The Romulan War: Beneath the Raptor's Wing - Discuss (SPOILERS)

In the first few years of WWII in Europe, it was pretty heavily one-sided in Nazi Germany's favor. For a while, German conquest and expansion seemed like an unstoppable force. If you'd asked a citizen of Europe in 1940 whether it was believable that Britain and its allies would eventually turn the tide and have Germany on the run by 1944, they would've probably said no.

The Earth-Romulan War is only a year old at the end of the book, and the founding of the Federation is, what, five years away? There's certainly plenty of time for things to change.

 

I was pretty annoyed with how the NX fleet got treated. Finally, they were being rolled off the assembly line at a faster-than-glacial rate (one good thing about the TV show no longer being on), and then...poof. Gone just like that. Seriously lame.

Does that mean the Romulans are going to stupidly attack the Klingons and bring them into the war when they really shouldn't have?

 

Seconded. That was kind of a low blow, destroying all of the NXes (except for the Enterprise, of course, we can never destroy that! ). The Columbia doesn't count, since Destiny already dealt with it, but still...

And it was also a bit unfair to have a real Captain Dunsel and have him only ever be remembered as a slang term at Starfleet Academy for something that's useless. Especially since the real Dunsel was anything but!

 

^ Refresh my memory - what was the original reference to Dunsel from?

 

"The Ultimate Computer." Commodore Wesley referred to Kirk as "Captain Dunsel," and Spock explained to McCoy that "dunsel" is Academy slang for a part or object that serves no useful purpose.

 

Except that the Allies could turn the tide with the strength of their soldiers. All it took was enough men and enough determination.

Earth's entire population can't do jack against the Romulans if they don't have ships to fight them in, and for much of the book it genuinely seemed like Earth had a handful of ships at best. Gannet Brooks kept saying "Where is starfleet, boo hoo!" and the obvious answer is---they don't have enough ships to cover every Earth colony at once, and to try would make those ships they do have easy targets!

Towards the end they seemed to have gotten on track and begun pumping out Daedalus vessels, but only because the Romulans failed to capitalize on their advantage by destroying Earth's shipyards early.

Then again, the entire notion of the telecapture weapon always did seem a bit far-fetched. I could buy it working on Vulcan tech; Romulans could have easily infiltrated Vulcan and stolen the necessary plans. But the idea that such a tool could work on any arbitrary technology given time is a bit silly. Maybe if the weapon were a full-on AI, but there's no indication of that.

 

^I'm not saying this war needs the same solution as WWII. Analogies are never meant to be that exact. I'm saying that we're only one year into the Earth-Romulan War, and there have been previous cases -- WWII just being one example -- where what seemed like an inevitable outcome in a war was reversed and the underdogs came out winning. Heck, particularly in fiction, it's pretty much a given that the villains will seem unbeatable at first, and perhaps for most of the story, so that the heroes' eventual turnaround of the situation will seem more heroic and triumphant. (See the Dominion War. Heck, see any episode of the '70s Harlem Globetrotters cartoon.)

 

I guess my complaint is that the telecapture weapon is too effective. It makes a stand-up fight a losing proposition, so the only way to win is via that last-minute turnaround. I had always figured the E/R war to be a down-and-dirty slugging match, and this portrayal of it is very different.

But then, that was always the problem with Enterprise from the start. It tends to be the problem with most prequels in general. The story in detail is almost never as good as you imagined it in broad strokes.

 

^Again... we're only one year into the war. A lot could change. The effectiveness of the telecapture weapon could be negated somehow. We've seen the early phase of the war; it's way too early to assume the whole war will unfold the same way. The one constant in warfare is unpredictability. (Well, that and death.)

 

Or see the final game of the 2003 ALCS.

 

Ah, thanks for the memory. Truly a glorious day in world history. And it led to a fantastic moment in Lost.

 

I got such a kick out of the NX-01's refit at Cygnet XIV. It was a welcome humor break, and I was laughing my ass off at D.O.'s swat at Archer's butt. I wonder if there was any interest in him on her part? And T'Pol ordering Archer and Reed to go get the ladies some tea - hah, and people say Vulcans don't have a sense of humor.

 

Quite! And a Trek connection as well, since I believe Connor Trinneer looks exactly like Aaron Boone.

Okay, now you lost me.

 

Ignore me, I misread your post and thought you said 2004. Obviously the last game of the 2003 ALCS was an abomination and should never be spoken of again.

 

^ Yeah, I was thinking "Wait a tic, isn't this guy a Red Sox fan?"

