I noticed a while ago in "Redemption, part II" that the specific dialogue used in the script pointed toward a Romulan informant within Starfleet. While this is all very likely, I was wondering if there's any clues as to who the informant was?
I'm referring to the line that Sela has when referring to disrupting the Tachyon Detection Grid. The Romulans notice the hole opening in the network and that the USS Sutherland is within the vulnerable zone. Sela's line was not to focus the disruption at that ship by name, but rather to direct the beam at "the ship with the Android captain."
How could she have known of Picard's last minute decision to assign Data to captain the Sutherland? My first guess was to suspect the informant was one of the two admirals at the episode's beginning, but then I started leaning toward it being Commander Hobson...the one who didn't like serving under an artificial captain.
Any thoughts??
Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :
Perhaps the Romulans were simply monitoring the Fleet's communications or something similar to that. I doubt that anythign in the episode was meant to give them impression that there was a Romulan agent involved here.
Sela's knowledge that Data was in command of the ship has always seemed to be a bit unrealistic to me. And the explanation for how she got that knowledge was never worked out very well.
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
Data took command at the spacedock. Who knows HOW long the trip from SB 234 to the border was. In that time, I'm sure the well-developed Romulan mole network relayed whatever information they could. Mentioning that Picard parceled out his senior staff to various ships is easy enough, along with who went where.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Their "mole" could also be a crewman on a sub-space relay.....not a lot of close supervision on them puppies as I recall. Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
It's simple -- the Romulans were monitoring the fleet's communications. We saw Riker and Geordi on the viewscreen at one point, calling from the Excalibur. Doesn't it make sense that Data would have been at least mentioned in any message between the Enterprise and the Sutherland?
For instance, in today's combat situations, military intelligence can sometimes (or often) determine who the local commander of the opposing force is -- and the other side can sometimes tailor their own battle plans based on that knowledge.
I remember hearing a story a while back, about one of the battles in North Africa during World War Two. An Allied general was watching the German army, commanded by Field Marshall Rommel, as it maneuvered into battle. The general commented to himself, "Rommel... I read your book." As in, he knew that Rommel was the commander, and what his tactical background was, and could therefore anticipate the strategy. (I don't remember who the Allied general was, though, or in which specific battle that happened.)
Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :
Patton.
Or at least, George C. Scott AS Patton in "Patton."
"Rommell, you magnificent bastard! I read your book!"
Posted by Cpt. Kyle Amasov (Member # 742) on :
Hobson may have a problem with Data, but that would never be the reason he betrays starfleet. What about Geordi? Sela did this mind-probe thing with him just an episode earlier (to make him kill a Klingon ambassador, I think). Maybe she did something similar with someone else serving in that fleet and the poor guy didn't even know that he was forced to reveal secrets to the romulans from time to time. Maybe it was Geordi wo was still - to some degree - under the influence of that device (can't remember how that story ended though. It could be the device and everything were removed at the end or there wasn't even a device - which of course makes this theory more possible).
Posted by Fleet-Admiral Michael T. Colorge (Member # 144) on :
Ah... aren't Romulan sensors able to detect the lifeforms onboard Federation starships? I'd just scan who's onboad and find an android and figure out that Data is in command.
Posted by Tahna Los (Member # 33) on :
If the Romulans were monitoring Federation Channels, then it is more likely that they would have heard of the Federation's plan to trap the Romulans. Remember that Sela figured out the Federation's plan from the moment one of the ships left the formation.
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
Random potshots #4077&78:
Even if ship-to-ship communications revealed the whereabouts of Riker and LaForge, that wouldn't have helped in locating Data. His bridge had no viewscreen!
And whatever Patton knew about Rommel at Kasserine didn't amount to a tactical advantage. Or if that was tactical advantage, then I'd have hated to see Patton at a disadvantage!
OTOH, Montgomery at Alamein did set up a trap for Rommel specifically, knowing that the fox favored flanking attacks from the south. He put a big minefield there, left it seemingly undefended, but trained all his field pieces at it. And Rommel fell for it. Just goes to show that "great military leaders" aren't. Unless they can change style in mid-campaign.
I gather the Romulan spy network would be very interested indeed in the affairs of the starbase so close to their border. Yet the very appearance of the fleet seemed to come as a surprise to the Romulans, and its composition ("too small to be an invasion fleet") beduffled them for a long time. Perhaps Sela only got the crucial information after a delay - which is why she also engaged in the stalling maneuver of contacting Picard.
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
...or mabye it was just another plot thread that TNG never got to follow up. Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
Maybe it wasn't a plot thread. She doesn't know Data. I'd go for the 'scanning for life-forms, those tiny little life-forms... where are you...' Thing - instead of listening to comm-traffic. We know that comm-traffic is Encrypted too, especially officer movement orders.
