Minor problem with censorship. You can`t say that the four-armed musician sucks salt.

Oh. Right. You can. Shaka, when the walls fell.

Then again, in the world of music, four-armed is four-warned, after all.

(sorry)

How was Riker planning to take 2000 Romulans prisoner? Tow them to a starbase?

I can't believe Sela was dumb enough to leave Data and Spock in a room with a computer terminal, especially one connected to the outside. Would it have been that hard to put them in a brig or detention area?

It's not a nit but they never said where they got the other two Vulcan ships. Perhaps they just did some reverse engineering and copied the T'Pau.

How was Riker planning to take 2000 Romulans prisoner?

Simple just call for some transport ships and let the Vulcan ships sit in space until they arrive. The ships aren't going anywhere.

According to Phil's second trivia question there is a Rutian vessel near the planet. Isn't Rutia fighting terrorists and needed the Federation to send them medical supplies? I guess Archeologists have a very high priority in their society. ("Oh, yeah, give the Archeologists any supplies they want. We're just going to beg for some more from the Federation.")

There are 43 parts to the Romulan cipher key, but the one Data can not decode is number 20-something. Does this seem right to you? I'm not a computer expert, but it seems to me that when you run into something you can't decode, the computer doesn't let you answer all the rest, before going back for a second try. Why doesn't Romulan Security know that someone is trying to get into their system? ("The computer says someone is repeatedly failing to give the right code for access, sir. What shall we do?" "Just ignore it. It's probably just some kids playing around")

The Romulan definition of `passionate' must be quite different from the Human one. Most of the people seemed rather `blah.' Of course, I believe Spock was the one who used the word, so maybe it's only something a Vulcan would notice?

Spock and Pardek walk into Neral's office, presumably inside a Romulan government building, Pardek leaves and a few minutes later, Spock leaves, unescorted. Either the Romulan guards are blind, or there are a number of Vulcans living on Romulus, or possibly there are still quite a few old Romulans who don't have those brow ridges.

The fat Ferengi says he doesn't speak hypothetical, but couldn't the Universal Translator translate it for him? ;-)

How about those shoulder pads, huh? You could land a shuttlecraft on three Romulans standing shoulder to shoulder!

I can't believe Sela was dumb enough to leave Data and Spock in a room with a computer terminal, especially one connected to the outside. Would it have been that hard to put them in a brig or detention area?

SSS. Alternatively, why didn't she leave the guards with them? Again, SSS.

How close is Vulcan to the Neutral Zone? Travelling at Warp 1, it would still take years for the ships to reach Vulcan. By then, the Federation just might have figured it out...

Would 2000 Romulans really make a difference in a (assumed) population of 1 billion? Except as terrorists?

Are the 2000 Romulan soldiers ridged or non-ridged? If they're non-ridged, they would be pretty easy to root out of Vulcan.

How about those shoulder pads, huh? You could land a shuttlecraft on three Romulans standing shoulder to shoulder!

Exactly my thought, Scott!

Speaking of the Romulans - Denise Crosby's acting ability is...well, shall we say, not shown off to best advantage here? Or more bluntly: She's just not getting that 'menacing fanatic' thing across at all.

Am I the only one who was amazed at how •••••• the Romulan plan is?
As it's already been pointed out 2000 soldiers is a little small to take over an entire planet. We have more people than that over in Afghanistan right now. I think that it wouldn't take the Vulcans long to realize it's a trap and would be able to take out those few Romulans.
But let's assume the Romulan plan works and Vulcan is magically conquered by a couple of guys. Then what happens? Vulcan is a member of the Federation and the UFP will declare war. Is Vulcan really a strategic enough target for the Romulans to make it their Pearl Harbour. I would guess no, as we've never seen any shipyards or military installations around Vulcan. If they think they can beat the feds (and the Klingons too, who must be wanting revenge for the events in Redemption) why don't they launch a real all out attack on an important location? It seems to me that capturing Vulcan would just make the Federation very mad while not accomplishing anything of military value.

It's not just you Makgraf. If this episode is to be believed, the entire Romulan high command has signed off on a hare-brained scheme hatched by the 22-year old daughter of an admiral and a Starfleet prisoner. (BTW: Isn't she a little young to be in charge of such an operation?) In addition to the problems you have pointed out, Sela actually boasts to Picard that, once they have taken over Vulcan, the Federation won't do anything about it. Say what?!!! Is Sela so naive to belive that the Federation will ignore an attack on one of its founding members? Its a good thing for the Roumulans that this plan failed before the ships entered Federation territory.

