To the people of Thailand

 To the people of Thailand

How awkward is it to write a letter to another nation? But here I am doing it. You probably don't know who I am. I'm just a normal person with some followers in Cambodia. Even though I reside in the United States, I do follow what happens to Cambodia and Thailand. It is a passion of mine to provide well meaning opinions to my followers, and it's a habit of mine to question everything our leader does. For the longest time, I hold the opinion that Bangkok is the crown jewel of Southeast Asia. I admire Thailand for its tenacity and resilience during the past 100 years, avoiding so many geopolitical pitfalls that so many other nations have fallen into. Now our nations are at war.

I am writing this because I cannot stand by and just watch two nations hack each other to death. I am skeptical of what happened between Thailand and Cambodia recently. There's too much circumstantial evidence to my liking. The death of a soldier; the leaks; the border closure; the gambling bill in Thailand; the increase in Thai military budget; the new land mines. These series of unfortunate events are not a coincidence but a carefully laid out plan. The land mine incident is clearly a false flag operation designed to deceive the world. The Thai military knows how to provoke the regime in Phnom Penh. The recent announcement of the closure of the Ta Muen temple by the Thai Army is also another false flag operation, a temple that was supposed to be shared by both countries. What better way to start a war than to do precisely just as Cambodia has warned not to do? You can say it was a premeditated action to provoke a war. This is the danger of a military led country as opposed to a civilian led country. The consequence is total war. The military only knows how to solve things through military means, not diplomatic means. Unfortunately, Cambodia did play a role in neutering your civilian government via leaks, which gave way to your military leaders to do as they please.

I ask the people of Thailand to question their leader as I do with mine. Thailand's leaders say Cambodia placed landmines and they even found a video of it. Ask yourself, why would anyone record themselves placing land mines? This is nonsense. Would you record yourself committing a crime? I think not. The truth is we're all being manipulated by the powers that be. News media propagating propagandas. What is there to gain by creating tensions and conflict between the people of Cambodia and Thailand? The people of Thailand have been battling the same forces for decades. One coup after another. Your struggles resonate with us. We have much more in common than our differences. We share the same common cause.

Authoritarianism comes in many different forms. It has many names. It festers. It corrupts. It is poverty-stricken. It spreads lies and hatred. It's warmongering.

Instead of keeping our eyes on the ball, they've managed to distract us from the true challenges at home.

Now the devil is whispering in our ears for retaliatory strikes. This is the same playbook that keeps happening over and over again in the history book and we're all falling for the same trickery. All for what? To retain power and control over a nation of 71 million people that is demanding real change every single year. In order for them to retain power they must create a perceived enemy for the people of Thailand to unite around.

I admit, Cambodia isn't perfect, we have our problems, but Thailand is one of the few bright spots in Asia that could have a thriving democracy. A beacon of hope for SE Asia. Millions of Cambodians migrate to Thailand because of this hope. It's a shame, though you've tried, that you couldn't choose your own political leader, instead you've been repressed again and again. I know, because I've been an observer for many years.

I ask all sensible people from both nations to ask their government to de-escalate and to stop this senseless war. Hatred is not the answer. We don't want the new generation of Thai and Cambodians to hate each other. We are better than this.