On his first visit to Moscow, the NATO secretary general, Mr Solona, is learning at first hand the depth of Russian opposition to the alliance's plans for expansion to the East. After expressing concern that his foreign minister may have been "too mild" in his approach, the Russian President, Mr Boris Yeltsin, yesterday took charge of the discussions and vowed that he would "be tough in making our position clear". There are few signs to date that Russian objections are having much impact. Mr Solana has signalled that the alliance will not be diverted from its path: the US Secretary of State, Mr Warren Christopher, says that NATO will not renege on its commitment to enlargement of the alliance to the east. But the alliance might also be wise to take a wider view further insensitivity on the issue of enlargement will only bolster extremist and ultra nationalist candidates in next June's presidential elections.
In truth, the alliance has been much too blase about some very legitimate Russian concerns on its expansion. When plans for NATO enlargement were first unveiled two years ago, the alliance insisted that this would build security and stability across the continent. Enlargement was presented as the best of all worlds a means of improving security for all of Europe without creating any new divisions.
But there was a failure to acknowledge, much less to address, Russian concerns. Viewed from a Russian perspective, NATO's eastern expansion could be seen as a further means of humiliating and isolating Moscow. The expected first wave of new NATO members - Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary - are all anxious to take shelter under the Western security umbrella. But it is hard to convince Russia that any such move will improve its security when all these countries - and others such as the Baltic states, Bulgaria and Slovakia - could also effectively withdraw from Russia's sphere of influence.
That said, the desire of the applicant countries now pressing NATO to open membership negotiations is understandable: most are already in line for EU membership perhaps by the end of the century. From their perspective, it clearly makes sense to seek the security guarantees that flow with NATO membership as well.
But the alliance needs to be alive to Russian concerns as it ponders the enlargement issue. The Russian argument that NATO's eastern expansion will only create new divisions between competing military blocs is well grounded. There is also, as Mr Christopher has acknowledged, a real danger of creating "three Europes" - a prosperous stable West, a centre en route to NATO and the EU and an East that is "consigned to isolation and crisis".
It may well be that some compromise will be worked out in which NATO will agree not to deploy nuclear weapons in new member states. It may be that Russia's membership of NATO's Partnership for Peace programme can be used to build trust and to ease suspicion between east and west. But there may also be a case for a more radical approach. An attempt to build a new security for Europe by expanding NATO is always likely to generate old fears and suspicions. An alternative approach, in which a new European security order is built through the European Union's common foreign and security policy, should be more inclusive and less risky.