Around the time of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s brief uprising against the Russian government last month, a French warship was making its first trip to the Baltic.
The frigate Auvergne docked in Helsinki on June 24 in a show of support to NATO’s newest member, Finland. The deployment just 300 kilometers (190 miles) from Putin’s home city of St. Petersburg might also have been intended to demonstrate France’s renewed enthusiasm for the Western alliance after decades of ambivalence.
As leaders of NATO prepare to gather in Vilnius next week, French President Emmanuel Macron is trying to make up for lost time.