Why didn't the Federation help? (SPOILERS)
- Thread starter Brent
- Start date
Long story short, that would have meant sharing Federation, or at least Vulcan red-matter research and tech with the Romulans, and the Vulcans didn't trust the Romulans enough to go along with that. In fact this is exactly why Nero blames the Vulcans and the Federation for Romulus getting destroyed, though this isn't explained very well in the film itself.
Not really, I don't see why that would mean sharing the technology with Romulans.
In the prequel-to-the-film comic that's the reason given.
I don't know that I can answer your exact question here, but this is how the Vulcan council explained their decision so you just need to accept it as "their reason" even if we can't explain it.
Because...
the Vulcans had the technology and know-how, but not enough red matter to do the trick by themselves. The Romulans had the red matter but not the tech. So, to destroy the supernova in time to save Romulus, Vulcan and Romulus would have had to pool their resources. Eventually Spock came up with an alternate plan that involved the Jellyfish, but that wasn't until after Romulus got fried.
Pretty much what NCC74894A posted. Spock and Nero go to Vulcan with the Romulan minerals needed to make Red Matter. The Vulcans decline to make the Red Matter for the Romulans. Nero goes to save his wife and fails.
Meanwhile, the anomaly that destroyed Romulus keeps growing and will destroy the Federation eventually. Spock goes to stop it. Nero thinks that if Romulus is gone, Vulcan and the Federation should suffer too and tries to stop Spock. They all get sucked in as Spock succeeds.
This movie would have been even better if that had been explained in Spock's flashback.
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