I compared current situation with Cuba crisis, BUT Ukraine in NATO would put Russia in jeopardy against conventional attack too.
Unlike conventional attack from Estonia/Latvia/Lithuania, conventional attack from Ukraine would put Russia in situation where only defense
would be use of nukes
NATO nukes haven't moved closer to Russia in the last 30 years and there were no plans to do so. NATO expansion was quite clearly defensive and it would have remained so even if Ukraine joined NATO. Despite Putin's delusions, the West wants a stable prosperous Russia to trade with, not a shithole to fight with. If they wanted to attack it they'd have done it in mid-1990s.
Putin was upset about NATO missile
defense systems in Poland et al - do you realize how insane that is? "Don't you dare to defend against us should we decide to liberate you at some point".
In case of neutral or friendly Ukraine, for conventional war vs NATO Russia only has to close Suwalki gap
Its 100km vs 2300km border to defend
It doesn't look like Ukrainians want to be "friendly" (aka Belarus) with Russia so yeah let's bomb them to rubble.