Why didn't anyone on Voyager know about the Dominion?

[PKTrekGirl]

Jack Bauer said:
They obvioously knew about the Dominion since we saw Paris training Kes to fly a shuttle and you could see Jem'Hadar ships flying past the viewscreen.

Humm...I had completely forgotten about this, it's been so long since I watched VOY.

What episode is that in?

Because the Jem'Hadar were instant enemies from the moment they appeared on DS9....and the only point in having them in a shuttle training scenario is BECAUSE they were known enemies.

So it seems to me that as of this episode where Paris is teaching Kes to fly the shuttle, not only was the Dominion 'on the radar'...they were known as enemies. And further, that pictures of their ships had been relayed to the VOY crew somehow. Otherwise they would not have been programmable into the training scenario.

Since I don't recall which episode this is in...I'm wondering if this is a continuity error.... Was this before VOY made contact with the Federation???

If it was, how did they know what a Jem'Hadar ship looked like?

 

[exodus]

PKTrekGirl said:

Jack Bauer said:
They obvioously knew about the Dominion since we saw Paris training Kes to fly a shuttle and you could see Jem'Hadar ships flying past the viewscreen.

Humm...I had completely forgotten about this, it's been so long since I watched VOY.

What episode is that in?

Because the Jem'Hadar were instant enemies from the moment they appeared on DS9....and the only point in having them in a shuttle training scenario is BECAUSE they were known enemies.

So it seems to me that as of this episode where Paris is teaching Kes to fly the shuttle, not only was the Dominion 'on the radar'...they were known as enemies. And further, that pictures of their ships had been relayed to the VOY crew somehow. Otherwise they would not have been programmable into the training scenario.

Since I don't recall which episode this is in...I'm wondering if this is a continuity error.... Was this before VOY made contact with the Federation???

If it was, how did they know what a Jem'Hadar ship looked like?

It's the ep. where Neelix and Tom fight over her by throwing pasta, then they're sent to a planet to get supplies but end up nursing a baby alien instead.


Before Voyager had departed DS9, Sisko & Quark had already encountered the Jem'Hadar and they had been aware of the Dominion since second season. Being that Voyager's first mission was into the badlands, I'm pretty sure they had to have their data updated being they were that close to DS9 & the wormhole. However, not much else was known about the Jem'Hadar nor the Dominion at the time. The only info they probably had available was their ship design.

 

[PKTrekGirl]

Thanks, exodus. I decided to stop being lazy and look it up at Jammer's. I didn't include stardates...but by air dates alone we can see that there is not a continuity problem, necessarily.

6/13/94 - The Jem'Hadar (Sisko & Quark get captured by Jem'Hadar and discover the Jem'Hadar and Vorta, as well as see Jem'Hadar ships. Figure they are 'bad guys' but do not really grasp the full picture yet of who/what The Dominion is.)

1/16/95 - Caretaker (Voyager lost in DQ)

4/24/95 & 5/1/95 - Improbable Cause/The Die is Cast (first real indication that we are headed in the direction of war on DS9)

10/9/95 - Parturition (Paris uses training program with Jem'Hadar vessels included) (DS9 episodes occurring around this time - Way of the Warrior, The Visitor, Hippocratic Oath)

2/17/97 - By Inferno's Light (Cardassia joins The Dominion)

6/16/97 - Call To Arms (DS9 overrun by the Dominion and falls into Dominion hands)

10/27/97 & 11/3/97 - Favor the Bold/Sacrifice of Angels (DS9 taken back by the Federation & the Klingons after miraculous intervention of The Prophets saves the AQ)

1/22/98 - Message in a Bottle (EMH goes back to AQ for first real contact) (DS9 episodes occurring just previous to this time - Waltz, The Magnificent Ferengi, Statistical Probabilities)

2/11/98 - Hunters (Voyager crew learns that AQ Maquis has been wiped out by The Dominion, but First Officer Chakotay is shown to have practically zero information about the Dominion - only that they are the Cardassian's 'new allies')

Okay. So from this, I don't think there is a continuity problem with Paris & the shuttle training program. But I must admit I'm a bit skeptical about the EMH not hearing about the war when he was back in the AQ. I mean, wow! - it would be pretty hard to avoid mention of the war at that point, given that DS9 had been lost and retaken (a fact that was NOT only of concern to those in the Bajoran sector, given the Dominion reinforcements that were sitting on the other side of that wormhole, ready to invade the entire AQ when the minefield came down!) AND the Federation had come within a hair's breath of all-out war with the Klingon Empire as a result of Founder influence.

