East Asia has ceased to be the East Asia we are accustomed to and the US' past influence there is gone. Washington is playing an increasingly embarrassing role in this area.

It is now difficult for the US to sustain its leading position in the region. The traditional East Asian order arranged by the US has long been a "hub-and-spoke" system, a regional security order dominated by the greatest power in the world and centered by its bilateral security alliances with Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Thailand and other nations in the region. The system is also characterized by the deployment of US military forces on the frontiers of regional conflicts.

John Ikenberry, professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University, vividly described the hegemonic order as a phenomenon where "East Asian countries export goods to America and America exports security to the region."

Such an order, which was aimed at shaping a security structure and coping with so-called "common threats," took bilateral alliances as "hubs" and the US hegemony as "spokes," with a view to create a win-win situation where the US provided security and market access and its allies served as strategic partners.

However, with China's rapid rise in recent years and in particular after the ASEAN-China Free Trade Area came into effect in 2010, Asia-Pacific countries began to depend more on China and turn away from the US in terms of finance and trade. That's why the concept of the "Asian Paradox," where relevant Asian nations rely on China in economy and on the US in security, came into being. They began to doubt whether Washington would continue to play the role of a "patron saint" in this region given its severe debt crisis and reduced military expenditure.

To appease its allies and fence in a surging China, the Obama administration proposed the "pivot to Asia" or "rebalancing" strategy and initiated the Trans-Pacific Partnership as a new trading network in the Asia-Pacific region to disintegrate the Asian economic and trading system with China's market as its core.

The US has mired itself in the plight of an "offshore balancer." It has inherited certain traditions of the British Empire and adopted three island chains to block China to impede it from integrating into the international community. It is obvious that Washington fears that an ascending China will eventually threaten its position in East Asia or damage its hegemonic interests.

In recent years, the US has been trying to disseminate the theory of "global commons," which it failed in selling to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, to Asia-Pacific states. It has been shaping a new security order fencing in China under the excuse of so-called freedom of navigation on the high seas.

To further put in place the theory, the White House clamors for the opening-up principle in maritime commons by unreasonably demanding freedom of navigation in Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) and freedom of flight in Air Defense Identification Zones (ADIZ). It frequently sends fighters and vessels to spy on China's EEZs, posing a severe threat to the latter's national security.

Therefore, China's demarcation of its own ADIZ last month constitutes an effective countermeasure regarding Washington's aerial surveillance and intelligence gathering, as well as safeguarding its sovereignty over the Diaoyu Islands.

The US was, of course, unhappy at Beijing's maneuver but could not lodge direct protests since it was the initiator of ADIZs and also prompted Japan and South Korea to establish such zones. Uncle Sam was consequently left with no other choice but to raise the issue of flight freedom over the ADIZ to Beijing and supported Seoul's southward expansion of its ADIZ, with the fundamental purpose of ensuring the US alliance system and supremacy in East Asia.

Furthermore, the US' "rebalancing" strategy, to put it more accurately, shows an intention to rebalance China's influence, security and economic order, as well as the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific region. The country is actually seeking a new identity in East Asia when it lost the leading position in this strategically important area and its role as an offshore balancer no longer worked.

In a nutshell, Washington's shifting role in East Asia can barely fit a changing world and a changed Asia. Now it counts only on the "rebalancing" policy to address conflicts and challenges in this region with no adjustment to its hegemonic attempt and its role as an arbitrator. It appears that neither US Vice President Joe Biden's visit to Tokyo, Beijing and Seoul earlier this month nor President Barack Obama's Asia trip in April 2014 will restore Washington's waning credit in Asia and the world at large.

The author is a senior fellow with the Charhar Institute and a professor with Renmin University of China. opinion@globaltimes.com.cn