I can't quite understand what Snowdon is trying to do here. Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems the most likely outcome from this revelation is to alienate his existing supporters in the USA and to possibly seed a cold war with China.
There is already a hot cyber war going on with China, it isn't even really 'classified', I am sure the full extent is classified, but its well known that china's cyber force have been relentlessly attacking US government and commercial assets on a large scale for years. That the US is doing the same thing, while not publicly stated, i would think is a pretty reasonable assumption.
He is literally committing espionage, I am glad the privacy related items came out, and frankly I hope the bulk of what he stockpiled eventually becomes public knowledge.
But he is without doubt releasing US government secrets to a 'friendemy' foreign nation with the express intent of personal benefit. thats spying, text book, thats not whistle blowing.
It's pretty clear this was his plan from the get-go.
Now we know why the U.S. was looking for him so hard. Revealing that the country is tracking its citizens is one thing. Revealing covert cyber espionage secrets to a country the U.S. has a lot of tension with is something else.
It appears the delay in releasing this information was to let him build up a good guy and hero image in the Western press first. "Hero selflessly outs nefarious government plot for the common good!"
Then he goes and tells China about the U.S. infiltrating its systems, so that China will protect him.
So much for the whole hero thing.
The NSA didn't even have to roll out a tar-and-feather campaign. Snowden took care of it all by himself.
