The United States should ``stop selling weapons to Taiwan, especially explicitly promising not to provide TMD to Taiwan and its related technology, equipment and necessary systems,'' the ministry said.
Facing military threats from China, Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui was quoted as saying this week TMD ``not only meets the needs of the current situation but also is in line with the long-term interest of the country.''
Beijing and Taipei have been locked in a war of words and military posturing since Lee declared last month that bilateral ties should be on a ``special state-to-state'' basis.
Beijing, which has threatened to invade if Taiwan declared independence, saw Lee's declaration as a lurch towards statehood.
State television showed footage of wargames at a desert in the Lanzhou war zone in northwest China, but defense analysts said the joint exercises were ``routine'' and had been planned long before the row between Beijing and Taipei erupted.
Artillery fired salvo after salvo of missiles and helicopters hovered over convoys of tanks, while jet fighters screeched past and parachutists descended to the desert, the footage showed.
The official Xinhua news agency quoted Chief of Staff General Fu Quanyou, who observed the drills, as saying a major task of the People's Liberation Army was to ``strengthen preparation for military struggle.''
The Foreign Ministry statement said the United States should ``recognize the severity and danger of Lee Teng-hui's 'two state theory.'''
It said peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region would be threatened if the anti-missile umbrella covered Taiwan.
China was resolutely opposed to TMD for Taiwan because it would make Taiwan independence forces more arrogant, it said.
Beijing regards Taiwan as a breakaway province and has sought to push it into diplomatic isolation since the Communists won a civil war and drove the defeated Nationalists into exile in 1949.
China has opposed the TMD idea since it was first floated by Washington, which cited dangers to its troops based in Japan and South Korea from maverick and missile-armed North Korea.
In March, U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said China should stop worrying ``about a decision that has not been made to deploy defensive technologies that do not yet exist.''
China's state media are waging a psychological war against Taiwan. One newspaper said the island could put up a resistance of no more than five days.
But Western defense analysts doubt whether the 2.5 million-strong People's Liberation Army -- the world's biggest armed forces but a backward fighting machine -- has the capability to mount a successful invasion of Taiwan.
The United States, which sent two aircraft carrier battlegroups to back Taiwan in 1996 when China conducted intimidatory war games and missile tests near the island, could be dragged in again if China took military action against Taiwan, the analysts said.
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