Over 38 million died in the last world war, a war fought to end the ideology behind it: fascism. As Europe burned in mid-1941, common Allied cause was forged beginning with a pivotal document known as the Atlantic Charter, which guided the U.S. and U.K. through four years of war and set the conditions for winning the Cold War.

As consequential as that victory was, however, it hasn’t freed the world of an ideology that has killed over 100 million people: Communism.

The Atlantic Charter suggests a way forward. Congresswoman Aumua Amata Coleman Radewagen of American Samoa, while speaking at the Heritage Foundation last December, rightly called out the dangers posed to Pacific Island nations from the Chinese Communist Party. Common cause for today’s new cold war is needed, which led her to call for “a Pacific Charter for the Indo-Pacific Freedom to emulate the Atlantic Charter.”

Congresswoman Radewagon’s call is rooted in history. Victory over the Axis powers (which initially included the Soviet Union) was far from certain in May 1941 with the U.S. on the sidelines. In 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave a public speech that endorsed “a world consecrated to freedom of speech and expression” and opposed “a Hitler-dominated world.”

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Soon after Hitler attacked the Soviet Union in operation Barbarossa, and two months later in August the Atlantic Charter was signed. The Charter committed the two Allies to territorial changes made only with the freely expressed will of the peoples concerned, equal trade and access for the advancement of all peoples, the establishment of a lasting peace, the freedom of navigation, and to encourage the abandonment of war for offensive intentions.

Today, the free world confronts threatening challenges worldwide, from major wars in Europe and Middle East to increasing tensions in Asia fanned by a revanchist Communist China.

A new path is needed to successfully protect the United States, its allies, and their shared values. Offering a Pacific Charter is a worthy cause that can help unite free nations along several shared principles with a vision for a free and prosperous shared future in the face of an adversarial China.

There is reason to believe this will be welcome. Pacific countries have demonstrated individual advances to preserve their sovereignty and values.

For example, the 2019 Free and Open Indo-Pacific framework was compelling to partner nation for its focus on common interests, such as trade and security. Similar efforts have encouraged countries dealing with a threatening China to embrace a pragmatic resistance, including Taiwan’s procurement of more asymmetric weapon systems, multinational military exercises like Talisman Sabre, and the Philippines hosting of U.S. forces with the Enhanced Defense Cooperative Agreement.

A Pacific Charter would build on these efforts, as well as the Atlantic Charter’s legacy, by promoting new and bold collective actions that unite likeminded nations for a long struggle against a shared existential threat.

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The Pacific Charter would align well with several recommendations detailed in the Heritage Foundation’s “Winning the New Cold War: A Plan for Countering China.” To be specific, the Charter should:

• Support mutually beneficial trade relationships that provide all nations with a path to prosperity.
• Seek to support national sovereignty.
• Resist Communist China’s efforts to weaponize its considerable economic power and expanding security footprint that compromise national sovereignty.
• Defend freedom of speech and religion as foundational principles for free civil societies.

Peace is only guaranteed by adequate defense and resistance to powers working to undermine it. The foes of global security and democracy think their day is near, with China’s Xi telling Putin, “Right now there are changes—the likes of which we haven’t seen for 100 years—and we are the ones driving these changes together,” But the United States and its allies have opportunities to prevent such global adversaries to democracy from succeeding.

A Pacific Charter would be a first step to better unify likeminded nations to push back on China’s worst behaviors and preserve the values that underpin freedom and prosperity for billons of people around the world.