Diplomats are poker chips. The pomp and mystery that accrues to the diplomatic and intelligence services en poste overseas conceal a simple truth: in today’s world, journalists, bankers, NGOs and bloggers are, far more often than not, better informed than diplomats about the countries in which they operate. I know this to be true in Russia – I speak to senior British and US diplomats in Moscow regularly. Believe me when I say that I can think of half a dozen veteran foreign correspondents in Russia who have considerably more extensive, diverse and senior contacts in the Russian establishment than any Western diplomatic mission.
And yet – the expulsion of diplomats matters, because despite their essential worthlessness they represent a kind of currency in international relations. The expulsion of a total of 160 Russian diplomats by 23 nations – more than any expulsion during the Cold War – sends a powerful signal of solidarity and disapproval to the Kremlin.
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