Not a continuity problem...but I do think it's an omission on the part of the VOY writers. I mean, the Voyager crew perhaps shouldn't have been fully briefed on it...but they should have at least heard of it. I mean, you'd think the EMH's first conversation would go something like this:

EMH: "So...we're lost in the DQ. And by the way, things were so grim that we had to join forces with a Maquis ship! Can you believe that??? By the way, what's new in the AQ?"

EMH2: "Well....I got ya topped there, Doc! See, there's this little war going on...one we might just lose, by the way. So if you do get back here, don't expect business-as-usual. You might just find that you are now a citizen of The Dominion."



In other words, regardless of whether or not the EMH's purpose was intelligence gathering, one would think that the first contact with the AQ in YEARS might entail some degree of basic 'catch-up' as to major events. At the point of Message in a Bottle, discovering the existence of the Dominion War was not a matter of 'intelligence gathering'. At that point, the Dominion War was completely and utterly consuming the resources of the Federation, and indeed threatened it's very existence! So dire were the circumstances, in fact, that Bashir and the Jack Pack had already predicted Federation defeat. Now true, the EMH would have no way of knowing about Bashir and the Jack Pack. But there is no getting around the fact that Statistical Probabilities illustrates clearly that the War was by that time of HUGE concern to every Federation citizen.

Maybe the EMH was not an intelligence gathering unit...but we are not talking intelligence here. We are talking 'awareness of the blatantly obvious'.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Not an exact quote, but I recall these lines from the script...

EMH1 "The Romulans!? Are we at war with the Romulans!?"

EMH2 "The Romulans have chosen to so far remain neutral in our war with the Dominion."

EMH1 "The who?"

The contention here is that the Picardo EMH should have known about the Dominion already because the Dominion destroyed the USS Odyssey and the New Bajor Colony in DS9 Season 2, but these two EMH's did have a conversation similar to what you described, so the argument has been if the Doctor didn't know about the Dominion, then Janeway didn't know about the Dominion so why then was she afraid to set a course for the Bajoran Wormhle 4 and a half years earlier?

 

[exodus]

PKTrekGirl said:
Thanks, exodus. I decided to stop being lazy and look it up at Jammer's. I didn't include stardates...but by air dates alone we can see that there is not a continuity problem, necessarily.

6/13/94 - The Jem'Hadar (Sisko & Quark get captured by Jem'Hadar and discover the Jem'Hadar and Vorta, as well as see Jem'Hadar ships. Figure they are 'bad guys' but do not really grasp the full picture yet of who/what The Dominion is.)

1/16/95 - Caretaker (Voyager lost in DQ)

4/24/95 & 5/1/95 - Improbable Cause/The Die is Cast (first real indication that we are headed in the direction of war on DS9)

10/9/95 - Parturition (Paris uses training program with Jem'Hadar vessels included) (DS9 episodes occurring around this time - Way of the Warrior, The Visitor, Hippocratic Oath)

2/17/97 - By Inferno's Light (Cardassia joins The Dominion)

6/16/97 - Call To Arms (DS9 overrun by the Dominion and falls into Dominion hands)

10/27/97 & 11/3/97 - Favor the Bold/Sacrifice of Angels (DS9 taken back by the Federation & the Klingons after miraculous intervention of The Prophets saves the AQ)

1/22/98 - Message in a Bottle (EMH goes back to AQ for first real contact) (DS9 episodes occurring just previous to this time - Waltz, The Magnificent Ferengi, Statistical Probabilities)

2/11/98 - Hunters (Voyager crew learns that AQ Maquis has been wiped out by The Dominion, but First Officer Chakotay is shown to have practically zero information about the Dominion - only that they are the Cardassian's 'new allies')

Okay. So from this, I don't think there is a continuity problem with Paris & the shuttle training program. But I must admit I'm a bit skeptical about the EMH not hearing about the war when he was back in the AQ. I mean, wow! - it would be pretty hard to avoid mention of the war at that point, given that DS9 had been lost and retaken (a fact that was NOT only of concern to those in the Bajoran sector, given the Dominion reinforcements that were sitting on the other side of that wormhole, ready to invade the entire AQ when the minefield came down!) AND the Federation had come within a hair's breath of all-out war with the Klingon Empire as a result of Founder influence.

