The mix up of "r" vs "l" thing is a Japanese problem, not a Chinese one. Are you saying that if the US hacks China, the Japanese will call the US to stop? Be a little smarter and do a little more research next time when trying to be cute.
No, it's not a display of weakness, not even close. It's purely an act of public opinion manipulation. They are trying to steer the public opinion to a certain direction.
You are not wrong, however, I would have a hard time believing the NSA would hack a personnel database, and then sell social sec info and personal info to the highest bidder. I have no problem believing the chinese would.
The PRC is a state, not a criminal gang. They have the second largest GDP after the USA. Why on Earth would they sell the information? The more people have the blackmail material gathered by hacking the OPM the less valuable it is.
In fairness how far back do we apply this, should the Italians be censored for what the Romans did in the North of England, or the Mongols for what they did to most of Europe or the Spanish for what they did in South America or what we (the British) did to...well basically everybody.
If you hold that no past behaviour is considered expired then pretty much every country on the planet or the people who live there before it was that country is responsible for something.
African tribes have warred for millenia, European tribes have warred for millenia, South America, Middle East, Far East pretty much everyone has at some point beaten up their neighbours and not so near neighbours.
Yeah, we could at least give Guam residents the right to vote. Them not having that right has a lot to do with racist legislators in a previous era feeling like votes by "alien races" (e.g., Asians) would be detrimental.
