Story highlights Sens. McCain, Rubio, Cardin and Reed: It is imperative the United States engages economically in Asia

Our success in the region is not just based on military might, but on our values as well, they write

John McCain is a US senator for Arizona. Marco Rubio is a US senator for Florida. Ben Cardin is a US senator for Maryland. Jack Reed is a US senator for Rhode Island. The views expressed are their own.

(CNN) On the heels of Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis' successful trip to South Korea and Japan last week, and with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in Washington this week, we have an important opportunity to reaffirm America's commitment to security and prosperity in the Asia-Pacific region.

John McCain

Seventy years ago, out of the ashes of a world war, America and our allies and partners built a rules-based international order -- one based on the principles of the rule of law, free peoples and free markets, open seas and open skies, and peaceful settlement of disputes.

Marco Rubio

Put simply: These ideas have changed the fortunes of the United States and Asia forever, and for the better. Our nation enjoyed access to resources that fueled broadly shared economic growth at home and a stability that kept another world war at bay, benefiting Americans from all walks of life, while an unprecedented era of peace and prosperity lifted hundreds of millions of Asians out of poverty and toward self-sufficiency.

Ben Cardin

None of this was preordained. And the rules-based order is not self-sustaining. America and our allies have made the choice to uphold and defend this order. We do so because it is profoundly in our national interest. And with challenges mounting from China's assertive behavior in the East and South China Seas to North Korea's increasingly dangerous nuclear threat, this is the stand we must take again. This is not just a choice for President Donald Trump. As a coequal branch, Congress must do its part to strengthen our alliances, deepen our diplomacy, and protect our interests.

A simple yet valuable first step would be to affirm America's broad, bipartisan commitment to defend our allies when they are threatened. Prime Minister Abe's visit is the right moment for President Trump and Congress to reiterate what Mattis asserted last week: that the Senkaku Islands are administered by Japan and therefore fall within the scope of Article 5 of the US-Japan Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security, and that the United States will oppose any unilateral attempts to undermine Japan's administration of these islands.

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