John Heubusch: The Reagan-Thatcher Legacy Lives

Mr. Heubusch is the executive director of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Library.

Speaking at Westminster Hall earlier this year, President Barack Obama hailed the British-American relationship as "indispensable to the goal of a century that is more peaceful, more prosperous and more just." The central threats he was referring to include the spread of terrorist networks and the proliferation of nuclear weapons in the modern age. Some 29 years earlier, President Ronald Reagan also stood before a joint session of parliament and pledged that the march of freedom and democracy, led by the United States and Britain, would "leave Marxism-Leninism on the ash heap of history."

Such declarations of a shared destiny are important between these two nations that constitute the greatest alliance of the last 100 years. Both Britons and Americans must never forget the impact their "special relationship" has had on world peace—first in its restoration, second in its preservation.

Words are fleeting though, and we often need visible reminders of our commitments. So today the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation is dedicating a statue of America's 40th President at Grosvenor Square in London. Several American and British dignitaries will attend the ceremony and fittingly, Margaret Thatcher may be among them.

Like Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill before them, Mr. Reagan and Mrs. Thatcher presided over one of the most consequential partnerships in modern history. Together, they helped bring the twin forces of free-market capitalism and renewed military resolve to bear on an "Evil Empire" that had no intention of going to an ash heap. In fact, outside the Reagan-Thatcher alliance, there were few in the free West who believed the Cold War could be won...