The Borg - their Status

[Timo]

otherwise they would have assimilated the entire galaxy a long time ago

What evidence do we have that this hasn't happened already? In the 24th century, the Borg are readily found in the Delta and Alpha quadrants at least, and probably in Beta as well (although we seldom hear mention of this quadrant anywhere in Trek).

However, in none of those quadrants are the Borg "in control" or otherwise a visible presence. They always lurk in the shadows, assimilate a world here, a world there, and apparently virtually never keep a world they have assimilated, preferring to live in deep space in their ships or other constructs. For all we know, the entire galaxy is already permeated by them, as evidenced by our heroes running into them basically wherever they go. (The heroes just haven't gone to Gamma much, due to the Dominion blocking the way...)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Mr Silver]

otherwise they would have assimilated the entire galaxy a long time ago

What evidence do we have that this hasn't happened already? In the 24th century, the Borg are readily found in the Delta and Alpha quadrants at least, and probably in Beta as well (although we seldom hear mention of this quadrant anywhere in Trek).

However, in none of those quadrants are the Borg "in control" or otherwise a visible presence. They always lurk in the shadows, assimilate a world here, a world there, and apparently virtually never keep a world they have assimilated, preferring to live in deep space in their ships or other constructs. For all we know, the entire galaxy is already permeated by them, as evidenced by our heroes running into them basically wherever they go. (The heroes just haven't gone to Gamma much, due to the Dominion blocking the way...)

Timo Saloniemi

Well i'm with you on them assimilating different worlds all over the Galaxy, but they haven't assimilated "The Entire Galaxy"

The Borg originated in the Delta Quadrant from a canon point of view, when or how, doesn't matter, but what does is that on the 14th century it was established in VOY that they only controlled a handfull of planets in the Delta Quadrant

Later on in the 22nd Century The Borg transmitted the location of Earth to the Delta Quadrant, in the 23rd Century, The Borg destroyed the El-Aurian home planet (which was likely on the edge of the Delta Quadrant,it can't have been much later that the Enterprise B rescued the refugee ships in the Beta Quadrant)

In the mid 24th Century the Borg assimilated the Hansen's and then later the Enterprise D encountered a Borg Cube in System J-25, 2 years later the Borg attempted to Assimilate Earth's inhabitants

Basically what i'm saying is, is that the Borg have only assimilated planets within the Delta Quadrant, in other quadrants they've merely destroyed civilisations and assimilated the inhabitants and technology as to why thats unknown, but they've only ever tried to assimilate Earth on one occasion (and that was when the Enterprise E tharwted them in the past, the other time could have been like what they did with other planets, scooping their technology off the planet and assimilating the inhabitants, leaving nothing but massive craters where civilisations once were)

The Borg don't rely fully on Biological matter, therefore they would have no need for a planet, as we've seen, the Borg build giant Unimatrix' in Space

What i'm getting at is that the Borg operate from the Delta Quadrant, they move around the Galaxy choosing civilisations to assimilate, but they don't actually take over planets...if they did then the entire Alpha Quadrant would be overrun by them

 

[Timo]

The Borg originated in the Delta Quadrant from a canon point of view

I don't think there's any canon data on Borg origins. All we know is that our heroes think the Borg were in Delta before they were elsewhere - and we also know our heroes are often mistaken about the Borg. Even our inside agents to the Collective have been established as being ill-informed at times, because the Collective lies to its members.

what does is that on the 14th century it was established in VOY that they only controlled a handfull of planets in the Delta Quadrant

...By another bunch of fallible Borg adversaries, and as regarded their immediate neighborhood ("Dragon's Teeth"). What would they know? VOY spent time and effort establishing that the Borg work in mysterious ways, and aren't seen when they don't want to be seen, which is most of the time.

Basically what i'm saying is, is that the Borg have only assimilated planets within the Delta Quadrant, in other quadrants they've merely destroyed civilisations and assimilated the inhabitants and technology

But we only know of two planets the Borg might have assimilated. One was in Delta, and was destroyed in "Scorpion". The other was Earth, in the alternate timeline of ST:FC. That doesn't yet make for much of a pattern.

What i'm getting at is that the Borg operate from the Delta Quadrant, they move around the Galaxy choosing civilisations to assimilate, but they don't actually take over planets

I'd like to undersign everything else but not the "they operate from Delta" part, as it seems unnecessary. They operate from their cubeships and unimatrix-cities, and we have seen the former basically everywhere and have no pressing reason to think the latter wouldn't be everywhere as well.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Deks]

I would just like to add that the Borg did assimilate another species planet while Voyager was in the D.Q.
It was species 10026 (during Dark Frontier two parter).
At the very least we know that there were 300 000 individuals (virtually all of the population) that were assimilated.

 

[Timo]

They assimilated that culture. But the question was whether they conquered the planet, that is, whether the assimilated people continued to live on that planet. In the short term, they of course would - but in the medium term, they might all build cubeships and begin standard Borg life in interstellar space.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Deks]

True.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Borg left those drones on that planet for resource utilization.

 

[Chicagoan]

Actually, I wonder just how (to use Asimov’s term) “planetary chauvinist” the Borg are. I could easily see the Borg branching out von Neumann probe-style, utilizing organics and metals from Oort clouds and asteroid belts to build up their resources—making possible the assimilation of entire solar systems. Or are the Borg too humanoid-centric for that?

 

[Deks]

I doubt they are too humanoid-centric.
The writers are on the other hand which resulted in the Borg becoming depicted like that sometimes.

 

[Timo]

The idea of the vast Unimatrix One space habitat was an interesting one, though. Fits right in with the Borg being the new Bigfoot, living way off the beaten path.

"TNZ", "Q Who?" and "BoBW" were all sort of scary in giving us a threat force that, when encountering a helpless planet, chooses to violate it not by conventional conquest or bombardment but by scooping up entire cities and then leaving. That's somewhat ghastly and downright inhuman - we would understand conquest or destruction, all too easily at that, but the senseless empty holes are like malevolent crop circles to us.

That's already two strikes against the Borg taking a conventional view at planets. It might be fun to see them proceed even further, perhaps entirely dismantling an assimilated planet for raw material in some weird megaconstruct project...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[F. King Daniel]

I'm sure this has come up already, but: We saw Borgified Earth in First Contact.

I somehow doubt that was the only time it happened - wasn't there mention during "Scorpion" that 8472 had destroyed several Borg worlds?

 

[timelord1010]

I'm just curious if the Trek writers took the idea of the Borg scooping cities off of planet's surfaces from Superman. Braniac (another cyborg) scooped cities off of planets including Kandor on Krypton.

 

[SWHouston]

Found another "place" where the Borg had a problem...

In Voyager, they ran across a Planet, where there were about 80,000 X-Borg. This was in or near the Nekrit Expanse in the Delta Quad.

Something happened to their Cube, and they had to transport down to the Planet. Nothing was said about exactly which one.

Ref at...
http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Borg_Cooperative

These are not the same group as those connected to the Hugh Conglomerate, who I'm pretty sure are in the Alpha Quad somewhere.