I chalk it down to 'scan ships' - oh one has an Android Captain... how? cause Sutherland on last report needed a captain - and the Android out-ranks the rest of the crew.
Not an important story line.
One thing I always wish was that they had Sela on DS9.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
it would have been soooo cool for the to have been the Romulan commander that was killed/replaced by the Founder during the bried Romulan-Cardassian alliance. ....at least then we'd have had some closure with the character.
Posted by SoundEffect (Member # 926) on :
quote:Originally posted by Timo: Even if ship-to-ship communications revealed the whereabouts of Riker and LaForge, that wouldn't have helped in locating Data. His bridge had no viewscreen!
Actually, the Sutherland bridge did have a viewscreen. Data used it at the end to show the 3 distortions that concealed the Wrabird's locations. He then sent the modified torpedoes to those locations. He was in the captain's chair looking forward as we were seeing the viewscreen, so it was at the front of the bridge right where it should be.
By the way, did anyone else notice the Sutherland bridge was a redress of the Star Trek VI Enterprise kitchen??
There were pots and pans in the alcove later converted to TV monitors for Data to use.
Posted by CaptainMike (Member # 709) on :
i doubt the Romulans extensively scanned the crew rosters of each ship in the armada to identify each crewmember-- its unnecessary. besides, their cloaks would prevent sensing of that accuracy,as established in many older episodes.
more than likely, they could at best overhear normal supspace chatter -- a simple message like
"Captain Picard to Sutherland. adjust course to 215 mark 3, Mister Data."
"Data commanding the Sutherland to Commander Riker on the Excalibur. Please adjust your subspace exhaust, you bloated gasbag. Was that not funny?"
More than likely the Romulans had dossiers on the Enterprise crew and could identify them by name, and Sela knew them from her mother's stories.
Why do we have to come up with a complicated explanation for a very simple plot point? Hasn't anyone ever heard of Occam's Razor?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
...Sela jusd did a quick scan for her mom's DNA and found some on Data (He does'nt need to shower after all) and then....
No. That's just sick.
Posted by Styrofoaman (Member # 706) on :
quote:Originally posted by SoundEffect:
By the way, did anyone else notice the Sutherland bridge was a redress of the Star Trek VI Enterprise kitchen??
There were pots and pans in the alcove later converted to TV monitors for Data to use.
I'm glad I'm not the only one to have noticed that... Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
quote:Originally posted by Timo: I gather the Romulan spy network would be very interested indeed in the affairs of the starbase so close to their border. Yet the very appearance of the fleet seemed to come as a surprise to the Romulans, and its composition ("too small to be an invasion fleet") beduffled them for a long time. Perhaps Sela only got the crucial information after a delay - which is why she also engaged in the stalling maneuver of contacting Picard.
Actually, Sela first found out about Picard's fleet while she was still on Qo'noS. Because it was Lursa or B'Etor who brought the news... and then she had that Romulan General who was with her send a message and prepare their own fleet.
Yes, they were surprised about the fleet's relatively small size and the fact that they originally assumed that Starfleet wouldn't be able to blockade them because of the cloaking device, but....
Posted by Dat (Member # 302) on :
Actually, I think the Sutherland bridge had the redressed back walls of the ST6 Excelsior bridge (which was redressed from the Enterprise-A bridge). The rest of the set may have been the kitchen set. There certainly was a viewscreen, but it was very small and more like a regular station display panel.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Mabye the Romulans had a bug in the Enterprise A's kitchen from waaaay back in the day and so, of course, it was still there 80 years later in the Southerland's bridge.......
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
The Sutherland's bridge incorporated nothing of the ST6 bridge (one wonders why not; it's possible they were keeping it for reshoots) and incorporated stock props (chairs, monitors, etc.) from previous sets (Data's chair was previously on the Enterprise-C). Anyone have screencaps of the Sutherland's bridge?
Mark
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
quote: Perhaps Sela only got the crucial information after a delay
I would not be at all surprised to learn that Sela was not popular with some members of the Tal Shiar. I mean, always coming up with covert invasion plans and black ops work...that's not the job of a mere military officer!
On the other hand, I can see her primary loyalty being to the Tal Shiar, with the military not so hot on her presence among their ranks.
Posted by SoundEffect (Member # 926) on :
quote:Originally posted by CaptainMike: Why do we have to come up with a complicated explanation for a very simple plot point? Hasn't anyone ever heard of Occam's Razor?
Well, the reason for the thread is that the simple line by Sela should've been "Direct the beam at that ship", while pointing to the Sutherland on the monitor.