Actually, by now she's probably 23.

And that makes all the difference.

GREAT LINE: "Not bad". Spock to Data after Data executes a perfect Vulcan nerve pinch.

GREAT MOMENT: Spock's facial contortion after mind-melding with Picard...feeling Sarek's emotions for the first time.

FUNNY SCENE: Worf singing Klingon opera.

John, I read your posts, and I also liked the neck pinch scene.

NANJAO: I finally saw the big nit mentioned in Phil's book...the reflection of the man with the glasses chewing gum in the glass pyramid on Sela's desk. It's the second most hysterical thing I've seen to date in Star Trek. (the "scpipt supervisor" snafu in TOS ranks #1)

It is my best guess that sometime during Picard's capture in this episode that they obtained some of Picard's DNA to create Shinzon. (As you recall from "Nemesis", Shinzon was genetically altered to age quickly, thereby making him as old as he appears in Nemesis)

When the fat Ferengi comes into the bar, he is accompanied by two women. The brunette is wearing an interesting blue dress. It is the SAME DRESS that Troi will wear in "Man of the People"

I have to agree about the insane plan to take Vulcan with 2000 troops. First, surely there are several times that number of Starfleet members on Vulcan, assuming they are the only ones willing to fight. Second, even if the Romulans all go to the capital and seize the government's HQ, do they really think the ruling body of Vulcan will be any more willing to help them than Spock was? Vulcans seem not to fear death, especially if that death makes them martyrs. Third, I assume the Romulans planned to backup those first 2000 guys with a fleet and more troops, which will have to fight their way to Vulcan, secure a supply route from their territory against the eventual Starfleet counterattack, and drive off whatever fleet defends Vulcan, which is their obvious goal. They must have sent this bunch as an advance unit, though why they bothered disguising them escapes me. Finally, this whole plan depends on the remarkably unbelievable premises that the Vulcans are too pacifist to defend their world, and that Starfleet won't defend one of their founding races. I think the Vulcans would see the logic of demolishing this pitiful little garrison to dissuade the Romulans from doing anything like that again, and Starfleet would either have to fight or watch the Federation fall apart.
Did Sela honestly think her superiors were so hog wild to get Vulcan, that they'd let her risk a galactic war, just on the far outside chance of conquering Vulcan? I guess when the smoke cleared, this insane debacle, along with getting her ships caught by the Sutherland the previous year, led to Sela joining her mother before the firing squad. Does anyone think she was set up by the higher-ups, that they were testing her intelligence and cleverness, like they did the loyalty of the late Admiral Jarok, and she failed even harder than he did? Maybe the 2000 they sent out were like the Dirty Dozen, people they didn't mind losing.

Perhaps the 2000 on the ships was only supposed to punch a hole in the planitary defenses and a whole bunch of cloked warbirds was following with more troops and just wanted to be able to approach the panet and not be blasted out of the sky as soon as they decloked.

Perhaps, but is it reasonable to assume there's one big off switch they can seize in just one location? These are planetary defenses, so they defend a whole planet, which is really big. Besides, if the whole scheme hinges on this small group of people taking a small number of objectives, one starship or orbiting base can end it real fast by firing a few wide area stun shots from a phaser bank (like in A Piece of the Action), then beam down some security people to disarm and take away the Romulans for questioning.
Then, one of 2 things happen. First, the cloaked ships either decloak, open fire and start a war with the Federation. Second, the cloaked ships run back to Romulus, where Proconsul Neral has Commander Sela, and some of her superiors he wants gone, arrested and declares them solely responsible for the entire incident, before their show trial and execution. Nothing we saw indicates she was under anyone's orders in this matter. Even if she was acting under a superior's orders with the government's approval, would the Romulans admit that and be embarrassed before the galactic community? No, they'd probably sell her and whoever else they felt like blaming down the river to stop a war for which Starfleet is now ready.

