Intelligence community says Russia wants an arsenal of nuclear space weapons, says China and Iran want to meddle in the 2024 election and lay out their concerns with TikTok

• US spy agencies published their 2024 annual threat assessment on Monday
• It described how regional conflicts were fueling global insecurity and fragility
• And it said Iran, China, and Russia may all try to influence 2024 elections 

U.S. intelligence agencies on Monday warned the country it faces threats from an ‘increasingly fragile world order,’ as Russia and China jockey for position against a backdrop of regional conflicts, economic strains and accelerating artificial intelligence.

‘An ambitious but anxious China, a confrontational Russia, some regional powers, such as Iran, and more capable non-state actors are challenging longstanding rules of the international system as well as U.S. primacy within it,’ the agencies said in the 2024 Annual Threat Assessment.

It warns that Russia, Iran, and China may act to influence the outcome of the 2024 U.S. elections in order to try to sideline critics or sow confusion. 

Beijing has a head start, the report says, with TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance.

‘China is demonstrating a higher degree of sophistication in its influence activity, including experimenting with generative AI,’ it says. 

‘TikTok accounts run by a PRC propaganda arm reportedly targeted candidates from both political parties during the U.S. midterm election cycle in 2022.’

The video sharing app, used by about 170 million people, is emerging as a key issue in the 2024 campaign. 

President Joe Biden says he would back legislation to ban it, while his likely Republican challenger Donald Trump said he shares national security concerns but the move would only help Facebook, which he continues to criticize for what he sees as its role in his 2020 loss.

But it was identified as just one of the routes that foreign powers could use to undermine U.S. security in the assessment, run by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

And it comes at a time of rising global fragility, the report says. 

Avril Haines, the director of national intelligence, appeared before senators to offer an additional warning that the conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza could spread further insecurity.

‘The crisis in Gaza is a stark example of how regional developments have the potential of broader and even global implications,’ she said.

Haines also urged lawmakers to approve more military aid for Ukraine, saying it was hard to see how it could hold territory recaptured from Russia without more support from Washington.

The report also set out how Russia’s strengthening ties with China, Iran and North Korea presented fresh challenges for the West as it continues to seek confrontation.

Recent reports have suggested it is looking to take the arms race to space, deploying a nuclear weapon that would destroy satellites by triggering a huge energy wave when detonated.

‘Russia continues to train its military space elements and field new antisatellite weapons to disrupt and degrade U.S. and allied space capabilities,’ says the report.

‘It is expanding its arsenal of jamming systems, directed energy weapons, on-orbit counterspace capabilities, and ground-based (anti-satellite) missiles that are designed to target U.S. and allied satellites.’