The Chinese military slammed Washington for its frequent "provocations" after an American guided-missile destroyer sailed through the Taiwan Strait on Tuesday.
The comments came after the USS Benfold made its way through waters claimed by mainland China for the third time in a week.
China's Eastern Theatre Command, which is in charge of defence in the country's eastern waters, including the Taiwan Strait, has criticised the US for provocations and destabilising the narrow waterway separating Taiwan and the Chinese mainland.
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Tensions are high between the US and China after a report emerged that US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi planned to visit the self-ruled island in August. If the trip comes to fruition, she would be the highest-ranking US official to visit the island since ties between Washington and Beijing normalised in 1979.
"The ship transited through a corridor in the strait that is beyond the territorial sea of any coastal state," the US Seventh Fleet said in a statement on Wednesday.
"The ship's transit through the Taiwan Strait demonstrates the United States' commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific."
The US Navy routinely travels to contentious sea territories to assert freedom of navigation as permitted by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), of which China is a signatory.
Beijing has said it has jurisdiction, sovereignty and sovereign rights - privileges of a coastal state to use a body of water - over the Taiwan Strait.
Taipei, however, said the strait was an international waterway and stood by the US freedom of navigation operations.
"The frequent provocations and showing off fully show that the US is the destroyer of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait and the creator of security risks in the Taiwan Strait," the Eastern Theatre Command said in a Wednesday statement after the Benfold's trip.
"Troops of the theatre command are always on high alert and determined to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity."
Taiwan's defence ministry said on Wednesday that the situation in the strait was "normal" as the Benfold sailed north.
On Saturday, the Benfold travelled near the disputed Spratly Islands, which China calls the Nansha Islands, in the South China Sea.