But didn't USA try to change the government in Cuba as well? And I'm not a communist. I'm just talking about the double-standards.
Sure you are not.
Ukraine was off-limits for the West. But you had USA,Britain and a lot of NATO and EU leaders trying to make Ukraine into an American protectorate.
If Mexico had joined the Warsaw Pact,would you have felt ok with that? If Canada had joined the Warsaw Pact let's say,would you have tolerated that?
So now we can put John Mearsheimer's theory of great powers geopolitics to the test where, for the sake of discussion in this little corner of the interweb, we will legitimize his theory as valid justification to respond under the national security umbrella. We have two relatively contemporary real world situations.
Situation 1:
The US is a great power and is the leader of the democracy bloc.
Cuba is a neighbor and is a member of the communist bloc, not of the Warsaw Pact in particular, but of the communist bloc in general.
Cuba hosts nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union, the leader of the communist bloc.
The US responded with a blockade of Cuba.
The US negotiated with the Soviet Union for a successful settlement.
The Soviet Union withdraw the nuclear weapons.
The US ended the blockade.
Situation 2:
Russia was once a Soviet state, leader of the Soviet Union, and leader of the communist bloc.
Russia today is a great power and is no member or leader of any bloc.
Ukraine was once a Soviet state, not an allied country but a member of the Soviet Union who had full jurisdiction over Ukraine.
Ukraine today is an independent country next to Russia and is no member of any bloc.
Ukraine expressed an interest in being a member of the democratic bloc and specifically NATO but no actual admittance occurred.
Russia responded by invading Ukraine.
We can see the different responses by both great powers regardless of their neighbors. Both great powers felt threatened but at different stages of the national security crisis.
So under Mearsheimer's theory of great powers geopolitics, to what degrees of response is acceptable?