They directly funded people and organizations that are sympathetic to them.

They still do and so does the USA.

"bot" accounts are really only one piece of an influence campaign. They're there to make it seem like a large number of people agree with a talking point and to provide more ways that someone might get caught up in that influence network. A lot of "bots" are real people that have just been entrained by an influence campaign, useful idiots. You still need other individuals that specialize in creating or rewording the talking points to appeal to various audiences and still others to be the "trusted face" or parasocial relationship i.e. influencer.

The target in an influence campaign is not really the individual voter. It's much more effective to convert someone who already has mass appeal and influence. You often can't get to these people directly but you can reach them by making your cause seem popular/justified/righteous/countercultural/cool/sophisticated or whatever else appeals to the people you're trying to influence.

I've got bad news for you. It may seem like a good thing that Y. Pestis is bacterial since we have antibiotics but remember that bacteria can become antibiotic resistant. You might say "no problem, that would only happen if there were a lot of cases and people weren't properly using antibiotics" and while this is true it is also possible to deliberately make Y. Pestis antibiotic resistant. "Who in their right mind would do a stupid thing like that?" you may ask, well it turns out the Soviets did and likely stockpiled large amounts of it with plans to deliver it in an aerosolized form over cities. Aerosolized particles are how you contract pneumonic plague which if you can't treat it with antibiotics is nearly 100% lethal in all cases. It can also be passed from human to human via coughing. So, here's hoping that this is just a rare case of wild type Y. Pestis that the lab worker somehow unfortunately inhaled and didn't get treatment for in time.

Answered this in another comment but my major fear if a bacterial plague like this became a pandemic would be our manufacturing output keeping pace with demand, not like during covid when it was not clear if it was even possible to create a cure.

Making it antibiotic resistant is not difficult and they already did that back when they were the USSR. Not only did they develop it, they produced large quantities of it to stockpile for a rainy day.

The Soviets developed antibiotic resistant strains of the plague meant to be dispersed over cities as aerosolized droplets. Inhaling these droplets causes pneumonic plague (coincidentally the type of infection this lab worker supposedly had which seems odd) and pneumonic plague can be spread human to human via coughing once the infection has been allowed to incubate for a few days. It can also be passed to animals from humans which could result in another vector for infection via handling, butchering or eating infected animals resulting in either primary bubonic plague or pharyngeal plague. Untreated pneumonic plague is almost always fatal so it goes without saying that antibiotic resistant plague is effectively 100% fatal in all contracted cases.

It would be more effective than chemical weapons in that it is more persistent, has delayed action and can be spread person to person or through animal vectors. This means it would be possible to deploy it more discretely and that it requires greater effort to contain. You're right that it is a better weapon for a terrorist attack or asymmetric warfare. It would still make a good weapon for creating an undue amount of stress on a region's medical capacity, if enough people were infected then a significant amount of antibiotics would initially be used attempting to treat them and a lot of resources would go to containing the spread, quarantining the infected or potential exposures and providing supportive care to a lot of people that would inevitably die very miserable deaths.

Yes, this is why doctors are only required to read textbooks and pass a written exam before practicing. Only mastery of the documentation is necessary. /s

Aedes aegypti are container breeders, you can totally eliminate them from an environment through diligent removal of standing water left in buckets, tires, pots, etc. This has been done before but the effort wasn't properly sustained so they've made a major comeback in disease prone areas. Killing a lot of them does have a substantial effect because they don't easily travel long distances by themselves so if the remaining resistant population is small enough it might just as easily end up dying out due to its breeding cycle being interrupted through other means. The part that should be criticized here is that any eradication campaign should also involve efforts to eliminate their breeding environments by removing junk and unattended containers that collect water.

Aedes aegypti aren't native to anywhere outside of Africa. Native mosquito species in most other continents don't spread the same diseases that infect humans. Aedes aegypti mostly breed around where humans live since they lay their eggs in containers of stagnant water, other mosquito species live primarily in wetlands and areas that stay moist due to thick vegetation or soil conditions. The native species of mosquitos are a much larger food source than Aedes aegypti for that reason.

Aedes aegypti most likely spread to the US via the slave trade.

We are choosing to not undo the harm we caused by spreading Aedes aegypti all over the world in the first place.

Aedes aegypti is an invasive species native to Africa so removing it from the environment everywhere else in the world that it has been spread to would benefit the local mosquito species which don't spread the same diseases and are less of a nuisance to humans.