In universe... Why would Romulans need Klingon ship designs?

[Shawnster]

We know the real world story why the Romulans were using the Klingon ship - the Romulan warbird model was lost/destroyed.

But real world stinks. Who cares! This a Star Trek board!

What in universe reason led to the need /desire to use Klingon design for starships. Yes, we understand there was an alliance, but that still does not answer the question as to why. Plenty of alliances did not result in one civilization adopting the tech designs of another.

 

[Dukhat]

Excellent question. The only in-universe reason I can come up with based on what we saw in the show was that the Romulan ship seen in "Balance of Terror" was vastly inferior to Starfleet vessels in terms of speed or durability (other than its cloaking tech and plasma weapon), and they didn't have the infrastructure to build more advanced ships. Ergo, they turned to the other major power who seemed to be equal to the Federation in terms of ship tech.

But that also brings up another question: Did the Romulans actually build their own ships based on the Klingons' designs and tech, or did they buy (or steal) the ships? The original idea in BoT was that the BoP was going to resemble the Enterprise's saucer section because the Romulans stole Starfleet designs. So did the Romulans steal the Klingon designs as well? Or even steal their ships? Spock's line, "The Romulans are now using Klingon designs" is unfortunately too ambiguous to be able to determine that. At one point I would have said that the Romulans traded their own designs and tech to the Klingons, per the Klingon cloaked BoP in STIII. But then both ENT and DSC establish that Klingons had both cloak tech and BoPs a long time ago.

It's my opinion that the Romulans just didn't have good enough ship tech, so they stole better ships from other races, and then realized that they needed to isolate themselves from everyone for a long time so that they could focus on rebuilding a new fleet of their own, which is why we see huge warbirds in TNG.

 

[TrickyDickie]

I seem to remember a TOS novel a long time ago that worked it out as being cheaper for the Romulans to purchase ships from the Klingons....and that they then did a lot of complaining about the quality.

 

[Christopher]

The simplest explanation is that they just bought the ships from the Klingons. It's not unprecedented for a nation with a lot of experience building naval vessels to sell them to another country. IIRC from history class, part of the reason the Ottoman Empire sided against the UK in World War One was because the UK (specifically a racist military official named Winston Churchill) had reneged on a deal to supply the Ottomans with a pair of British-built warships, nationalizing them for the UK even though the Ottomans had already paid for them.

It always seemed fairly clear to me that the Romulan Bird of Prey was inferior to a Constitution-class starship except for certain advantages like the plasma torpedo and the cloaking device. But Klingon battlecruisers are more of a match for Starfleet's finest. So since the Romulans were pursuing a policy of renewed confrontation with the Federation, it made sense to shore up their military power to match Starfleet's, and they could do that faster by buying (or leasing?) ships from the Klingons.

 

[apepa]

Technology exchanges are a common occurrence within military alliances. Just buying Klingon ships would save them the time and expense of R&D.

 

[Dukhat]

Now that you mention it, I do recall Geordi mentioning in TNG that there was a former alliance between the Romulans and the Klingons, which would negate the idea that the Romulans simply stole the ships.

 

[Paradise City]

The big military powers in real life trade arms, ships..etc. Anyone remember the big ship the French tried to sell the Russians until the French government pulled the plug on it?

Well, the Klingons sold them a fleet of their ships to augment the Romulan fleet during some period were they where close.

 

[Christopher]

The Klingon-Romulan alliance is one of those bits of information that were introduced in The Making of Star Trek and thus always taken as fact even though they were never stated onscreen -- like Kirk being the youngest starship captain and the forward dish being a navigational deflector.

 

[Dukhat]

^See my reply above. I'm pretty sure Geordi made a comment to that effect. Unfortunately I can't recall which episode it was. I think it was when they found out that the Duras sister were working with Sela.

