Chinese military general Rear Admiral Luo Yuan published a commentary in response to the New York Times report that the U.S. is going to retaliate on the incident of "China stealing more than 20 million American’s personal information." Luo claimed that, if the U.S. were to impose sanctions against China, it would be declaring a cyberwar. Luo said that China-U.S. relations are no longer the same as the past U.S.-Soviet relations and that the era when the U.S. dictated to China with a big stick is gone. The order of the strength of power is reversing. Who would win the war is far from conclusive.
Luo also listed five reasons that the U.S. brought up the cyber security issue at this time.
First, the U.S. is anxious about China’s rise.
Second, the involved interest groups have their own agendas. The initiators of the hype were the U.S. Director of National Intelligence and the Cyber Army commander. They wanted to attract attention to secure more funding for their departments.
Third, more sinister military attempts are looking for excuses and preparing public opinion for further cyberattacks against China in critical infrastructure areas such as transportation, financial, industrial control, and the military’s central surveillance system.
Fourth, it serves the need of electoral politics.
Fifth, it undermines the upcoming summit meeting, embarrassing the U.S. think tanks who advocate improving relations with China and making it difficult for them to launch positive recommendations to promote Sino-U.S. relations.
Source: People’s Daily, August 5, 2015
http://military.people.com.cn/n/2015/0805/c1011-27412396.html