It seems the hours of talks US Vice-President Joe Biden had with Chinese leaders last week in Beijing served their purpose and the United States might have got the message, as he said on Friday in Seoul that it is necessary to improve cooperation among the US and its Asian allies so they can get their relationship with China right.

In a speech delivered at South Korea's Yonsei University after meeting with South Korean President Park Geun-hye, Biden said the United States is devoted to promoting cooperation rather than competition with China, and the US, Japan and South Korea should be able to improve cooperation with one another and improve their relationship with China in order to combat shared challenges such as maritime security and the proliferation of nuclear weapons in the region.

These are positive remarks, but Washington needs to do more to match words with deeds. To shore up the spirit of cooperation, it may want to readjust its stance and seek to ease, instead of ratchet up, tensions over China's demarcation of an Air Defense Identification Zone over the East China Sea.