I'm not suggesting one way or another, only that the quoted explanation taken at face value isn't suggesting China based on name analysis.

There's also no reason to assume a nation state. This is completely within the realm of a single or small group of hackers. Organized crime another possibility. Errors with naming are plausible just as the initial mistakes with timing analysis and valgrind errors.

Even assuming a nation state, you name Russia as a possibility. Russia has shown themselves to be completely capable of errors, in their hacks (2016 election interference that was traced back to their intelligence base), their wars, their assassination attempts, etc.

And to me it doesn't seem any more likely that China would point to themselves but sprinkle doubt with inconsistent naming versus just outright pointing to someone else.

It's all guesses, nothing points one way or another. I think we agree on that.