Why did the Enterprise not attempt to stop the Warbird from escaping after it destroyed the transports? It may be SOP not to take on a Warbird without backup, but this event took place well within Federation territory, and that Warbird was still armed and had its cloaking device intact. It could easily begin a campaign of raids against Federation colonies and shipping instead of politely going home, and since the Romulan Empire had pretty much committed itself to war the moment she decloaked, there is not a lot of reason not to do so. In spite of this distinct and frightening possibility, Riker didn't engage the Warbird while sending for backup. He didn't order the Warbird to surrender and prepare to be boarded (futile as it may be). He didn't even order them to eject their weapons and cloaking device before departing (that would be minimal). In addition, he did not try to secure the transports before the Warbird finished decloaking, so the crews and passengers could be interrogated, but that is a side issue. This whole incident is another example of an alien race committing a blatant act of aggression against the Federation, and facing no retribution for it. The Federation did not even go to the trouble of demanding an apology from the Romulans, which is the least the Romulans could do after violating treaties and trying to invade one of the oldest member worlds of the Federation without provocation.

Just caught the end of this ep in a rerun today. Made me wonder...

I recall Picard and Data were either surgically altered or wearing prosthetics to appear Romulan. They were captured wearing Romulan cloaks with the exceptionally wide shoulder pads as noted in previous comments. But when they appear in Sela's office they are no longer in disguise, in fact Data's skin is now it's usual pale white. But they're both wearing Starfleet uniforms and combadges! Should have left those at home, boys...

After Spock, Picard and Data had subdued the Romulan guards and Sela, Sela tells them that they couldn't stop the Romulan invasion force because it would be in place in a matter of minutes. The following scene on the Enterprise bridge begins with Worf reporting that the Vulcan transports carryinig the Romulan invasion troops had just entered Federation space from the Neutral Zone, and Geordi had projected their course to take them to Vulcan at warp 1. Never before had there been any mention that Vulcan bordered the Neutral Zone. I wish I had a map of the Federation sometimes, but I'm fairly sure that it would take more than a few minutes for the Romulan troops to reach Vulcan at warp 1.

Just a couple of thoughts....

I am completely mystified by the Romulans' plan to conquer Vulcan with 2,000 troops. First of all, you can't conquer an advanced, populous planet with just a brigade-sized force. If Vulcan has even just a billion people, that's 5,000,000-to-1 odds. Even overwhelming technological superiority--which is not the case here--would be hard-pressed to even those odds and make the mission doable.

But let's assume that the Vulcans are defeated by a mere 2,000 Romulan troops. After their victory, the forces are no doubt weakened and depleted. So the invasion force has to try and hold the planet, policing all critical points and quelling all resistance, with less than 2,000 troops. How long can those troops hold out? Is there a plan to rotate forces out? Or do they plan on getting Vulcans to work for their regime? (Not likely.) Or does Romulus expect that a battle-weary below-strength brigade can simply continue to hold Vulcan for years at a time? If they plan on a force rotation, that means a supply line, and now we're talking about a full-out invasion of the Federation, with several campaigns to capture key star systems, all in an effort to establish space lines of communication (SLOCs, an old Navy term) and spacelanes to replenish the forces holding Vulcan.

Now, it's apparent that the Romulans are relying on surprise as the key to victory. That's why they destroy their force and abort their attempt when their mission is exposed. But the invasion force was traveling in the open, in Vulcan ships. Even minimal police work would blow this wide open. As Phil pointed out, Vulcan ships implies a Vulcan role in the "peace initiative," so a simple call to Vulcan would rule out the Romulans' cover story. Also, wouldn't a simple scan of the vessel--which would reveal 2,000 people plus crew and a large amount of weaponry--blow the story wide open too? Therefore, if this was planned as a surprise attack, it was poorly done.

So, we've looked at (1) the faulty logic of using a 2,000-troop force to invade a planet and (2) the poor planning of the surprise mission. The overarching question is, what exactly are the Romulans trying to accomplish? What will invading Vulcan do? Some have suggested that it's an attempt to co-opt the unification process by unifying on their own terms, thus eliminating a potential domestic threat. In other words, the Romulans just want to seize Vulcan. The surprise nature of the attack supports this: the Romulans, without warning, seize the planet before the Federation can react, and soon the Feds see that it's not worth fighting over. A similar ploy was used in Tom Clancy's novel Debt of Honor, in which the Japanese, capitalizing on the weakened state of the US Pacific military following the end of the Cold War, seized the Marianas Islands on the theory that, having lost the islands in a lightning attack, the US would abandon the idea of trying to reconquer them. The plan failed because the Administration refused to accept the invasion of US territory.

