That's a valid point, but not at all what I got out of the argument. I picked up primarily on the specific counter-strategy.
It's certainly true that selfish mining strategy A which gave a 5% increase in results would lose out to another selfish mining strategy B which gave 10% increases in results. However that's not an argument that strategy A doesn't break the system, merely that the optimal selfish strategy breaks the system at least badly as strategy A.
Now it is possible that there isn't a stable strategy to use. If we supposed for the purposes of argument that the fair weather strategy was more profitable than the selfish strategy described in the first article you posted, then it would seem that the optimal strategy would oscillate. As more people participate in a selfish pool consistently the more profitable it is to be a fair weather miner. However, supposing that leads to a dissolution of the selfish pool all those fair weather miners turn honest. Against honest miners, however, the selfish strategy is proven to be more profitable. And so you'd see an oscillation where people constantly shift between being honest, selfish and fair weather.
Of course, if the long run gains keeping up on this strategy treadmill is less than simply sticking to the selfish strategy through thick and thin, then perhaps the fair weather strategy isn't better in reality.
It's certainly true that selfish mining strategy A which gave a 5% increase in results would lose out to another selfish mining strategy B which gave 10% increases in results. However that's not an argument that strategy A doesn't break the system, merely that the optimal selfish strategy breaks the system at least badly as strategy A.
Now it is possible that there isn't a stable strategy to use. If we supposed for the purposes of argument that the fair weather strategy was more profitable than the selfish strategy described in the first article you posted, then it would seem that the optimal strategy would oscillate. As more people participate in a selfish pool consistently the more profitable it is to be a fair weather miner. However, supposing that leads to a dissolution of the selfish pool all those fair weather miners turn honest. Against honest miners, however, the selfish strategy is proven to be more profitable. And so you'd see an oscillation where people constantly shift between being honest, selfish and fair weather.
Of course, if the long run gains keeping up on this strategy treadmill is less than simply sticking to the selfish strategy through thick and thin, then perhaps the fair weather strategy isn't better in reality.