Post-DS9 Cardassia

[Jono]

Just had a quick look at the first few chapters of Abyss and the Section 31 guy makes a mention of "former Cardassian holdings" and Bashir corrects him, calling them "protectorates" set up by the Feds, Klings and Roms to protect Cardassian territory until the Cardassians can resume control.

Had a look over at MemoryBeta to see what they had from the non-canon sources and was surprised that they only had a little bit. Thought they would have more from the DS9 relaunch but only Stitch in Time gets a mention in their article on Cardassian history.

[Damask]

msbae wrote:

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Doubtful. This would alienate the Bajorans and hurt the Federation's position with regard to using the Wormhole. It would also make it more difficult to talk the Bajorans into joining the Federation at some point in the future.

Well the Bajorans were fairly quick to come up with a peace agreement with Cardassia. Plus an important Bajoran office (CO of DS9 no less) did help the Cardassians.

I doubt the Federation would offer membership anytime soon but I could see them helping the Cardassians with relief efforts, etc. I doubt Bajor would have a problem with that and suspect that DS9 would be instrumental in this also.

[Sisko4Life]

One of the first cracks in that facade, as far as the entire society is concerned, was the Klingon attack right when they were starting to pull things together into a form that might be a little better than before. That's when I first started getting really annoyed with the way they were being treated. They reform and get invaded for it. Talk about "no good deed going unpunished"...

Yeah, it got to the point that I actually wanted to see the Cardassian / Dominion alliance win... or at least beat the Klingons (I guess they had to go through the Feds first). I felt like the rest of the Alpha Quadrant kind of deserved it. No race should be invaded for trying to reform. Then the writers shot them again when the Dominion tried to exterminate them for standing up for themselves. I don't know what happens after the war, but I think the Federation would actually help them rebuild. Looking at the actions of Cardassians like Damar and Garak, and then finally acknowledging that it was the fault of the Klingons and Maquis for having them (as Sisko put it) "run into the arms of the Dominion." Seriously, the Alpha Quadrant powers need to do a serious self-check. Plus, rebuilding will help them get some insight into Cardassian culture to sqush the stereotype that they are all militaristic xenophobic boneheads.

[Nerys Ghemor]

I wouldn't go so far as to say the Alpha Quadrant powers deserved the deaths that came to them--I mean, that's the same as suggesting the Cardassians deserved to have billions of their people killed because of what their governments did.

We rarely got to see a credible dissent within the Federation, either. Most of the time, the dissenters were shown as loony or violent. (Alixis, Eddington, Cartwright, Section 31, need I continue?) To see someone fundamentally disagree with Federation policy and be taken seriously as a character--that's not something I think I ever saw. You never saw a conservative that was treated as anything but a stumbling block, a blockhead, or an enemy: kind of the Cardassian problem in inverse. And THAT is pretty chilling considering the Federation was supposed to be a democracy.

[Sci]

Nerys Ghemor wrote:

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To me it cuts to an even bigger issue: is it me, or has the Federation got a habit of making and excusing some pretty shady allies? They say you can judge a man by the company he keeps--and same for a government...

Well, it's not like they have a lot of options. Consider the powers that surround them -- the Klingon Empire, the Romulan Star Empire, the Cardassian Union, the Ferengi Alliance, the Tzenkethi Coalition, the Breen Confederacy, the Gorn Hegemony, the Tholian Assembly, the Talarian Republic. Frankly, the Federation doesn't have a lot of nice folks to make friends with -- the closest would be the Ferengi Alliance.

And besides the point, peaceful and friendly relations are certainly better than antagonistic relations. The Federation ends up in a better position in terms of its security, and it then has the opportunity to influence the internal politics of allied societies so that they're less, well, evil. The Ferengi Alliance began instituting Federation-style reforms within 11 years of making first contact with the UFP; the last two Klingon Chancellors were installed by Federation Starfleet officers... Etc.

An alliance with an evil government is still just the best option.

[Nebusj]

Sci wrote:

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Well, it's not like they have a lot of options. Consider the powers that surround them -- the Klingon Empire, the Romulan Star Empire, the Cardassian Union, the Ferengi Alliance, the Tzenkethi Coalition, the Breen Confederacy, the Gorn Hegemony, the Tholian Assembly, the Talarian Republic. Frankly, the Federation doesn't have a lot of nice folks to make friends with -- the closest would be the Ferengi Alliance.

It's one of Trek's bad production decisions: the idea that if anyone out there was going to be a good guy, then naturally they'd be part of the Federation. It's fine for the Federation to be the United States Writ Large, but its existence doesn't mean that the United Kingdom, France, and Brazil wouldn't also exist.

I can't tell --- I don't have the direct information --- but I have the sense that the Ferengi Alliance was originally-in-1987 conceived as being a sort of parody of the original Federation. The dropped hints about it being explicitly interventionist and viewing the Prime Directive as destroying opportunities for everyone involved gave me that strongest hint. So in that regard the `Humanization' of the Ferengi as it actually worked out would be also the discovery that they weren't so different to start. (Apart from not being a multi-species polity like the Federation was.)

[Nerys Ghemor]

Nebusj wrote:

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It's one of Trek's bad production decisions: the idea that if anyone out there was going to be a good guy, then naturally they'd be part of the Federation. It's fine for the Federation to be the United States Writ Large, but its existence doesn't mean that the United Kingdom, France, and Brazil wouldn't also exist.

