The latest episode implied that there are warlords running the show in various parts of the former Empire. No doubt a few have Warbirds at their disposal and use them to keep control of their little fiefdoms.
the Remans should create their own independent government now that the empire that conquered and enslaved them is destroyed
Belgian Congo may be the most (in)famous (today) political entity, which bore the title "free state", but far from the only one. Throughout history, there have been many other free states that greatly differed from each other in appearance and form of government. Perhaps the writer had in mind a completely different free state when he composed this story. Perhaps he did not mean anything at all. He just got tired of all these endless sci-fi galactic republics, empires, federations, confederations, dominions, protectorates, unions, concordates ... How about something new and original? Oh, Free State! This is something that is not found every day in the space opera! Let's use it.
No Neutral Zone doesn't mean no border. Unless the Romulan Free State is a Federation member, their ships would need clearance to pass through. And maybe Romulans just prefer to mostly keep to themselves in their own space. Kor
This assumes a decent number made it out. Remember their planet was in the blast radius of the supernova as well, and they would not likely be well loved considering what happened with Shinzon less than 10 years earlier.
The Romulan military may not have had a great number of ships to begin with. They seem to always be about misdirection, giving an impression of a large military force of ships. Makes sense given their covert lifestyle. Why build a large force when you can make an enemy think you have one? They seemed to be all on par, power and size wise, to Galaxy class ships. But we never see a great deal of them, even during the Dominion War. It's very possible that after the heavy losses during the Dominion War, and possibly more losses with the supernova, there may only be a handful of D'Deridex class ships and the like left. That would explain why we saw a TOS style ship than, say, a NEMESIS one. Or even one like Admiral Jarok used in "The Defector", though that was more a scout than an attack vessel.
The current state of the former Romulan Empire reminds me of the multitude of kingdoms that came out of the fall of the western Roman Empire. I always assumed we'd see something like this when the Federation fell (and maybe we still will). Perhaps what's happening with the Romulans is a foreshadowing of what we'll see on the other show. (I know TPTB say the two shows won't be linked, but I don't buy it- too much opportunity to use one to set up the other)
I never thought they got wiped out. Only had their space born projection capability severely crippled.
The Obsidian Order is the one that was wiped out. The Tal Shiar survived. They're referred to in the present tense in "Inquisition" (DS9) and "Message In a Bottle" (VOY). It's another example of how the Romulans can take and know how to take more hits than the Cardassians and still keep going.
Considering the Tal Shiar was just a mask for the Zhat Vash, an ancient secret society that secretly controlled the Romulan Empire, it's no surprise they were back so soon, meanwhile the Obsidian Order and Cardassian Central Command barely tolerated each other. The Tal Shiar was in a much better position to survive the Dominion ambush than the Obsidian Order.
We know that there is also a lot of warlordism. Critically, this seems to straddle the former Neutral Zone; Vashti, IIRC from the novel, was on the Federation side. That a Romulan warbird can cross the frontier implies to me that the Federation may also be slipping. We may be starting to see a pluralization of Romulan civilization. With the old uniformity forced by the Star Empire and isolation gone, with the Neutral Zone being permeable and with multiple movements afoot, we may see the birth of multiple permanent Romulan states.
I believe that V'draysh (federation) is now a kind of fascist state that dominates much of the galaxy
There's no evidence of that. Assuming that the V'draysh actually are (in some way) connected with the Federation - which has not been proven, I might add - this doesn't mean they're the bad guys. For all we know, Craft and his people are.
I believe that those troops that attack the members of the discovery where there are humans, Andorian, Cardassian are the V'draysh
^ We have no idea who those troops are. Hell, we don't know if the V'draysh will turn up AT ALL in DSC, nor even if "Calypso" will be dealt with in any way.