AP Photo

After years of great gains in relations with its Asian neighbors, thanks to skillful use of soft-power tactics, Beijing since has managed to worry the region with confrontational talk and actions that create a welcome for America’s so-called “rebalancing” or “pivot” back to Asia after years of distraction by costly Mideast wars. As the restaurant sign suggested, a narrow, sometimes angry nationalism has been both a cause and a result of this shift, undermining China’s longer-term interests but showing no sign of ending anytime soon.