US President Donald Trump, while speaking at the US-Saudi Investment Forum on Wednesday, repeated his story of ending the India-Pakistan conflict earlier this year, a story that India has firmly rejected but Pakistan has endorsed.
Trump claimed that he put an end to the conflict by threatening the two countries with 350 per cent tariffs. He also claimed that Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi had called him to say “we’re not going to go to war”.
The US president has repeated the claim dozens of times that he “helped settle” the tension between India and Pakistan in May this year, even as India has consistently denied any third-party intervention.
The India-Pakistan military conflict began after Pakistan-sponsored terrorists massacred 26 unarmed civilians at the popular tourist spot of Pahalgam, in the Indian state of Jammu & Kashmir, on 22 April 2025.
A few days later, on 7 May 2025, the Indian military launched Operation Sindoor and precisely struck several terrorist camps within territories controlled by Pakistan.
For the next few days, a brief military conflict followed as Pakistan fired upon India, and India hit back at Pakistan.
This is the military conflict — not quite a war — that Trump claims to have settled. India has firmly rejected the claim of mediation, stating that it was Pakistan that directly called and requested the ceasefire.
Nonetheless, the US president has repeatedly said that he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for ending wars.
“…I’m good at settling disputes, and I’ve always been. I’ve done very well with that over the years, even before this. I was talking about the different wars… India, Pakistan… they were going to go at it, nuclear weapons,” Trump said on Wednesday at the US-Saudi Investment Forum.
Speaking at the investment forum, which was attended by visiting Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammed bin Salman and a number of Arab delegates, Trump said that he told the two nuclear-armed neighbours that they “can go at it, but I’m putting a 350 per cent tariff on each country. No more trade with the United States.”
Claiming that both India and Pakistan asked him not to impose such a tariff, Trump said that he told them, “I’m going to do it. Come back to me and I’ll take it down. But I’m not going to have you guys shooting nuclear weapons at each other, killing millions of people and having the nuclear dust floating over Los Angeles. I’m not going to do it.’”
Trump then said that he was “all set” and told Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent that he would put a 350 per cent tariff to settle (the conflict) and added, if the countries stopped the war, “we’ll make a nice trade deal”.
He added, “Now, no other president would have done that… I used tariffs to settle all these wars, not all of them. Five of the eight were settled because of the economy, because of trade, because of tariffs. I did this.”
The US president said that Prime Minister of Pakistan Shehbaz Sharif called him and thanked him, in front of White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, for saving millions of lives.
Trump then claimed that he “got a call from Prime Minister Modi saying, ‘We’re done’”.
“I said, ‘You’re done with what?’” said Trump in the Kennedy Center speech, and then he claimed that PM Modi replied, “We’re not going to go to war.”
Trump said that he then thanked Modi and said, “Let’s make a deal.”
The US president also added that he had saved a lot of people, millions of people, in many other wars.
Trump had repeated the claim that he stopped the war between India and Pakistan a day earlier, too, during a bilateral meeting with the Saudi Crown Prince in the Oval Office.
Since May 10, when Trump announced on social media that India and Pakistan had agreed to a “full and immediate” ceasefire after a “long night” of talks mediated by Washington, he has repeated his claim over 60 times that he “helped settle” the tensions between India and Pakistan.
India has consistently denied any third-party intervention and maintained that the understanding on cessation of hostilities with Pakistan was reached on May 10 following direct talks between the Directors General of Military Operations (DGMOs) of the two militaries.
—With inputs by CtoI News Desk
