Why is Earth not a subjugated colony of the Klingon Empire?

[BillJ]

What possible benefit could Earth have provided the Empire in the nineteenth or twentieth century? The planet doesn't hold quantities of dilithium, at least as far as we know. The Klingons didn't appear to be interested in interstellar commerce in Earth's vicinity.

I'm sure that the Klingons have needs above dilithium. Plus, you'd have an entire population that you could easily subjugate for slave labor.

 

[mic of orion]

And Earth is less than a week away from Qo'nos at low warp, apparently. It seems almost impossible they missed Earth. And yet they somehow did, obviously.

I don't buy this. I much preferred the setup in John M. Ford's excellent novel The Final Reflection which had Earth and the Klingon homeworld several months apart at about Warp 4. And Ford sets the first time Klingons and humans first knowing of each other only about fifty years or so before the TOS era.

x2

I think Enterprise Broken bow wasn't really sticking to the cannon, lets say Branon didn't care about the canon and allowed for all sorts of bull to go unnoticed, reason why many star trek fans left the show early on.

Distance between two homeworlds might be several months at warp 4.5 if not more.

not knowing what actually warp speed is, lets assume warp 1 is 30 million km/sec, ans warp 4 is 240 million km/sec and warp 4.5 = 360 million km/sec.

At these speeds Klingon homeworld would be around 300 light years away *(3 months away from earth)

 

[CaptainStoner]

Looking at the various Klingons, some Houses wouldn't attack a weak target, others most certainly would. Certainly Klingons like Kruge are not too hung up on honor.
House politics would be my No-prize guess. A House that otherwise would have attacked already had a surplus of labor and instead decided to block another House from attacking to keep advantage over them.

 

[Green Shirt]

Enterprise doesn't make to much sense if you think about it.

Even less if you don't think about it.

 

[BillJ]

Looking at the various Klingons, some Houses wouldn't attack a weak target, others most certainly would. Certainly Klingons like Kruge are not too hung up on honor.
House politics would be my No-prize guess. A House that otherwise would have attacked already had a surplus of labor and instead decided to block another House from attacking to keep advantage over them.

As good an answer as any.

 

[Gotham Central]

The simplest solution, aside from Earth being strategically unimportant to Klingon interests, is that Earth, Alpha/Proxima Centuari, and Vega all fell within a general Vulcan protectorate. After all, the Vulcans had been to Earth at least a century before first contact and they were patrolling close enough to Earth to detect the flight of the Phoenix. We already know that the Vulcans had their own version of a non interference directive...so much like the Federation later, they simply took steps to ensure that Earth was left alone. This also explains why no other aliens contacted or tried to infiltrate earth. The Vulcans kept everyone away.

 

[captcalhoun]

yeah, apart from the Skagarans kidnapping people out the old west and the freaky-deaky aliens from Time's Arrow and the ones from the DQ who kidnapped the '37s or the other aliens going around kidnapping humans, like the Preservers...

 

[C.E. Evans]

Personally, I think the bulk of the Klingon Empire expanded from Qo'noS in a direction away from Earth and that the Human race was just lucky that it did. Other civilizations weren't so lucky, IMO...

 

[Nerys Myk]

To pretend they can't indicates hidebound thinking and a double standard. If one was to apply that standard franchise wide, TOS alone might have close to 70 "alternate timelines".

Some like to say this, but it isn't at all true.

I'm saying it and I say its true. All Trek shows have continutiy problems, with in themselves and with other series. The fact that most of episodes and films manage to work together (though a little grease is needed at times) is pretty amazing.

 

[Captain Verata]

And Earth is less than a week away from Qo'nos at low warp, apparently. It seems almost impossible they missed Earth. And yet they somehow did, obviously.

I don't buy this. I much preferred the setup in John M. Ford's excellent novel The Final Reflection which had Earth and the Klingon homeworld several months apart at about Warp 4. And Ford sets the first time Klingons and humans first knowing of each other only about fifty years or so before the TOS era.

x2

I think Enterprise Broken bow wasn't really sticking to the cannon, lets say Branon didn't care about the canon and allowed for all sorts of bull to go unnoticed, reason why many star trek fans left the show early on.

One of those fans would be me. The show didn't seem to care about what came before it. It just needed familar Star Trek ideas like Klingons, Borg, Ferengi, and transporters regardless if it made sense.

To pretend they can't indicates hidebound thinking and a double standard. If one was to apply that standard franchise wide, TOS alone might have close to 70 "alternate timelines".

Some like to say this, but it isn't at all true.

I'm saying it and I say its true. All Trek shows have continutiy problems, with in themselves and with other series. The fact that most of episodes and films manage to work together (though a little grease is needed at times) is pretty amazing.

