Good points, I agree.
Vreenak
- Thread starter Finn
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In any other case, I might agree. But the data rod isn't a matter of technobabble. It's futuristic disk. Nothing more complicated about it. Okay, it's a super indestructible write-protected disk, but still. It's not like the writers were going for deus ex machina in this one... For once. Actually I think the writing was very neat in this case.
It's not at all illogical to presume that a shuttle would have limited resources in comparison to a ship, a base, or a dedicated forensic science facility. Indeed, even in-universe, we have instances in which starbases are deemed to have superior capabilities, and sometimes ships with dedicated purposes are called in to continue work our heroes began.
Given that, I don't think it's all that unreasonable to imagine that Garak would want to avoid an unaltered (undamaged) disk arriving at such a facility where the odds of detection would increase.
I don't know much about espionage as a trade -- I'm sure 99.9% of us don't -- but I'd like to think that spies make it a point to do their jobs as thoroughly as possible. If not as a matter of simple professionalism and a desire to be as effective as possible, than at least as a matter of personal safety. Sloppy work tends to create all kinds of problems.
Tolar was necessary to get the best stuff. Would anybody believe that legitimate archive data from the Kremlin would be hand delivered on a simple 3M floppy instead of a nearly-indestructible QR disc? It had to be the best to pass muster. I suppose there are other Tolar's around who could have done the work, but were they available and readily accessible?
And I don't think any dead Senator would do. Vreenak's political position makes him the perfect candidate. A senator with anti-Dominion leanings returning to Romulus -- dead or alive -- would seem much too convenient.
Imagine the shock over Donald Trump bringing forth documents "proving" that trickle-down economics works? Nobody would bat en eyelash. But if Hillary Clinton was the one to bring that same evidence forward, seemingly intent on endorsing its claims, that would make a lot of people think long and hard about it.
Vreenak's situation is similar. A pro-neutrality person getting killed while trying to bring forth evidence contrary to his position. Now that's a lot more convincing. It had to be him (or another with similar political leanings).
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Also remember that nobody on Vreenak's side knew about Garak's involvement.
The prime pathology of the Romulans is that they believe that they are always the smartest,sneakiness guys in the room.And that the Feds(with their usual high-mindedness) could never put one over on them.
Remember your own and the audiences reaction when you realised the scope of what was transpiring,many could not reconcile Sisko's gambit with their idea of Starfleet ideals.
The prime pathology of the Romulans is that they believe that they are always the smartest,sneakiness guys in the room.And that the Feds(with their usual high-mindedness) could never put one over on them.
Remember your own and the audiences reaction when you realised the scope of what was transpiring,many could not reconcile Sisko's gambit with their idea of Starfleet ideals.
Yeah, whatever. But there should be some internal consistency to these things even if only within an episode. A perfect rod helps cover all the bases. A rod and a wreckage is better than a refined but vulnerable forgery waiting on a Tal Shiar table to be dissected by the Empire's finest minds.
I wonder what kind of explosion would kill everyone and yet let the rod sufficiently intact to retain some of its memory? I mean a bit too damaged and you can't tell what's on it at all, a bit too undamaged and you can see signs of forgery. The bomb must be fine tuned.
Dunno. It might be something like the black boxes of today. Black Boxes' can withstand terrific explosions but of course aren't categorically indestructible and the information salvaged is usually someway distressed to a lesser or greater degree.
Really? I thought it was pretty much an all or nothing situation. I mean either the box withstand the conditions of the catastrophe and its contents remain intact or it is too much for it and it is damaged beyond any retrieval.
Garak was hoping that the forgery would hold up, knowing that if it didn't he could still kill him. There's no reason to think Vreenak was a changeling and if he was it'd make the episode less cool, not more.
I don't see Vreenak using DS9 equipment to send such a privileged communication, and Garak could have set up a dampening field or any number of things to prevent communication from his ship. For me the tough thing to believe is that Garak could have counted on the rod being completely readable but still plausibly damaged in such a way for the imperfections to be plausibly the result of the damage.
