Two people were injured on Thursday night when a drone struck a block of flats in Galați, Romania. According to official reports the drone was Russian and carrying an explosive payload. At the same time, the Ukrainian Danube port of Reni, 20 kilometres away, was attacked. Romania ordered the closure of the Russian Consulate General in Constanța. Commentators see this response as insufficient. Military reaction called forJOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. For political analyst Abbas Gallyamov, the incident is no coincidence. He writes on Facebook (Russia): “If Nato’s response remains purely diplomatic, Putin will take it as an official invitation to invade. That’s exactly how the ‘hawks’ in his inner circle will interpret it, at any rate. If I were in the alliance’s leadership, I would order some units to be deployed further to the east. The response must be a military one. You have to hear the tank tracks grinding. I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that the incursion was not accidental. Putin cannot yet bring himself to launch a full-scale invasion of the Baltic states, preferring instead to test the waters quietly.” No longer the periphery but the first line of defence In Adevărul, military analyst Alexandru Grumaz advises a fundamental shift in perspective (Romania): “Speaking of an ‘Eastern Front’ rather than an ‘Eastern Flank’, as had been the case up to now, is not merely a change of terminology, but an expression of a new strategic reality. … The message is clear: Europe can no longer rely exclusively on protection from others. If it wishes to deter a revisionist and increasingly aggressive Russia, it must take its defence into its own hands, invest in credible military capabilities and preserve the political unity of the Western alliance. In a new European security architecture, the Eastern Front is no longer the continent’s periphery but its first of defence.”