Annual Threat Assessment: 2025 Edition

The administration's priorities are clear

NOTE: This is a follow-up to an article I wrote earlier about what the US Annual Threat Assessment is. If you’ve never heard of this before, it’s a good place to start.

After patiently waiting, the 2025 edition of the Annual Threat Assessment arrived a couple of weeks ago as of the time of this writing. There are some expected changes and some surprises. Below are my top ten first impressions with the report, in no particular order.

1. It’s short. A good 15-20 pages shorter than previous reports in fact. The whole things feels… rushed? Maybe that’s just by own biased opinion. It certainly doesn’t feel like this was a priority. And this can’t even be blamed on the fact the the current administration just came into power. If you look at 2021, 2017, 2013, etc., they don’t have the same short page count and rushed feel.

2. The report starts with a clear focus on immigration and illicit drugs/cartels. Previous years focused on the war on terror or rival state actors, but this year brought domestic issues to the forefront; but maybe not how you’d expect. Giving credit where it’s due, the report identifies the availability of naloxone as a source of reduction from synthetic opioid (e.g. - fentanyl) deaths. One would hope this means narcan will be made more available so more opioid-related deaths could be prevented, but cuts to so many domestic programs raises concerns. The report also states that cartels are increasing violent attacks. Given the previous rhetoric about special operations and air strikes being used against cartels in Mexico, I have to assume this is an attempt to manufacture consent for those activities.

3. “The New Year’s Day attacker in New Orleans was influenced by ISIS propaganda, and separately, an Afghan national was arrested in October for planning an election day attack in the name of ISIS, highlighting ISIS’s ability to reach into the Homeland to both inspire and enable attacks.” They chose to make no mention of the New Orleans attacker being a veteran, having financial issues, or having recently separated from his wife, as reported by the Associated Press. The attack in Las Vegas by an Army Special Forces veteran using a cybertruck is also suspiciously absent. As is any mention of domestic terrorism that isn’t linked to drugs or ISIS. Previous years had brought attention to the rise in domestic terrorism caused by extreme ideologies like white supremacy. But that’s probably too “woke” to make the report this year.

4. Listed in a subsection under the heading Other Transnational Criminals: “The total number of migrants trying to reach the United States has dropped significantly since January 2025 due to a surge in border security enforcement.” Whether or not there’s any truth to these claims, the fact that migrants have been relegated to “other transnational criminals” alongside cyber criminals and human traffickers is at the very least dehumanizing. The factors that cause immigration are acknowledged in the report, but the only response that seems to be given any thought is increased border security.

5. Speaking of other transnational criminals, here’s more credit where it’s due: Cyber criminals are using ransomware and other attacks on critical infrastructure, healthcare systems, municipalities, etc. We’ve seen everything from school districts to hospitals, from courts to financial institutions being subject to these attacks. Water is becoming a more common target, which can either include the clean side (i.e. - the water supply) or the dirty side (i.e. - wastewater processing). A municipality will find themselves in a bad place if either of these are put in danger by bad actors.

6. COVID is specifically brought up as a “biosecurity” threat in the section on China. Moreover, the report seems to make the claim that China was at least negligent, or possibly somehow complicit, in the COVID pandemic: “These efforts have led CIA to assess that a research-related hypothesis is more likely than a natural origin hypothesis.” This stance officially changed only days after the 2025 Presidential Inauguration, and the CIA’s own analysis gives “low confidence” to COVID lab origin theory. The report also claims that China refuses to acknowledge that COVID started in China. I can only find evidence that they refute the “lab leak” theory — favoring instead that the virus emerged naturally — and do not deny Chinese origins.

7. Both China and Russia are said to be seeking energy exploration and trade routes through the Arctic due to expanding opportunities caused by melting sea ice, but make no mention of why that is happening. In fact, there is (as expected) no mention of climate change whatsoever in the entire report. It does state that there is interest in Greenland for natural resource (China) or strategic (Russia) value, which are probably valid assumptions. These claims seek to further support the administration’s desire to obtain or otherwise control Greenland in the interest of national security.

8. For Russia, the invasion of Ukraine is framed as a “proxy war” with the West; and the US more specifically. It seems like a simpler explanation of resources and access to shipping ports is more likely, and the need for this conflict to be a proxy war would only seem to serve the interests of those trying to reignite a Cold War. Despite this claim, the report seems to have an overall positive view that Russia will prevail against Ukraine despite intervention by the US or other allies. It urges a ceasefire and warns that Ukraine’s position is weakening. Outside of the conflict with Ukraine, there is successful identification that Russian attempts at undermining the confidence in America’s election process is just as good as affecting the outcome. Amazing that this was presented without a hint of irony…

9. Syria and Middle East Conflicts are listed under the section for Iran. This subtly suggests that Iran may somehow be behind or responsible for everything going on in the Middle East, or at least gives little thought to the region outside of the Iran framing. They have influence over events, certainly, but would hardly seem to be the puppet masters for the entire region. The Middle East Conflicts section includes the threat HAMAS poses to Israel, with little regard for Palestinians. There is also a specific call-out to an email phishing attack against the trump presidential campaign by Iran, because everything this administration does is either transactional or about personal victimhood and aggrievement.

10. North Korea gets the shortest section, and probably deservedly so. It’s mostly relegated to Russia’s and China’s little buddy. The focus is primarily on their strategic alignments and minimizing their opportunities to obtain or develop weapons of mass destruction (mostly nuclear).

Honorable mention: “Adversarial Cooperation” has its own section, stating that the above four nations (China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea) have been forming alliances. Alignment between China and Russia is listed as the greatest threat. This section has a “US vs. the rest” framing instead of a multi polar world where all state actors are operating in their own best interests; “an international poker game where everyone is cheating,” as a former YouTuber used to call it. The Arctic is mentioned again in this section of the report as point potential interest and conflict.

A quick internet search reveals that I am predictably not the only one with thoughts on this report, and there are reviews of its content from across the political spectrum. Some, remarkably, seem to think like it didn’t go far enough. A review I saw from a defense industry magazine liked that the report said that further innovation was necessary for national security, which of course is exactly how they make their money. One analysis of the report that I thought was interesting came out of a security publication in Eastern Europe. Since Russia and the war with Ukraine is on their doorstep, they have opinions on the matter.

There’s obviously a lot more in this report, but those are just some of the items that stuck out to me. The two most important, in my opinion, are the omission of climate change and the focus on immigration (under the guise of drugs and cartels). Climate change will be a driving force for global security until we either find a viable solution for a more sustainable world and all of humanity enacts it, or our international order breaks down to the point that nations are all but forgotten and humanity is scratching by in groups small enough that global security isn’t a concept worth worrying about anymore. And as far as immigration goes, any increases in security — which will include physical and cyber security, among others — will be sold to the American people as necessary for their own protection.

Denial of what your eyes tell you, fear of others that are unlike yourself, and an emphasis on establishing a security state. Sure sounds like the earmarks of authoritarianism to me.