Not a continuity problem...but I do think it's an omission on the part of the VOY writers. I mean, the Voyager crew perhaps shouldn't have been fully briefed on it...but they should have at least heard of it. I mean, you'd think the EMH's first conversation would go something like this:

EMH: "So...we're lost in the DQ. And by the way, things were so grim that we had to join forces with a Maquis ship! Can you believe that??? By the way, what's new in the AQ?"

EMH2: "Well....I got ya topped there, Doc! See, there's this little war going on...one we might just lose, by the way. So if you do get back here, don't expect business-as-usual. You might just find that you are now a citizen of The Dominion."



In other words, regardless of whether or not the EMH's purpose was intelligence gathering, one would think that the first contact with the AQ in YEARS might entail some degree of basic 'catch-up' as to major events. At the point of Message in a Bottle, discovering the existence of the Dominion War was not a matter of 'intelligence gathering'. At that point, the Dominion War was completely and utterly consuming the resources of the Federation, and indeed threatened it's very existence! So dire were the circumstances, in fact, that Bashir and the Jack Pack had already predicted Federation defeat. Now true, the EMH would have no way of knowing about Bashir and the Jack Pack. But there is no getting around the fact that Statistical Probabilities illustrates clearly that the War was by that time of HUGE concern to every Federation citizen.

Maybe the EMH was not an intelligence gathering unit...but we are not talking intelligence here. We are talking 'awareness of the blatantly obvious'.

Actaully the EMH did know of the Dominion War upon returning to Voyager in the Delta Q..

After his return, you'll see holograms of Jem'Hadar in "Flesh & Blood". That info to create those images were aquired from Voyager's data base thanks to the EMH.

 

[PKTrekGirl]

^ The OP doesn't say anything about Janeway not setting course for the Bajoran wormhole because she might have feared going through the GQ & meeting up with the Dominion. Isn't that discussion taking place in another thread? I've not read the other thread, but I see there is one about the wormhole. And I don't understand why the EMH NOT knowing about the Dominion (not the war, because he should have been the first to learn of the war - I'm talking *just* about the existence of the Dominion) would be any sort of proof that Janeway didn't know about them early on.

However, I don't think she should have been afraid based on the destruction of the Odyssey and New Bajor way back in season 2 of DS9. Ships and colonies are destroyed all the time in the Trek universe...so why she would be especially afraid of the Dominion at the point in time of Caretaker and it's immediate aftermath doesn't seem to make much sense....especially since civilian supply ships were going through the wormhole all the time and there was alot of trade going on without incident.

I guess the problem I was addressing was Chakotay's apparent cluelessness about the Dominion War at the time of Hunters (I am assuming this is what the OP was talking about in his first paragraph). If the EMH took that conversation with EHM2 to it's logical conclusion, then Chakotay, who was first officer, should have known more than he did about 'the Cardassian's allies'....who were infinitely more dangerous - not just to the Maquis, but to EVERYONE in the AQ, than were the Cardassians.

 

[PKTrekGirl]

exodus said:
Actaully the EMH did know of the Dominion War upon returning to Voyager in the Delta Q..

After his return, you'll see holograms of Jem'Hadar in "Flesh & Blood". That info to create those images were aquired from Voyager's data base thanks to the EMH.

But Flesh and Blood didn't air until 11/29/2000. That is well after Pathfinder - well after Voyager had established a solid link with the AQ. And LONG after the initial contact was made in Message in a Bottle in early 1998. If the EMH didn't know what the Jem'Hadar looked like by THEN, well, he would have had to have been the most clueless crewmember ever.

After Chakotay, that is.

 

[Guy Gardener]

After rereading the original post. I think the real question is: Why did everyone on Voyager keep forgetting about the Dominion?

 

[DanTheGrey]

After all is said and done I figure it was because of

Vidiians, Hirogen and Borg...oh my

Or...not much we can do about it, let's just focus on our problems.

 

[I am not Spock]

Good Dominion timeline, there, PKTrekGirl. A good read.

