Once again, you only lose me at "only." And to be honest, the more you emphasize it, the less I'm really seeing the big issue with the window placement.
With the curvature of the saucer, would they not provide at least a partially unobstructed view out from under the (clearly non-NX) nacelles? It looks like they would to me, from the oblique views. And even if not, there are windows on the aft module—which is definitely no NX component either—that would seem to offer little or no more than a view of the (also not NX) pylons! Had I my choice, I might well prefer a view of the pretty swirling Bussards to that. (And what would be wrong with there? I don't recall offhand
any onscreen evidence that nacelles emit dangerous radiation
from the outside, despite this being suggested by Matt Jefferies and others behind the scenes over the years. If I've forgotten something canonical, I welcome correction.) Heck, maybe that
is the very purpose of those windows, to observe and monitor
their function? Maybe a lot of things. IMO, your explanation is a perfectly reasonable one; it is merely your suggestion that it's "the only way to explain it" which is not.
...although, for all we know, she and her convoy were unmanned robot drones like the
Woden from "The Ultimate Computer" (TOS) and those from "More Tribbles, More Troubles" (TAS)—and presumably those which visited the similarly automated lithium cracking station on Delta Vega only once every twenty years per "Where No Man Has Gone Before" (TOS)—with only a lonely maintenance engineer putatively "commanding" her at that moment to send the alleged distress call! ("Babel" [DS9] saw O'Brien musing about such a posting a century further on, too.)
At any rate, "Fortunate Son" (ENT) itself
did show us that among cargo haulers, some were quite content with the idea of retaining their tried-and-true Warp Two engines, even if others feared they would need at least a Warp Three one to keep afloat in the oncoming Warp Five era. But my point was merely that the option was apparently available to them. Personally, it's harder for me to envision forward-thinking Starfleet choosing not to take advantage of such an option in newly-built vessels than it is to imagine them electing not to refit outdated ships with faster engines they weren't designed for, or indeed doing exactly the latter, but the process being an undertaking that would require years to carry out. However, I do concede that there could be "reasons" for the first scenario, and further that the point becomes entirely moot if we simply ignore the script's suggestion of the
Intrepid as being a Warp Two vessel altogether.
Indeed, although the
Nebula might be an even more apt comparison, since IIRC it duplicates the proportions and window arrangement of the
Galaxy's components even more exactly. We can't really say from canon whether the former predates or postdates the latter, either—although there are
Nebula registry numbers significantly lower than any the
U.S.S. Galaxy's, we all know that's a bit of rabbit hole, as it's quite...
nebulous...as to precisely how their order of assignment correlates with that of respective design and construction timelines. (I am reminded yet again of so many debates of yesteryear here!
)
At
least. In actual fact, discounting the series bible's suggestion that the organization had been around for "less than twenty years" and going strictly by what's onscreen, it might well be even
older than that. In "Fusion" (ENT), Archer showed T'Pol an astronomy book he received for his eighth birthday, in which he had inscribed "from the library of
Admiral Jonny Archer" in expression of his "high hopes as a kid." So Starfleet
might have been at least
envisioned by that point already.
In "
Horizon" (ENT), Archer told Mayweather that he'd given serious thought to serving on a cargo ship "a few years before Starfleet was chartered" which could have been at any point before or after this (despite Memory Alpha making the unwarranted assumption that it would have been around his senior year in college). Yet, even if his father had imparted to him pipe dreams of a future space exploration service in which Archer hoped to serve and eventually oversee, he might nevertheless have been anxious to get "out there" as quickly as possible without having to wait around for such to come to fruition.
Of course, maybe the ECS has "admirals" too, for all we know. And there would surely have been any number of previous space forces that predated both. UESPA was around by 2067 per "Friendship One" (VGR), and someone had to have fought those four Man-Kzin wars from "The Slaver Weapon" (TAS), after all...in any case, Starfleet probably wouldn't have had so much as a single ship to its name at the time of its initial charter. No telling how long it would take to build the old
Bonaventure and install her warp drive, making her the first, per "The Time Trap" (TAS)!
For a real world example, the U.S. Navy, following on from the earlier Continental one disbanded in the wake of the Revolution, was established by the Naval Act of 1794, with construction commencing almost immediately on six frigates (including the
Constitution and
Constellation!), but it would ultimately not be until 1798 that the smaller man-of-war
U.S.S. Ganges would become the first of its vessels to actually set sail.
Lots and lots of room for various speculations and interpretations there! (And even though mine here were sparked by your post,
@Christopher, please don't feel this is meant as an argument with it specifically, but rather more an addition or expansion to your point!)
Well, I don't know about anyone else, but I for one am having more fun with it today than I was a couple of days ago! (Speaking of which, there's another word that can range in meaning from a strict pairing of two to some slightly greater quantity, even if the latter usage may drive prescriptivists up the wall!)
Alas, I can never get through more than a minute or two of their smirking at a time, sadly. (No offense intended, should they be with us today.) Can anyone summarize or give a specific time index as to the most pertinent points? Did they obtain any further info from Eaves or other production personnel about their intentions, or are they merely shooting the breeze like we all are here? In either case, live and let live, say I!
-
MMoM