I don't see Vreenak using DS9 equipment to send such a privileged communication, and Garak could have set up a dampening field or any number of things to prevent communication from his ship. For me the tough thing to believe is that Garak could have counted on the rod being completely readable but still plausibly damaged in such a way for the imperfections to be plausibly the result of the damage.
Kll both guards so smoothly that Vreenak or anyone in his crew doesn't even notice until he's on his ship? And plant a bomb? And have the ship depart the station by remote control, while keeping up a flawless radio dialogue with Ops? Garak is good, but that's more in the realm of Dr. Bashir's secret agent holosuite program than a practical plan.
I guess there's always technobabble to fall back on. Pity. The episode as presented is character driven and would work just as well translated into 20th century terms.
Well, how the bomb got onto the ship is left to Garak's spymaster-assassin mystique. One might imagine a micro-transporter carried along some sort of normal background signal within the ship. Or whatever. But I don't really see the problem in blowing it up. You got the specs in hand, you know the mass of the ship, you calibrate the amount needed to blow up the ship, the best place to place the bomb for the desired effect that will kill everyone whilst ensuring there's a sufficient debris field with a Dominion signature. You take a reasonable risk that the rod might still be lost for all of that. Easy peasy, lol.
However, this will all be for nothing if the rod is too damaged for any retrieval. That's the thing I have a hard time believing. I mean if you damage a dvd for example with something as crude as an explosive device. How can you make sure that you've erased all the telltale signs that it's been tampered with while leaving enough of it to see what it's about? To me it's like trying to carve a miniature statue with a jackhammer.
Well, we're talking about future fictional technology. A good analogy might be a specialty high security USB drive (i don't know if there is such a thing but bear with me). The explosion has to do several things: Kill Vreenek, (i believe he was traveling alone) make the explosion consistent with disruptor fire, cause some environmental stress to induce minor damage on the data rod. Now these rods are probably not designed to operate in a hard vacuum, so call the exposure and resultant freeze/defrost/background radiation damage A. Add in some heat warping from the explosion - call it B. Where would the rod be kept? I doubt such a piece of damning evidence of the federations inept forgery would be kept in the glove compartment; likely he had small personal safe meant to carry classified documents and valuables, probably rated to withstand some heat and some vacuum while keeping its contents safe. In order to breach it, a much smaller explosive, with half a kilo of standard bulkhead used as a projectile to penetrate the safe. Make it look like it was just some piece of the hull that got shredded by the weapons fire. Call that C.
Certainly doable.
I have no problem believing it all. Garak is the expert and if he says that the imperfections would be passed off as damage from the explosions, then I'm happy to defer to his judgement. And as events turned out his position was vindicated!
I'd say Garak would have to accept the possibility before he went through with this that 1. the rod would be discovered as a forgery even within the wreckage 2. the greater possibility that the rod would've been destroyed outright. This isn't a sure-fire little enterprise for Garak but one with a certain degree of risk attached to it.
I don't think he needed to put things in a safe while on the ship. The only people with him were his guards, people he trusted with his life, and if people boarded the ship then a safe wouldn't have made much of a difference.
They don't count
. It's been quite some time since I saw the episode, I just didn't remember there being guards. I doubt he would have just dropped it in the cupholder on the dash. Whether it was a safe or some other means of carrying it, the sabotage had to inflict minor physical damage on the rod without it being destroyed outright.
They don't count
There was. I watched it the other day. That's why I started this thread
There was. I watched it the other day. That's why I started this thread
He could be a changeling, but it wouldn't affect the story much except that his body (if recovered from the explosion) would be a mass of changeling liquid rather than a dead romulan
And Memory Alpha states that Vreenak was a high ranking member of the Tal Shiar
I think if the rod was in a safe that makes it all the more tricky to damage the rod without destroying it completely. You have to get through the safe first and that means something really violent, something that will likely either vaporize the rod or shatter it into micro pieces.
Garak said he was going to sneak inside the Romulan shuttle looking for intelligence information so that's the ample opportunity right there to plant the bomb.
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