This is relevant here; it's ridiculous to think that the Federation would meekly accept the violation of their territory--Vulcan--in this manner. It would completely invalidate the premise of the Federation as an alliance designed to secure to peace and integrity of its member worlds. When international bodies fail to protect their members, the members quickly lose confidence and the body dies. The League of Nations, having failed to stop Italy's invasion of Ethiopia in 1935, lost the confidence of the European powers and was powerless to avert WWII; it quickly withered into nothingness. The same would be true here: would planets support the Federation and surrender their sovreign powers to it if it failed to protect them? Symbolism aside, if Romulus can waltz in and snatch a piece of the Federation, what is to stop the Cardassians? Or the Breen? Or even more militant Klingons, for that matter? Ergo the Federation must vehemently fight any attempt to invade its territory, and this means that the Romulans cannot simply "stop" after capturing Vulcan; the situation will be forced into an all-out war.

Others say that this was just the opening move in a long and bloody war. That's quite possible, and it's the only scenario that makes any sense. Perhaps the Romulans figured that the loss of a founding member would shake the Federation badly enough that the Romulans could gain the upper hand. However, whether or not they could be successful in light of the Klingon alliance with Federation is doubtful at best. Also, since Sela appears to be spouting all of the invasion's top-secret plans to Picard, Data, and Spock, it's noteworthy that she said nothing of a war.

The {Debt of Honor} scenario also doesn't play, because it wouldn't be like Japan seizing the Marianas, but more like Japan seizing the entire US West Coast. Vulcan is one of the founding members of the Federation. There's not a snowballs chance in (the first 8 levels of) h*ll that the Feds would let that situation lie.

Well, I'm not likening the seizing of the Marianas to the seizing of Vulcan. Strategically, the seizing of Vulcan would be like the Japanese taking a vital state like California or New York. What I'm doing is likening the Japanese mentality in that novel to the possible Romulan mentality: namely, that both might be assuming that, because of the lightning-quick capture of their respective targets and the extreme difficulty in forcing the invaders out, both victims (the US and the Federation) might conclude that it is too difficult to re-take the seized territories.

I feel that the US's response in the novel was good and that it would parallel the Federation response. Both would conclude that the invasion of their territories would be unacceptable.

It would have made a lot more sense if they had called the Romulans on the Vulcan ships 'infiltrators' or 'commandos' rather than 'troops'. I think the situation would be plausible if the Romulan plan went like this:

1. Under cover of Spock's unification message, land the 3 Vulcan ships on Vulcan.

2. The Romulan troops then infiltrate and sabotage the planet's defences, sensors and communications.

3. With Vulcan defenceless and unable to call for help, the Romulans bring in a conventional Warbird fleet with many more troops to complete the conquest.

After all, why would that Warbird that destroyed the three Vulcan ships have been in the area?

Thande: It would have made a lot more sense if they had called the Romulans on the Vulcan ships 'infiltrators' or 'commandos' rather than 'troops'. I think the situation would be plausible if the Romulan plan went like this:

That still doesn't explain what exactly the Romulans were trying to do. Even if they executed a blitzkrieg invasion of Vulcan and forced it to surrender before Starfleet could render assistance, that doesn't mean that the Federation would conclude that they would have no choice but to let the Romulans have Vulcan. They would still conclude that only one option would remain: a swift, violent campaign waged against the Romulan invaders. Otherwise, the exact modus operendi of the Romulan invasion is pointless.

That's true, especially considering how close Vulcan is supposed to be to Earth and the other Federation core worlds.

Maybe the Romulans' emotions re conquering Vulcan are clouding their judgement (to quote Yoda )

You saw how close the cloaked Warbird was to the Vulcan ships. I wonder if there was a whole fleet of them, filled with occupation troops, who would follow the three Vulcan ships to Vulcan.