More like the European Union Writ Large, if you ask me...

But yeah, I think that was a bad decision as well. It would've been nice to see some allies that didn't get themselves assimil--er...um...absorbed into the Federation.

[cultcross]

Nerys Ghemor wrote:

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We rarely got to see a credible dissent within the Federation, either. Most of the time, the dissenters were shown as loony or violent. (Alixis, Eddington, Cartwright, Section 31, need I continue?) To see someone fundamentally disagree with Federation policy and be taken seriously as a character--that's not something I think I ever saw. You never saw a conservative that was treated as anything but a stumbling block, a blockhead, or an enemy: kind of the Cardassian problem in inverse. And THAT is pretty chilling considering the Federation was supposed to be a democracy.

I've felt the same way, actually. I always wondered if it was because we primarily saw Starfleet humans, who seem to be born and bred Federation policy regurgitators and non-Starfleet humans show a wider range of responses to Federation laws and policies. In the same way that Sisko's dad refused the blood screenings in Paradise Lost when all the Starfleet characters go along with it without blinking.

[Nerys Ghemor]

cultcross wrote:

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I've felt the same way, actually. I always wondered if it was because we primarily saw Starfleet humans, who seem to be born and bred Federation policy regurgitators and non-Starfleet humans show a wider range of responses to Federation laws and policies. In the same way that Sisko's dad refused the blood screenings in Paradise Lost when all the Starfleet characters go along with it without blinking.

And even when someone DOES show a different reaction, they seem to be looked at as kind of a throwback or superstitious or whatever.

[Bec]

Worlds of DS9: Cardassia by Una McCormack shows us what Cardassia might be like after DS9. It builds on some of the ideas of A Stitch In Time. Great read too!

[cultcross]

Nerys Ghemor wrote:

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And even when someone DOES show a different reaction, they seem to be looked at as kind of a throwback or superstitious or whatever.

Eddington kinda had a point didn't he? "You're just like the Borg, only more insidious"
I think that's what made him an interesting character - he was a character who turned away from the Federation ideals without appearing (to the audience at least) a nutjob or an idiot. In fact, at least in For the Uniform, he seems to ahve it together more than Sisko does. His references to Les Miserables in that episode are not misplaced, imho.

[Nerys Ghemor]

cultcross wrote:

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Eddington kinda had a point didn't he? "You're just like the Borg, only more insidious"
I think that's what made him an interesting character - he was a character who turned away from the Federation ideals without appearing (to the audience at least) a nutjob or an idiot. In fact, at least in For the Uniform, he seems to ahve it together more than Sisko does. His references to Les Miserables in that episode are not misplaced, imho.

I agree about Sisko coming unhinged in that episode. How was it that he didn't get court martialed out of Starfleet for unleashing a WMD on a planet?! I mean, yeah, Eddington did it, too, but Sisko supposedly had a higher ideal to uphold. What's principled about what he did?

[Sci]

Nerys Ghemor wrote:

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I agree about Sisko coming unhinged in that episode. How was it that he didn't get court martialed out of Starfleet for unleashing a WMD on a planet?! I mean, yeah, Eddington did it, too, but Sisko supposedly had a higher ideal to uphold. What's principled about what he did?

I've no doubt that he would have been court martialed if there had been any deaths from his WMD. But the fact that there was none, coupled with the Federation's irrational hatred of the Maquis for daring to want to secede from the UFP, meant that nothing happened.

[cultcross]

Sci wrote:

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I've no doubt that he would have been court martialed if there had been any deaths from his WMD. But the fact that there was none, coupled with the Federation's irrational hatred of the Maquis for daring to want to secede from the UFP, meant that nothing happened.

I think you've hit the nail on the head with the reason - there weren't any casualties to splay their faces all over the 21:00 Hours News (Not quite the same ring to it in the 24th century ) so the public wouldn't get their moral outrage up and running, and the planet was a Maquis base, so the Federation don't shed any tears over its loss. Which is hard to fathom, really - I realise Class M planets are rather stupidly easy to come by on Star Trek but it seems a bit much to just overlook unleashing a wmd on one out of, essentially, angry revenge.

[Jono]

cultcross wrote:

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I think you've hit the nail on the head with the reason - there weren't any casualties to splay their faces all over the 21:00 Hours News (Not quite the same ring to it in the 24th century ) so the public wouldn't get their moral outrage up and running, and the planet was a Maquis base, so the Federation don't shed any tears over its loss. Which is hard to fathom, really - I realise Class M planets are rather stupidly easy to come by on Star Trek but it seems a bit much to just overlook unleashing a wmd on one out of, essentially, angry revenge.

You also get the positive spin that can be placed on the fact that the displaced Cardassian colonists from the Maquis' initial surprise attack can apparently just swap planets with the Maquis colonists. That would have got the Feds some points from the Cardassian government, making Starfleet hesitate from taking action against Sisko lest it send the Cardassians the wrong message. Then you have Sisko's role as the Emissary to the Bajoran Prophets and if you imprision him or boot him out of service relations with the Bajorans could be damaged. Bajoran could just recruit him into their Militia order Starfleet out of Deep Space 9, or say that they want a Bajoran militia officer in command and Sisko could be back in command of the station and if Starfleet still has a presence, they would be then at his whim and no longer have any control over him or his actions.