 

[Christopher]

^Sorry, I meant that they were never stated onscreen in TOS. But in the years that followed, they were always taken as gospel because The Making of Star Trek was the book about the show back then. And that means that when Trek was revived in later movies and shows, they tended to canonize certain things from TMoST that were not canonical in TOS itself. (For instance, the term "mind meld" was used only twice in TOS and never in TAS, with other terms like "mind touch" and "mind probe" being used more often; but because TMoST used "mind meld," it became codified as the default term in every Trek production from 1979 onward. Also, while James Blish's "Space Seed" adaptation was the first mention of TOS taking place in the 23rd century, TMoST also asserted it, and so that became the accepted default in the movies and after.)

 

[Dukhat]

Ah, ok.

 

[Unicron]

Though not canon, the FASA Trekverse mainly had it more of an alliance of convenience than anything else. The Klingons and the Romulans had been having conflicts long before either encountered the Federation, and the Romulan War was actually a result of the Romulans mistaking Federation species for being either Klingon allies or even a Klingon ruse. They eventually developed a military alliance and technology exchange, in which the Romulans got some Klingon ships and the Klingons got a handful of designs along with cloaking technology and plasma weaponry (neither of which they liked much, apparently). The Federation served as a common enemy, but the bad blood between both empires made it a very tenuous agreement at best.

 

[I am Nomad]

I seem to remember a TOS novel a long time ago that worked it out as being cheaper for the Romulans to purchase ships from the Klingons....and that they then did a lot of complaining about the quality.

You are correct. The Klingon ships actually had more recall than Ford does today

 

[Valenti]

Unless they used the design to trick other races into thinking that they are Klingons.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Seemed like the Klingon ships were superior to the Romulan Bird of Prey from "Balance of Terror," so something the Romulans would want. Maybe the Romulans traded cloaking devices for Klingon ships and/or Klingon designs. It would explain how the Klingons got cloaking technology.

 

[Phaser Two]

My least favorite part of that is Spock waiting until they see the D-7s to announce that intelligence reports that Romulans are now using Klingon ship designs. Did he forget to read and/or share that memo earlier?

 

[Valenti]

The report probably said that they sometimes use their designs, and he just wanted to see it before he told them.

 

[Phaser Two]

No, the line is very definitive, and that was information that Scotty, as third-in-command, really needed to know in advance. It's clumsily handled.

 

[Valenti]

Third season. GR was out fishing. Or maybe it was confidential, top secret and on a need to know basis.

 

[ALF]

TOS: The Enterprise Incident

SCOTTY: That’s a Klingon ship! But it couldn’t be; not in this area.

SPOCK: Intelligence reports Romulans now using Klingon design.

The simplest explanation is that they just bought the ships from the Klingons.

That's what I always believed. It was a commercial transaction or in part of a swap of cloaking tech for surplus Klingon ships, the ship yards of Qo'nos evidently churn out D7's/K'tinga's non stop for centuries for the glory of Kahless.

All the legionaires of Romulus lined up and were given paint and buckets to complete the campy task of adorning the Klingon battle cruiser hulls with gloriously striking depictions of war birds in flight!

Though not canon, the FASA Trekverse mainly had it more of an alliance of convenience than anything else. The Klingons and the Romulans had been having conflicts long before either encountered the Federation, and the Romulan War was actually a result of the Romulans mistaking Federation species for being either Klingon allies or even a Klingon ruse. They eventually developed a military alliance and technology exchange, in which the Romulans got some Klingon ships and the Klingons got a handful of designs along with cloaking technology and plasma weaponry (neither of which they liked much, apparently). The Federation served as a common enemy, but the bad blood between both empires made it a very tenuous agreement at best.

That's really interesting... I never considered the military advantage of a common enemy using the same ship... that seems like a strategy with a very Romulan edge.
Star Fleet Battles... never played but I have some of those old modules and rulebooks and they are really fun to browse through. Maybe the Enterprise writers mined those old FASA modules for season 4 ideas.