The Chinese government is hacking US companies, including defense contractors, on a massive scale to steal intellectual property. This IP is used to make ripoff products to sell back to US consumers, or to build weapons to reduce the technological lead of the US military.
We should counteract this violation of trade laws by placing tariffs on Chinese imports, which would emphasize the economic cost of IP theft.
Even if the Chinese respond with similar tariffs, due to the Chinese US trade imbalance the tariffs will damage the Chinese economy much more than the economy of the United States.