Why are the Borg obsessed with Humans / Earth?

[Deimos Anomaly]

Out of all the Alpha Quadrant powers only one seems to be consistently targeted for conquest and assimilation.

Cardassia, Romulus, Qo'nos and even Vulcan have never had a single cube rolled against them, so far as we know. Earth has had at least two. The latter of those alien worlds is significant too, since it indicates a fixation with Earth / Humans in particular, rather than just the UFP as a whole... Vulcan and Earth are pretty much twin capitals of the Federation but the Borg are only interested in Earth.

It couldn't be for its people either. Humans tend to be a jack of all trades master of none, and for the borg should be a lower priority to make into drones. When you look at some of the others out there... Betazoids are telepathic, as are Vulcans to a degree... and then there are truly remarkable species like the founders, but the Borg seem disinterested despite the possibilities of adding such species to the collective.

 

[F. King Daniel]

There was an episode planned for season five of Enterprise which would have explained this. Alice Krige, playing a Starfleet medical technician, was going to make contact with 22nd century Borg and end up the Borg queen.

Alternately, read the excellent Destiny novel trilogy, which deals with the beginning and the end of the Borg.

 

[Kelthaz]

Poor writing.

They weren't obsessed with Earth until First Contact/Voyager came along and started turning the Borg into a Saturday morning cartoon villain.

 

[C.E. Evans]

I don't think the Borg are that obsessed with Earth, or else they would send more than one Borg cube at a time. At most, Earth is just one of many worlds that the Borg have an interest in assimilating, but it's not a top priority (i.e., a serious aggressive threat) and doesn't warrant more than a single Borg ship to test its defenses (which includes the Federation Starfleet) periodically, IMO. Earth likely received initial attention because it was the homeworld of the Federation, but now because it has successfully resisted two attempts at assimilation thus far.

But the Collective is patient. In the end, resistance will be proven futile anyway for Species 5618--even if it's years, decades, or even centuries from now.

 

[MacLeod]

Or perhaps there is a logic to it, the Borg assimilate technology, launch an attack on Earth every few years and you get to adapt to the new technology.

 

[SFRabid]

In TNG was it not insinuated that the Romulans were also having a problem with the Borg?

 

[cwl]

star trek is made from the perspective of the Federation so we don't get to see too much of what happens to the Romulans, Klingons, etc.

I imagine the Borg have attacked them too but they too managed to overcome the deadly 1 ship at a time strategy.

 

[Tyberius]

Cause Earth has all the hot chicks?

 

[Sci]

Out of all the Alpha Quadrant powers only one seems to be consistently targeted for conquest and assimilation.

Cardassia, Romulus, Qo'nos and even Vulcan have never had a single cube rolled against them, so far as we know. Earth has had at least two. The latter of those alien worlds is significant too, since it indicates a fixation with Earth / Humans in particular, rather than just the UFP as a whole... Vulcan and Earth are pretty much twin capitals of the Federation but the Borg are only interested in Earth.

It's probably just because of the fact that Earth is the capital of the Federation. Cut off the head of the snake and all that.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

It's because Humans Are Special.

 

[Gary7]

I don't see any indication of them being uniquely obsessed with Earth/Humans. Sure, most of the Borg drones appear humanoid. And aside from the assimilation aspect, we do know that on some ships there is a Borg nursery where human looking babies are raised with Borg implants. So, they're definitely humanoid in nature.

But what the Borg are obsessed with is assimilating any technology/civilizations. They were introduced to the Federation (thanks to "Q") and in typical Borg fashion gave serious pursuit. Astonishingly, after the first cube is destroyed at Wolf359, we do not see a massive incursion into Federation space. You'd figure they would consider destruction of one of their ships means a very formidable enemy that they must vanquish (they certainly took this tact with species 8472). It may also be possible that communication from the cube just prior to its destruction gave a clue back to the collective as to what happened... and so the Borg held off on further attack oriented invasions into Federation space until they could close up the gaps in their defenses (like blocking unauthorized use of the "sleep" command). We do not see them make relentless pursuit of assimilating the Federation after BoBW in TNG. The Enterprise does encounter a lone crashed Borg scout ship, where they revive the one surviving occupant, make him aware of individuality, and introduce him back to the collective. So, they're still exploring the Alpha quadrant to some degree. The only other encounters in TNG are from rogue Borg factions, created by Hugh's awareness of individuality while back in the collective. Nothing noted about the Borg in DS9.

 

[Anwar]

I did wonder why the Borg never bothered attacking the Klingon Empire or the Romulans, and why Earth was their sole target.

 

[cwl]

maybe the Borg saw the Federation as a better target as it was a combined group of many civilisations. we dont see many non romulans or non klingons in their empires (though they must exist)

 

[Caesar753]

I don't think the Borg are obsessed with Earth, merely curious. After coming in contact with humans and Federation tech, the Borg wanted to assimilate as usual. If they were really obsessed with Earth, they would have sent more than two cubes total to assimilate the planet.

 

[Jetboogieman]

Out of all the Alpha Quadrant powers only one seems to be consistently targeted for conquest and assimilation.