It just struck me odd that the writers would use the line "at the ship with the Android captain", when it wasn't established that the Romulans didn't know Data was not still on the Enterprise.
It was the specific dialogue that made me question how the Romulans knew about Data on the Sutherland.
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
Romulan scan could still pic up types of life-forms. There is an android in the captain's chair of the Sutherland. Easy done.
Posted by CaptainMike (Member # 709) on :
nah i still dont think that they could be that precise.. i mean, Data doesnt have lifesigns, and so they scan the chair and find noone there, so they assume an automaton. the logical explanation would be that the captain was standing somewhere else
still, we know that there was radio chatter (and it didnt behoove them to encode it, since they wanted the Romulans to know that they were there and that they were watching), and we know that Sela could very likely have knowledge of Data from both Romulan intelligence and from her memories of Mom's stories.
just saying, she could have known very easily without any wierd superspy-supersensor analysis-informant situation. making this whole discussion moot.
BTW, is anyone else of the assumption that was the Sutherland's auxiliary control center? it seemed kinda.. lame. A much better effect would have been to relight the Enterprise-D bridge and change the side wall panels to add some claustrophobia.. or perhaps use the battle bridge. evn though its small, at least it was a bridge (although parts of it were probably reconditioned for STVI.. i remember reading that the turbolift alcoves for the TMP-TSFS bridge were resued in ST:V, ST:VI and then again for the E-E bridge in FC -- as a link to the past, just as the corridors used until the E-D's death in Generations were the same from TMP, 15 years earlier
Posted by MrNeutron (Member # 524) on :
...as if the Captain sits in that chair all the time...
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
Surely a sensor that could detect a human being sitting in a chair millions of kilometers away would be able to detect a sophisticated mechanism sitting there, too?
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
Congratulations to Captain Dunsel.
Posted by SoundEffect (Member # 926) on :
quote:Originally posted by CaptainMike: BTW, is anyone else of the assumption that was the Sutherland's auxiliary control center? it seemed kinda.. lame
Since the Tech Manual reveals that starship bridges are Plug-and-Play modules easily swapped out for upgrading, and we know from Picard's line:
"I'm going to add the Tian An Men, the Sutherland, and the Hermes, whether the Yard Superintendant says they're ready or not."
The Sutherland did have visible damage on her starboard nacelle, so she may have been in the drydock for battle-related repairs and what we saw was only a temporary bridge, not the regular Nebula Class bridge.
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
I'd rather believe it's an aux control center... That bridge was so awkward, there's no way that it could be a regular bridge. Battle bridge at best, assuming the non-separating Nebula needs one.
Mark
Posted by Fleet-Admiral Michael T. Colorge (Member # 144) on :
I'd say the original bridge module for the Sutherland was damaged and a temporary one was placed in so Picard can use the ship. That or the upgraded module hasn't arrived yet til Tuesday.
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
But the original question remains - who would build such an ugly bridge? And if it's a pre-existing one, what starship class would it normally belong to?
No, I still think it's an auxilliary control room rather than another ship's bridge or even a hastily-built replacement module. The model exterior certainly wasn't changed, and we know that if necessary a TNG starship can be controlled from Engineering ("Brothers" et. al.). If Picard was really in a hurry, they wouldn't have bothered installing a bridge if one was missing or damaged.
Mark
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
quote:Originally posted by Mark Nguyen: I'd rather believe it's an aux control center... That bridge was so awkward, there's no way that it could be a regular bridge. Battle bridge at best, assuming the non-separating Nebula needs one.
Even the Constitution-class Enterprise had an auxiliary control room -- which was probably in the saucer according to a few indications and at the very center of the saucer according to FJ's charts.
Perhaps the "running the whole ship from Engineering" feature was new for the Galaxy-class?
Posted by SoundEffect (Member # 926) on :
From the TNG:TM, we know that a temporary bridge is in place during the starship's trial runs after construction. The Tech Manual gives us the line after in-system fight tests are performed that the "Operational Bridge is docked".
The Sutherland was commissioned on stardate 44820.5 (approx. Oct 26, 2367)and "Redemption, part II" happened stardate 45020.4 (approx. Jan 7, 2368), so it's only about two months old as of Data taking command. It's extremely possible that it was a standard shakedown bridge, not an emergency bridge, battle bridge, etc. Only the essentials for testing the starship's systems during shakedown trials.
P.S. The stardate translations are my own doing, but the system I have works well for most canonical date listings. Either way the Sutherland was commissioned near the end of 2367 and the show happened at the very beginning of 2368, so it's still only a couple of months.
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