If they had an entire fleet capable of seizing Vulcan inside Federation territory, and they were totally undetectable by Starfleet (incredibly hard to believe), why did the Romulans go through all the cloak-and-dagger with the Vulcan ships? Wouldn't their use of Vulcan ships, which might be identified as having been stolen, instead of their own ships have raised suspicions? Wouldn't a diplomatic envoy being sent so suddenly to Vulcan be a big deal, so that Starfleet and a lot of media would end up accompanying the ships to Vulcan? I think the sudden appearance of a single Warbird, let alone a fleet, opening fire on Vulcan under the guise of a peace mission, on a live broadcast to the whole quadrant would ruin the surprise. Even if the reporters who would be on hand would only send the reports to the Federation, the surprise would be lost. If Romulan cloaking devices are so powerful that they can hide an entire fleet and Starfleet can't overcome it, why don't they just use them to disorient and disrupt the Federation, cause it to collapse then grab what they want at their leisure? Why put detectable ships in front, and ensure the fleet will be followed?

Also, if such an invasion succeeded, Starfleet would lock down the border with the Romulans, and blockade Vulcan, if not simply counterattack and retake it. The Romulans would have to be insane to assume the Federation would take such an invasion lying down, or that any attempt to present this as a unification of the Vulcan and Romulan peoples would have any credibility.

I agree with Chris Diehl; the Romulan plot seemed rather convoluted.

Chirs was FAR from the first to say that here Mike.

He didn't say that Chris was, he was just agreeing with him.

A good episode but everyone does have a great many points.

Heck they could have even said "their were over 25,000 Romulan commandos on those ships" and it could have worked out better. We never get a good look at the ships but that sounds more plausible for a first strike and the size thing isn't really an issue. The Enterprise carries over 1,000 people and gives each individual bigger quarters than a 4 person room that we stayed in on a Royal Caribbean cruse ship that we went on back in 2006. For scaling the nuclear aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CVN-65) is less than half of the length of our favorite starship (342 meters), has a much smaller interior area (as it's a straight line while the starship has a huge circular saucer section) and still carries a standard crew of nearly 5,000 along with the fatalities to hold 90 planes and to service them. Meaning that three ships of its' size, if you converted the aircraft areas into living space such vessels could accommodate some 20,000 soldiers on a short trip to Vulcan to invade. It would also make that last bit seem even more cold blooded "there were over 25,000 Romulan troops on those ships" but still be believable as the Romulans are supposed to have an EMPIRE. Our current Earth has around 6 Billion people and still quite a bit of uninhabited land. The Romulans live longer than humans, have had space age technology longer than humans, and citizens on many planets. Meaning that while 25,000 soldiers sounds like a lot for a population of (just say 20 Billion) is jut a drop in the bucket.

The way history would have gone had the invasion worked...

1-The Romulan ships either spread out and land in different areas, or they land in the same place and disgourge troops.

2-The Vulcans instantly alert Starfleet. If the Romulans jamb communications that will also serve to alert Starfleet.

3-The Federation mobilises all avalible ships and ground forces at the nearest bases (Earth). The Federation declares war on the Romulan Star Empire.

4-The Romulan troops manage to capture the main planetary defense systems/facilities. They fail to capture all of the facilities due to lack of troops and because half of the facilities are located on the opposite side of the planet.

5-The Vulcan Militia recovers from the initial surprise and starts to mobilise. Romulan troops dig in to captured positions and await renforcements. Vulcan goverment refuses to submit to the troops demands that they order the militia to surrender.

6-News of the attack reaches the Klingon Empire. Although weakened by the civil war, Gowron honors the alliance with the Federation and strengthens his position by declaring war on the Romulans. Klingon ships along the Klingon/Romulan boarder immediatly start attacking Romulan targets, forcing the Romulan fleet to move forces intended for service against the Federation to the Klingon boarder. The Romulan fleet, not having been pre-warned about the plan and not having deployed ships for a full scale war is caught flat-footed. Romulan fleet is unable to mount significant attacks on the Federation or Klingon Empire.

7-A Romulan fleet arrives at Vulcan with renforcments for the initial troops. They discover that the planets defence's are at least partly opperational when the first ship to de-cloak is blown out of the sky. Romulan fleet starts landing troops to assist those forces still alive on Vulcan, while engaging remaining defences in orbit.

8-Romulan fleet destroys last defences. Federation fleet shows up and engages remaining Warbirds.

9-Having taken heavy losses to Starfleet and the planets defences the Romulan fleet is forced to withdraw. Starfleet starts to land troops to assist Vulcan forces.