Cardassia, Romulus, Qo'nos and even Vulcan have never had a single cube rolled against them, so far as we know. Earth has had at least two. The latter of those alien worlds is significant too, since it indicates a fixation with Earth / Humans in particular, rather than just the UFP as a whole... Vulcan and Earth are pretty much twin capitals of the Federation but the Borg are only interested in Earth.

It couldn't be for its people either. Humans tend to be a jack of all trades master of none, and for the borg should be a lower priority to make into drones. When you look at some of the others out there... Betazoids are telepathic, as are Vulcans to a degree... and then there are truly remarkable species like the founders, but the Borg seem disinterested despite the possibilities of adding such species to the collective.

I've come to the conclusion they're not obsessed at all.

So you're the borg queen.

1) you have what may very well be hundreds of thousands of ships at your command, along with billions of drones.

2) A transwarp gateway that can take you almost anywhere in the galaxy INCLUDING directly to Earth.

3) Seemingly the ability to travel back in time.

And what do you do with this massive advantage.

Send one cube to initiate a wierd time travel plot.

Makes complete sense

 

[Mr Silver]

Well the obvious narrative reasons are down to the viewer being able to relate more with a threat to our planet and species from a hostile alien race (metaphors for war, conquer and terrorism) that you would with another species and planet within the Trek story.

In universe, I just put it down to the Borg having a special interest in humans. Like another poster suggested, "Humans Are Special" is a common trope in many forms of science fiction. In Trek its been suggested that there is something unique about humans that intrigues advanced races like the Borg. ENT has a good example where the Vulcans bring up that it took Earth only 100 years to eliminate virtually all planetary issues and refine interstellar travel, compared to the centuries it took the Vulcans.

If anything thats a pretty impressive achievement and something that would warrant such intrigue from other races. As for the Borg not just sending an entire armada or using the transwarp hub. Whats to say the transwarp hub wasn't just a recent thing that the Borg had been developing when Voyager stumbled in its path? Perhaps the Borg's interest in Earth fluctuates constantly? I can't really rationalise why the Borg don't just send an armada and get it over and done with, but if I had to speculate, I would say its due to some kind of admiration. Humans are one of the few races to offer true resistance to conquer from the Borg on multiple occasions. Maybe the Borg seek to challenge them rather than conquer them in an effort to learn how this resistance works (something which they cannot gain through assimilation perhaps?).

 

[Gary7]

I did wonder why the Borg never bothered attacking the Klingon Empire or the Romulans, and why Earth was their sole target.

It's true, we were never told if the Borg attacked the Klingons or the Romulans. In BoBW, Admiral Hansen said the Klingons were sending warships to help fight the Borg, so they certainly knew about them.

Nobody ever brought something like this up on screen: "It's it odd how the Borg haven't attacked the Klingons or the Romulans?" or "We've been contacted by the Klingons--they're requesting our assistance in their fight against the Borg."

The fact that we don't see signs of the Klingons or Romulans being attacked doesn't mean the Borg exclusively engaged the Federation in the Alpha quadrant. I just assume we don't hear about it, because writers had other stories to tell. It's certainly clear that the Borg aren't all about attacking Earth. They've assimilated many thousands of worlds (perhaps even more--can't remember the exact quote), according to Seven of Nine.

 

[Sisko4Life]

The Borg are not obsessed with Earth if they have thousands of vessels and only send one to assimilate Earth. The non-canon invasion of 2381 is much more believable if the Queen truly believed the Feds needed to be conquered.

As for other races, Cardassians are most likely unworthy of assimilation, and I believe there was that minor reference to the Borg Attack in TNG "The Neutral Zone." And we see a Klingon drone Koraack in Unimatrix Zero

 

[CaptainJack]

Considering the fact that it was mentioned in an episode of TNG that the Romulans had a couple of outposts virtually wiped off their respective planets. Id say they didnt just have an obsession with Earth.
Then there is the whole transwarp hub which relates to the OP's question. Basically I can see a great reason why they have only sent 2 cubes at Earth if they dont have the Stupid Transwarp Instant Beaming Technology that the Decepticons had in TFOTM. Which is that overall the Borg are really far away, like Voyager far. So they only had the 2-3 cubes out that far.
Really its the Stupid Transwarp Tech that screws that up. With Transwarp there is NO reason why they havent swarmed Earth. Even if they are intrigued as to how we survived 2 separate assimilation attempts Im sure the 3rd try would be with 10 cubes and Earth would be Assimilated.

 

[Sci]

The Borg are not obsessed with Earth if they have thousands of vessels and only send one to assimilate Earth. The non-canon invasion of 2381 is much more believable if the Queen truly believed the Feds needed to be conquered.

For the record, the Borg Invasion of 2381, depicted in the novel trilogy Star Trek: Destiny, is explicitly established to have been the Collective's reaction to the destruction of the Borg transwarp hubs and the resultant collapse of their entire transwarp system by the Federation starship Voyager in the VOY series finale "Endgame."

Once the Federation had both demonstrated continuing resistance to assimilation and dealt the Collective such a major defeat, the Borg decided that the Federation and, indeed, the entire Alpha Quadrant astropolitical scene, represented too great a potential threat to be allowed to exist. As a result, the Borg Collective invaded en masse, sending an armada of over 7,000 cubes and support vessels as part of an extermination campaign to be waged against the entire Federation, Klingon Empire, and Romulan Star Empire.