Analysts say Chinese officials have skillfully tried to meet concerns that Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank members will be drawn into a power clash. During a visit to Australia last month, Zhou Qiangwu, a point man for Beijing’s selling efforts, noted that the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank would be run by a multinational secretariat and use the same management structure as the Asian Development Bank and World Bank.

The proposed bank would “follow the international practice and give highest attention to environmental impact and resettlement” issues, he said, with strong safeguards against corruption.

Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew tried to moderate the U.S. line against the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in testimony on Capitol Hill this week, insisting that the administration’s primary goal was to ensure that the bank did not undermine lending standards.

“I hope before the final commitments are made anyone who lends their name to this organization will make sure that the governance is appropriate,” Mr. Lew said.

But the White House and the State Department said this week that it was the “sovereign decision” of each country on whether to participate in the bank.

Mr. Lew did acknowledge that the longtime U.S. and Western primacy in the global financial sphere was being challenged by China and other rising powers, which may not share Washington’s priorities.

“New players are challenging U.S. leadership in the multilateral system,” Mr. Lew said, pleading for passage of the IMF reform package. “Our international credibility and influence are being threatened.”

But private analysts say that credibility and influence have taken major hits from the rush to join the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.

C. Fred Bergsten, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Peterson Institute for International Economics, wrote this week that the Obama administration made a huge mistake by trying to undermine the bank, not only failing to persuade allies to stay out but also strengthening the voices in Beijing who argue that the U.S. is trying to keep China down.

“The U.S. hostility reinforces the Chinese view that U.S. strategy is to contain and suppress it,” he wrote, “so increasing rather than decreasing the prospect of uncooperative Chinese behavior.”

Financial Times columnist Gideon Rachman said this week that the saga “is turning into a diplomatic debacle for the U.S.”

“By setting up and then losing a power struggle with China,” he said, “Washington has sent an unintended signal about the drift of power and influence in the 21st century.”