The ship, along with over 5,000 sailors, sailed from the Philippine Sea to the South China Sea last week, several days after a July 20 hostile incident between the China Coast Guard and Philippine Navy in which Chinese personnel aboard an inflatable boat struck a Philippine Navy service member with a wooden baton, injuring the individual.

Four days later, hostilities continued between the two nations when the China Coast Guard attacked Philippine Coast Guard and Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources vessels with water cannons in the vicinity of Scarborough Shoal.

U.S. State Department officials have criticized the escalatory actions by China and reiterated U.S. support for its Pacific allies.

A spokesperson for the department called for China to “immediately cease its destabilizing conduct.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on July 23 during the ASEAN Foreign Ministerial Meetings in the Philippines that the U.S. was “not going to abandon [its] allies” after appearing to reference the July 20 incident between China and the Philippines.

The USS George Washington, meanwhile, the flagship of Carrier Strike Group 5, was accompanied by the Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Robert Smalls, Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Shoup and the embarked Carrier Air Wing 5 during its port call.

“While our ship represents the high-end capabilities of the U.S. Navy, our visit here to Vietnam supports a U.S.-Vietnam relationship that continues to grow stronger across an increasingly broad range of subjects, reflecting our shared interest in a free and open Indo-Pacific,” Capt. Nicholas DeLeo, commanding officer of the George Washington, said in a release.