Modern airplanes can exceed their cruising speed in a relative sense but older planes have a higher absolute maximum speed, as well as cruising speed. Why is e

Modern airplanes can exceed their cruising speed in a relative sense but older planes have a higher absolute maximum speed, as well as cruising speed. Why is everyone trying to ackshewally this? The stat's are publicly available. Aircraft are optimized for a particular speed range and that impacts the designed cruising speed as well as Vs and VNE.