 

Is there a connection between the NY Yankees, and the Terran Starfleet?

 

I've finally finished (work kept interfering with my pleasure-reading, which is why I took so long), and I'm pleased to say I really enjoyed this book. While "The Good That Men Do" was fantastic, I had found "Kobayashi Maru" somewhat disappointing. "Beneath the Raptor's Wing" was back up to standard, though. I appreciated the scale of the novel very much- the "big picture" exploring the effects and details of the war (well, of its first year, that is) in their entirety rather than focusing on any one small cross section of known space, or one group of characters. This is how it should be- I wanted the history, politics and world-building far more than I wanted action for its own sake, so I was pleased to see the focus was on these aspects of the war rather than the actual fighting, and that all the players were covered in depth. The Romulans, humans, Vulcans, Andorians and Tellarites were all handled well (I particularly liked the use of their own calendars and in the case of the Romulans their own names for coalition worlds) and the Vulcan politics in particular was engaging. The Romulan politics was also interesting, particularly when we know the eventual outcome- for example, Vrax gets the last laugh. I'm glad Valdore has been fleshed out as a character a bit more, rather than just being the shadowy bad guy, although Nijil needs a bit more exploration- I don't feel I know him as well as I should.

The many continuity references and little clarifications pleased me (an example: clearing up the Laibok/Laikan issue by clarifying that they are two cities), and overall the book did a great job of continuing to flesh out the Trek universe. We got to see Berengaria VII up close and learn about its early history (and dragons eating Romulans, lest we forget ), we met several Romulans whose names will be memorialized on ships in later centuries, we got to see Achernar Prime and learn why it has a history of human colonization as well as being a Romulan world of importance, we visited Cygnet XIV and saw the first steps towards what will be an alliance between human and Cygneti in the Federation (and having just read "Titan: Synthesis" it was nice to see Sethe's homeworld), little details of interest about Vulcan, Andoria and Tellar were revealed (helping them convince as "real" places with detailed cultures and histories), and Tobin Dax and Skon are back in the continuity, as is Lydia Littlejohn.

I really like the way the war is being portrayed. It can't have been easy keeping it convincing while having to include some of the more questionable canonical ideas- no-one ever saw a Romulan, really?- but this book manages it, for the most part. After being a little bored with Trip's spy mission in "Kobayashi Maru", that plot has managed to grab my full interest again thanks to Ych'a and the rather complex shenanigans there. Poor Terix! Possibly poor Trip, too...

Artalierh got a black eye again; it does appear to be the Coridan of the Romulan Star Empire, so to speak. The Mars chapter was also intresting; it's nice to see non-Terran humans explored in depth and how Terran cultures adapt themselves to other worlds. On the other hand, it seemed to be implied that Kaferia is just a human colony, which doesn't track with Kaferians showing up in "A Time to Heal","Destiny", etc. Hopefully our buggy buddies will show up in the next book (maybe they live separately from the human colonists?). I'd also like to see how other non-human cultures are responding to the war. We know Draylax is with humanity due to Earth and Alpha Centauri's treaty obligations (and probably from a military defence viewpoint more a liability than anything, sadly), and of course Tellar, Andoria and Vulcan were explored in detail, but what about Rigel, Denobula and Axanar, say? Are they ignoring the Romulans and hoping they'll go away, or will they start offering assistance to Earth? I know Rigel and Denobula were scared off by Terra Prime, but Romulans are scarier, I imagine...

Possibly my favourite scene was Shran talking with "ghosts" after the Battle of Andoria, which I found very moving. His struggle to balance his new Aenar philosophies with his sense of duty to mainstream Andorian culture and the Imperial Guard was engaging. It just shows how good the character work was in this novel, that supporting characters whose appearances were few still made memorable impact.

All in all, very good, and I'm eager for the next book.

 

^ Great review. Thanks for sharing your thoughts! Made me think a little harder about a lot of the continuity references and short character beats that kind of blew past me.

 

I started to find the constant use of Romulan place names and time durations somewhat distracting. I generally don't mind that sort of thing, but when they're speaking in 'English' anyway, why not use 'Andoria', 'year' or 'lunar month'? I know, I know, it adds to the cultural flavor of the story, but at the very least, a lexicon at the end of the book, or a footnote would have been useful.

 

What Thrawn said. I'm just a little over half-way through, my own hectic schedule having kept me from finishing this epic read weeks ago. I really, really am liking this a lot; this is my kind of Trek. The attention to detail is superb. This universe feels real to me, with a real history behind it. I hope we don't have an overly long wait until the next volume, which I presume will also cover the events of one year.