Since Germany and Russia are the two big powers on the block and want to keep any other power (like the United States) from their region, it would make sense for Berlin and Moscow to want to forge an agreement to divide up the neighborhood—such as the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, which had secret protocol dividing the independent countries of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania into either the Nazi or Soviet spheres of influence. Most of those countries have since sided with Washington, but if Germany and Russia make some sort of deal, it will be open season on American influence in Europe. …And that was six years ago. In light of that ongoing situation, is it really “blinking”?
Germany is facing economic headwinds. Not discounting the spheres of influence concept/arrangement, but I think that economic interests are an influential, if not driving, component in all this.
Whatever the backdrop actually is, this is an interesting development to follow.