffs. And as of just hours ago, leaders from both countries came together and they officially announced an immediate and unconditional ceasefire. I mean, you literally cannot make this stuff up. Trump wields as both his weapon and his reward on the international stage.

The very tariffs that our expert class told us would only result in disaster. In the midst of this conflict, both countries have been suffering economically. So Cambodia’s ban on Thai fuel and consumer goods has strained its domestic supply chains, while Thailand’s closure of land crossings has cut off vital trade and threatened local economies on both sides. They both have been facing economic stagnation as a result of the tariffs imposed on them by Trump over the last few months. And Trump, of course, has been offering to renegotiate those tariffs. Buddy made it absolutely clear this weekend.

Those negotiations are totally off the table as long as the two nations continue to fight. And so as of today, they’ve officially ceased hostilities and they want to get to the negotiation table as soon as possible with the United States and once, you know, fire up their economy. So President Trump just keeps winning and he wins in ways that our political class, our credentialed so-called expert class by virtue of their own pathetic stupidity never could. Amazing stuff. So what do you guys think? Let me know in the comments section below.

And as always, you know what to do. Make sure to smack that bell and subscribe button for breaking news and analysis. You’re not going to hear anywhere else. I’ll see you at the studio later today. God bless, guys. [tr:trw].

See more of Dr. Steve Turley on their Public Channel and the MPN Dr. Steve Turley channel.