10-Vulcan is secured. Romulan ships attempting to return to Romulan space are harried by Starfleet and Klingon ships taking further losses.

11-Romulan senate meets in emergency session as the scope of the disaster becomes apparent. Before they can decide on a plan to stop the war a fleet of Klingon ships decloaks in orbit and destroys the senate building, leaving the Romulan Empire without clear leadership.

12-Starfleet, in co-opeation with the Klingons, starts offensive action against Romulan targets. Without clear leadership, a viable defensive plan in place and being both outnumbered 3-1 and having to fight on two fronts Romulan defences crumble.

13-Romulan Star Empire surrenders to the United Federation of Planets.

Now THAT would have made a great storyline. They could have spead it out over a season or two.

Come to think of it, does anyone here think that this should have been extended another episode. What about the political fallout from these events? Wouldn't the Romulan government have to account for this? Wouldn't there be a shake-up of some kind? The Romulans were planning to invade a Federation planet, after all (this would be like the former Soviet Union planning to invade Alaska)!

I think they should have done an episode that dealt with this. This could be why Sela was not seen again, she probably took the fall for this fiasco (Neral obviosly kept his job, because he is mentioned on a couple of DS9 episodes, and even became Praetor).

Instead, after this episode, the Romulans virtually disappeared from the series (except for The Next Phase, and that had nothing to do with what happened here)? To this day, I wonder why the producers chose to move the series away from the Romulans and the Klingons at this point. They had the start of something big here, and they let it slip away!

When I see the show in reruns, I tend to avoid most Season Five episodes after this one, because they became to soap opera like. Occasionally, you'd get a good science fiction episode (A Matter Of Time, Conundrum, Power Play, and Cause And Effect, and the acclaimed The Inner Light come to mind here), but it seems they chose to do episodes that could have been done on a contemporary show (Worf, the single dad thing, for example). I find most of the soap opera episodes just plain boring.

It was not until Jeri Taylor took over at the start of Season Six, that the soap opera format was scrapped.

Sorry for rambling here folks. My point is this, instead of •••• like New Ground, Ethics, Violations, and Masterpiece Society, they could have followed up on the events that Unification started.

I'm not so certain the scenario described back on May 15 would work. For one thing, why does anyone believe that even 25,000 infantry supported by a single spacecraft can seize and hold a major planet well within enemy territory? This is doubly unbelievable if the ground forces spread out to attack multiple, heavily defended locations. Surely nobody thinks the locations from which the planet's defenses would be directed are sitting undefended. For another, I doubt the Romulans would pursue this campaign further once Vulcan is back in Federation hands. The point was to take Vulcan for cheap, and once that idea failed, they would likely cut their losses. They throw Sela and a few other out-of-favor officials to the wolves, and try to return to the status quo.

If the Romulans decide to continue with the war at that point, I wouldn't bet on the Klingons riding to the Federation's rescue. Treaty or no treaty, the Klingons aren't under attack, and can argue that Starfleet can handle this problem themselves. Also, Gowron's government at this point is not very secure, which explains his efforts to whitewash Starfleet's involvement in his victory over his enemies. If he sends his currently scant forces to aid Starfleet, the Romulans could declare war on him, and openly send aid to his enemies to rebel against him. With the Federation buy fighting the Romulans, and the Romulans sending their assistance openly, he's doomed.

If the Romulans decide to continue with the war at that point, I wouldn't bet on the Klingons riding to the Federation's rescue. Treaty or no treaty, the Klingons aren't under attack, and can argue that Starfleet can handle this problem themselves. Also, Gowron's government at this point is not very secure, which explains his efforts to whitewash Starfleet's involvement in his victory over his enemies. If he sends his currently scant forces to aid Starfleet, the Romulans could declare war on him, and openly send aid to his enemies to rebel against him. With the Federation buy fighting the Romulans, and the Romulans sending their assistance openly, he's doomed.

The Federation/Klingon treaty seems to be one of mutual defence. If the Federation is attacked, without provoking such aggression - which in this case they didn't - The Gowron is bound by that treaty to provide help.

As to weakening his position it would do the opposite. A Klingon chancellor who not only avoids war but in doing so ignores a treaty to do so - thereby dishonouring the Empire - would have the life expectancy of a snowball in a blast furnace. Joining the war would strengthen Gowron's standing in the Empire, it would show him to be an honourable warrior who goes to the aid of an ally.