TOS does have some major continuity issues with itself and the rest of Star Trek. I personally just disregard the stuff that doesn't make sense and prefer TNG/DS9 view for any contradictions. Enterprise just started off bad and proved the producers/writers didn't give a damn about making any of the stuff that came before fit half way intelligently. That is especially bad for a prequel show.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Some like to say this, but it isn't at all true.

I'm saying it and I say its true. All Trek shows have continutiy problems, with in themselves and with other series. The fact that most of episodes and films manage to work together (though a little grease is needed at times) is pretty amazing.

TOS does have some major continuity issues with itself and the rest of Star Trek. I personally just disregard the stuff that doesn't make sense and prefer TNG/DS9 view for any contradictions. Enterprise just started off bad and proved the producers/writers didn't give a damn about making any of the stuff that came before fit half way intelligently. That is especially bad for a prequel show.

Disagree, ENT fits fine with what went before. Being a prequel set in a time little explored or mentioned in the prior series, it had little to get "wrong".

 

[Warped9]

^^ We'll just have to agree that we disagree...strongly.

 

[Nerys Myk]

At least we'll have the memories.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

As for the problem at hand. Earth falls under the Vulcan sphere of infuence and the Klingons do not wish to incur their displeasure.

The Vulcans don't seem likely to inspire fear in the turtleheads.

ENT had the chance to establish why Earth had been ignored by more advanced empires for so long; the Trekverse has always been unrealistically crowded with inhabited worlds, so maybe that's the explanation. Earth wasn't out of the way, but there was a lot of stuff inbetween that the Klingons found more interesting or put up more of a fight. The Andorians would have been no pushover. The only reasonable explanation for Earth remaining free until it was ready to explore the stars is sheer dumb luck. Maybe the Vulcans ran interference, but that alone wouldn't have kept all the baddies at bay.

ENT should have been about this danger from the first. Earth had simply been lucky all those millenia; now it was time to wake up and find out what was out there, before we learned the hard way. There was never any reason to make up any new enemies. The old ones would have been perfectly good.

 

[Nerys Myk]

As for the problem at hand. Earth falls under the Vulcan sphere of infuence and the Klingons do not wish to incur their displeasure.

The Vulcans don't seem likely to inspire fear in the turtleheads.

ENT had the chance to establish why Earth had been ignored by more advanced empires for so long; the Trekverse has always been unrealistically crowded with inhabited worlds, so maybe that's the explanation. Earth wasn't out of the way, but there was a lot of stuff inbetween that the Klingons found more interesting or put up more of a fight. The Andorians would have been no pushover. The only reasonable explanation for Earth remaining free until it was ready to explore the stars is sheer dumb luck. Maybe the Vulcans ran interference, but that alone wouldn't have kept all the baddies at bay.

ENT should have been about this danger from the first. Earth had simply been lucky all those millenia; now it was time to wake up and find out what was out there, before we learned the hard way. There was never any reason to make up any new enemies. The old ones would have been perfectly good.

The Vulcans are what keep the Klingons up at night. If they can get the Andorians nervous then the Klingons shouldn't be a problem.

 

[Paradon]

If they wanted to, they could have attacked earth already. Klingons are fearsome warrior and telling them to pissed off is not going to do. In fact, it would probably provoke them to attack.

Klingons need to die a good warrior death which means they have to use all their skills and weaponry available to either kill the enemies or die a glorious death in battle. Humans have always been technological backward compared to them before the 23 century, and furthermore, humans are physically incapable of taking on a any Klingons. What kind of glorious death could they achieve by fighting a primitive and weak cultures like earth? That's not how Klingons think. And, there was nothing of value to them on earth.

 

[T'Girl]

and furthermore, humans are physically incapable of taking on a any Klingons

This doesn't make sense. Klingons were never shown to be particular strong or unusually good fighters, the only clear advantage over Humans would be in the area of endurance.

 

[Paradon]

Have you seen Worf in "First Contact" where the one of the Borg ripped his space suit and all the air came rushing out. Worf still managed to survive in cold space!

Furthermore, they are not going to pissed off even if the Vulcans are technologically superior. They would probably see it as a chance to prove their worthiness and fought the Vulcans...a glorious battle in face of certain death and danger.

 

[JRoss]

^That's not physical strength. That's hardiness.

 

[Winterwind]

and furthermore, humans are physically incapable of taking on a any Klingons

This doesn't make sense. Klingons were never shown to be particular strong or unusually good fighters, the only clear advantage over Humans would be in the area of endurance.

We've seen Humans and Klingons fighting many times. And the Humans give as good as they get.