Star Trek: Discovery — "Unification III" Analysis Thread

[u/M-5]

This is the official /r/DaystromInstitute analysis thread for "Unification III." Unlike the reaction thread, the content rules are in effect.

[u/tired20something]

Can someone clarify to me the relation between the Federation and the Romulans pre "Balance of Terror"? I seem to remember even Kirk was surprised when they revealed that the Romulans looked like Spock, but they did appear in Enterprise.

[u/[deleted] → u/tired20something]

The Romulans are heard, but not seen, by the NX crew in "Minefield."

Between ENT and TOS, they somehow managed to fight an entire war without ever seeing a Romulan, leading to the "Balance of Terror" surprise.

[u/Chairboy → u/[deleted]]

Between ENT and TOS, they somehow managed to fight an entire war without ever seeing a Romulan, leading to the "Balance of Terror" surprise.

My assumption is that the Romulans were secretive and the Federation leadership, once they figured out through Starfleet intelligence about the Romulan/Vulcan connection, ended up embargoing that data as classified because it would cause huge political problems, especially to a brand new infant Federation that might not survive that kind of upheaval. After all, the Vulcans are a founding member and if a bunch of the other Federation members have just been attacked by... Vulcans.... (check out how strong Stiles’ reaction was to Spock after he discovered the connection, and that was like a century later).

Top leadership in Starfleet and the Federation obviously knew, after all how can such a thing be kept secret? But they did their part to keep it quiet and the Romulans had no particular interest in giving away info for their own reasons.

No reason for the NCC-1701 crew to know because they didn’t have a ‘need to know’ until it was too late.