Then there is the small point that the Klingon high council, and probably most 'important' Klingon's would be well aware that the house of Duras had Romulan aid during the civil war. They'd have every reason to get there own back. As to the Romulans providing aid to Gowron's enemies that would consist of the Duras family alone. Most of the Klingons who fought for them would not be interested in helping them again - unless things went very badly for the Empire.

Chris Diehl: "They throw Sela and a few other out-of-favor officials to the wolves, and try to return to the status quo."


As I wondered above, this might be the reason that Sela disappeared from the series after this episode. Think of it, the Romulans have been caught red handed attempting to invade a Federation planet. As I said, this would be like the former Soviet Union being caught attempting to invade a U.S. State. Clearly, when the Romulans were exposed, damage control was necessary. I think that Sela was the sacrificial lamb here. The Romulan Government, taking a Mission Impossible stance, dissavowed any knowledge of the plan, laying the blame on her and her alone. So, she was either excuted, or exiled, or locked up. No doubt, that must have satisfied the Federation.

However, I still feel that SOME mention of this should have been made in the following episode. You can't just forget a major event like this!

It's been said before, but I'll say it again. I would have liked to see Sela in "Star Trek: Nemesis." Unlike that dumb clone she actually would have had motive to want to kill Picard and attack the Federation since they foiled her plans in this episode. They could say that she was thrown into labor camp after this episode.

Brian, that's a great idea. I too felt that Sela would have made a better villian, because of her backstory.

The reason Shinzon failed as a good villian was because they just pulled him out of thin air. John Logan, who wrote the film, compared him to Khan, but that doesn't make sense. Khan had a backstory that we all saw, we knew why he hated Kirk.

Well, Sela would have a reason to hate Picard and Co. Now that would have made a much better film.

I wonder if Sela survived the destruction of Romulas. I suppose she did if she was off-planet at the time.

I suppose the Romulans really were banking everything on the Federation just sitting on their hands after the take over of Vulcan. I guess the Romulan high command based their projections on Starfleet's historic record of being attacked in space and patiently waiting while they take 5 or 6 direct hits before they fire once then spend the next 5 or 6 hits discussing what they should do next. Not only that but The Enterprise which represents the best of starfleet doesn't exactly set an impressive track record. After all this is the ship that was taken over by a dozen Ferengi rejects flying around in a pair of patched up Klingon ships. oh yes and let us not forget the whole Pakled incident. given how arrogant the Romulans are there had to be guys on the war committee saying "common guys! look if the Pakleds and the Ferengi can best the Flagship, WE could probably take the whole federation! I know we can do it common lets go!"

Fellow Trek Fans, I hate to admit it, but what happened in this two-parter, and what other posters like Tim, Brian, Chris, Don, and Cybermortis were discussing up above, this was a rare example of TNG's producers activating the infamous "Reset Button". For a long time I was under the impression that this was something that only happened on VGR, which would then be the explanation for that's show's sub-standard quality and it being obviously inferior to the Trek spin-offs that had come before it.

However, the Romulans "destroying their own invasion force" (which for some reason only consisted of 2000 troops) and the fact that they attempted to invade and conquer Vulcan and force them to "unify" in that oppressive manner? And the fact that this major conflict was quickly forgotten and not brought up again for the rest of TNG's run? What was the deal with that, anyway? Why, as Tim and others wondered, was the Romulan government not made to answer for their crimes and be held responsible for basically committing an act of war? Attempting to conquer a Federation world, one of the founding worlds of the UFP to boot, that doesn't get any other acknowledgement in a follow-up episode? Why would that not happen?

Well anyway, like I said, I didnt really think that any other Trek series made use of the reset button as much as VGR, but that's exactly what happened here. At least that's how it looked to me. And the fact that TNG's fifth season was full of "kiddie" episodes and that fact that it seemed to have a very "soap opera" feel to it, it wasn't really my favorite season of the show either, now that I have really given it some thought. I also didnt know that it was Jeri Taylor who got rid of those kind of shows when she became the ex-pro at the start of season six, because along with season three and four, the sixth was my other overall favorite of TNG.

