The fact that Russia closes its permanent mission at NATO headquarters and at the same time withdraws the accreditation of the NATO representatives sent to Moscow will not shake the Alliance and European security.
Foreign Minister Lavrov's complaint that the “basic requirements for joint work” are no longer in place is just the usual mockery: Of “joint work” with a country that is forcibly redrawing the European map and entering politics with cyber campaigns interfering with its member states, NATO does not want to know anything anyway.
It is not without reason that the military alliance has declared the “aggressive actions of Russia” (alongside terrorism) to be its greatest threat.
Because of allegations of espionage, NATO initially declared eight Russians from the Brussels mission to be undesirable persons;
Moscow did not want to be content with a proportional answer.
The escalation is worrying.
It is precisely when relationships are at their lowest point that opportunities for low-threshold contacts become important.
In any case, the Putin challenge cannot be mastered with a grand gesture.
Emmanuel Macron has now also learned this lesson from the Barack Obama primer.