I agree, the EMH seems incredibly dumb for not bringing back any info about the Dominion when he returned from the AQ in 'Message in a Bottle'.

 

[Akiraprise]

Remember there was a limit on how large his datafile could be. If I recall correctly all non essential files were deleted before he was sent so he could be compressed in the data stream. Starfleet probably gave him as much essential information, that pertained to Voyager and getting them home, as possible when they sent him back. The Dominion weren't exactly a concern for Voyager.

 

[Timo]

...so why she would be especially afraid of the Dominion at the point in time of Caretaker and it's immediate aftermath doesn't seem to make much sense....especially since civilian supply ships were going through the wormhole all the time and there was alot of trade going on without incident.

To be sure, the first time we hear of trade resuming after the Odyssey incident would be "The Abandoned", where the Boslic skipper lady is said to be "still" going to Gamma, supposedly one of the very few who are braving the known risks. Even Quark doesn't seem to realize that anybody would be doing that! And "The Abandoned", a non-stardated episode in the middle of a long run of non-stardated episodes, still apparently takes place closer to "Defiant" dated at 48423 than "The Search II" dated at 48213. The Voyager sailed out on 48315.6...

The last thing Janeway would have learned about the wormhole is that Captain Sisko had threatened to blow it up for good if the Dominion made a wrong move, and had then made good his threat (even if only virtually). If that isn't a reason to be afraid, then I can't think of anything that would be.

Remember there was a limit on how large his datafile could be. If I recall correctly all non essential files were deleted before he was sent so he could be compressed in the data stream.

You don't recall correctly, I'm afraid: the heroes had only minutes between the realization that a hologram could be sent through the Hirogen commnet, and the moment that the starship at the other end would sail out of range, and thus they hastily shoved the Doctor through without modifying him in any way.

At least there is no dialogue to the effect that the EMH would have been modified for the mission. And if it were possible to selectively delete parts of his mental ballast, surely this would have been done in "The Swarm" to save him from the accumulated opera scores that were crushing him.

The Doctor seems to have gone through from Delta to Alpha with all his mental faculties intact (unless they were damaged in transit accidentally). And those faculties thus do not appear to contain knowledge of a Federation enemy called "the Dominion".

Or then the Doctor, at least in his new and increasingly sentient form, is capable of forgetting things under pressure.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Akiraprise]

My bad. I was thinking of "Life Line" where they extracted most of his nonessential enhancements because his program was too large for the data stream back to the Alpha Quadrant.

 

[Timo]

Yup, and that's rather interesting as such. When Seven had the time to prune the Doctor's program, she removed specific skills from it - singing algorithms, athletic abilities and grandmaster chess program, painting skills, and possibly (but not necessarily) his ability to recite poetry, play hoverball, and practice holophotography and sex. Apparently, a skill takes up more room than anything else non-vital. Seven never mentioned removing any idle information from the EMH's virtual head.

Although she could probably have done that without mentioning anything. She didn't voluntarily tell the Doctor about the missing skill sets, either.

In any case, the Project Pathfinder comm channel probably behaved differently enough from the Hirogen array to render all such speculation moot.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[exodus]

PKTrekGirl said:

exodus said:
Actaully the EMH did know of the Dominion War upon returning to Voyager in the Delta Q..

After his return, you'll see holograms of Jem'Hadar in "Flesh & Blood". That info to create those images were aquired from Voyager's data base thanks to the EMH.

But Flesh and Blood didn't air until 11/29/2000. That is well after Pathfinder - well after Voyager had established a solid link with the AQ. And LONG after the initial contact was made in Message in a Bottle in early 1998. If the EMH didn't know what the Jem'Hadar looked like by THEN, well, he would have had to have been the most clueless crewmember ever.

After Chakotay, that is.

You answered part of your question.(follow your timeline) The EMH would have known about the Dominion & the war after his return to Voyager in "Message in a Bottle". He would have be breifed and debriefed by Starfleet.

The EMH is designed originally for only medical use, the only info he would orginally have on the Jem'Hadar would be the phyical information to treat them if sick or injured. Being that Starfleet had no such info before Voyager left DS9, the EMH would know absolutely nothing of them.

Chakotay wouldn't know of the Dominion because the Maquis gather info from second hand sources. They don't have the intelligence network Starfleet, Romulans or Cardassians have. They get info from spies, smugglers & traders.