Anyway, this was just my opinion and observation. I really like that the aftermath of the events of this two-parter, or should I say, an utter lack of it, was extensively discussed on this board. That was cool. No other mention of Romulus attempting to invade and conquer Vulcan in the rest of the series? Not so much!

I'm pretty sure a lot happend between the Federation and the Romulan empire after that incident. Diplomats on both sides must have done a lot of overtime on that one. However, the Federation would not have declared war on the Romulan empire, they prefer peaceful solutions to such conflicts, and the Romulans would not have declared war directly on the Federation, not after suffering a defeat like that. I'm sure a lot of high ranking Romulans heads rolled as a result of that humiliating failure, and it took a while for the new power structure to reach its equilibrium.

As for the invasion force consisting of only 2000 troops, that obviously was not the whole invasion force, only the part needed to initially seize control of the Vulcan capital. Other troops were waiting in the wings to provide support, occupy other key sectors on the planet and defend against Federation intervention after that first beachhead was established.

Finally, the reason we heard nothing about any of this in subsequent episodes is that it had nothing to do with the Enterprise. It all happened "back home", while the good ship and her valiant crew continued with their mission of exploration. No need to bore us with such mundane details.

Wow. I sure wasn't expecting an actual defense of this idiotic plotline. I sure didnt think that anyone would actually defend what happened in it. I really didnt think that it was in any way defensible, quite frankly!

Haven't you read enough of my posts on this site to know how I want people to respond to what I take the time and energy to type out and post on here? You were supposed to agree with what I said, and acknowledge the use of the RB as something extremely stupid and retarded on the part of the producers. And you were also supposed to look further up on this lengthy thread and also read what the other five posters I mentioned contributed to the nitpicking of this episode. I did that, and it helped me a great deal in deciding what to say here.

Tim McCree in particular is the most outspoken critic of this turn of events, namely the Feddies thwarting the Rommie's attempt to conquer one of their worlds and it never even being brought up in any other Trek-related medium again afterwards, let alone TNG itself. And with good reason. He, and anyone else, has every right to be offended and disgusted that TPTB just went *click* and "Hey, everything's business as usual, it's all back to normal again!" the way they did here. You (F.L., I mean) might not think it's a big deal, but I sure as hell do!

And then, many years later, when the writers and producers do a film with Romulans at war with their own slave laborers who rebelled against them and pulling a weak and ineffectual "villian" with absolutely no backstory out of their asses and trying to actually present him as a believeable threat to the Federation? That...was extremely incredibly unneccesary. It bombed for a very good reason, believe me. But the fifth-season two-parter having no aftermath and no stories chronicling the follow-up conflicts the Feds and Rommies had, that probably would have also involved the Klingons, as someone up above pointed out? Couldn't this has at least warranted a *little* bit of expository dialogue later in the series?

I think it should have. And why it didn't, I'll never know!

Wow. I sure wasn't expecting an actual defense of this idiotic plotline. I sure didnt think that anyone would actually defend what happened in it. I really didnt think that it was in any way defensible, quite frankly

The plotline itself wasn't so idiotic. The Romulans would have been the ones to convince themselves that such a plan would work. How did Troi put it? "Their belief in their own superiority is beyond arrogance". But of course, the Federation would never have let them get away with it, and the Vulcans themselves would have put up a formidable resistance.

As for the use of the reset button, well, I agree they should have done a better job of dealing with the aftermath of that failed invasion. It could have been evoked in DS9 for instance, when they were trying to convince the Romulans to join the war against the Founders. It would have been a good way to complicate things and justify the reluctance of both the Federation and the Romulans to work together.

A NIT HAS BEEN ERASED!!!

The new blu-ray release "fixes" a nit!!!

The infamous reflection of the random film crew guy chewing gum has been covered up! The obelisk on the desk now has a glowing green pattern superimposed on it to cover up the embarrassing reflection.

Personally I don't mind when they update the planet effect shots, because those were never very distinctive (every planet pretty much looked like brown blurs, or blue blurs, or green blurs, wrapped onto a sphere). But now they're taking away our precious nits!!!

What does everyone think of this???

I don't mind. As long as it doesn't change the story or the characterization (like making Greedo shoot first instead of Han Solo in Star Wars, or replacing rifles with flashlights in E.T.) then I have no objections.

It's what I would do.

I'm sorry--I tend to be a purist and want no changes whatsoever.
Sorry.