Where Was the Enterprise in the Dominion War? 

I love Femboys (no one will see this comment)

It would've been cool to see the Enterprise E take on a Jem'Hadar Dreadnought.

I would've preferred a film about crew of the Enterprise E liberating Betazed from Dominion occupation than what we got with Star Trek 9. It makes sense too since Betazed was within Federation lines so it's an intense battle space where the Sovereign class can test itself without all the dangers front line combat entails. Also it would be a great backdrop for a subplot about Riker & Troi getting back together instead of "they went to the planet that gave them puberty"

This may be a unpopular opinion but I think what the Enterprise-E was doing around this time makes a lot of sense. Yes the Dominion war is going on and its a major war but that doesn't mean that there are not other issues that needed dealing with before, during or even at the near the end of the war that needed to be addressed and resolved. There was still smaller threats. issues, and powers the Federation had to keep its eye on such as the Tzenkethi for instance that had very cold relations with the Federation at the time. Makes sense to have the Enterprise-E handle many of these important tasks because 1.Using the flagship for diplomacy shows the might and firepower the Federation has at its arsenal and that even during wartime the Federation has the might to respond to a situation and flex its muscles when needed 2. It is a very capable ship able to handle many crises on its own without little to no support 3. It is fast enough to respond to a situation where and when it is needed 4. Like most Federation vessels its versatile and able to counduct science and research missions well enough if needed.

The Sovereign class with its combination of extremely high speed and 'enough' firepower, is ideal for plugging gaps in territory and patrolling against incursions. It's a fast response ship to cover enemy breakthroughs behind the lines. And with its speed, each individual ship can protect far more territory than other ships, freeing up those ships. You can have this sector covered by three Galaxy classes (and some Nebulas) or just one Sovereign, well three Galaxy classes are more useful in the slugging match that a front line _fleet battle_ will be. Meanwhile the Sovereign is far more suited to chasing down enemy raiders that get through. It can kill anything it can catch, and it can't be caught by anything that can kill it. It's what is used for example to intercept a Breen fleet making an attack on Earth.... what if it was a Sovereign (or two) that finally destroyed that fleet? It could move to intercept and with its speed advantage choose the best attack vector, not just _the only one available_ to a slower ship that manages to get in the path of the enemy ships. So it pulls in behind and does hit and run attacks on the enemy ships, whittling the enemy down as they redline it towards their target star system. And if they stop to stand and fight, well they've just lost the initiative inside enemy territory. The Sovereign was faster than any ship the Dominion had, that's a huge advantage that shouldn't be squandered by tying it to slower ships in a fleet.

An interstellar war is a very big field of strategic operation. Indeed, the main reason (in-universe) for the lack of Sovereigns was just that there wasn't yet enough of them at the time. Best to use them only at the most opportune moments, be that in shows of strength to other powers, or in tactical strikes. Though it would be cool to eventually see a conventional fleet battle consisting of a large number of Sovereigns.

*Picard and Weyoun in negotiations with the Tamarians,* who are represented by the former first officer at El-Adrel *Weyoun* [in frustration]: What about Shaka's walls? *Picard* [to Weyoun]: The river Temarc in Winter. [Indicating Weyoun to the Tamarians] Kiazi's children, their faces wet. [Indicating Weyoun and the Tamarians] The beast at Tanagra. Uzani, his army with fists closed. *Tamarians* [to Weyoun]: Temba, at rest. *Picard:* Sokath, his eyes open. *Tamarians* [to Picard]: Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra. [They smile and both say in unison ] Picard and Dathon at El-Adrel. Weyoun wonders if he should just activate his suicide implant then and there.

My headcanon: Sovereigns were limited in numbers. Maybe only four or five being active -- Sovereign, Enterprise-E, Saratoga, Destiny and Musashi -- and were largely assigned to key planets like Earth, Vulcan, Andoria, Tellar and Alpha Centauri.

My theory was the Sovereign Class was either conducting raids or defending key territories but Starfleet didn’t want to risk the Enterprise doing that. She was the flagship with a legendary crew. Losing her in battle, possibly with all hands, would have been a tremendous blow to Federation morale. So having the -E doing diplomatic missions would be considered a great show of strength but also great morale booster if the Federation announced a new member.

There is one more reason to hold the Sovereigns off the front lines, and that is as a strategic reserve force. The Federation had recently had a Borg cube get within striking range of Earth, and now most of the ships they would have used to fend off such an attack were busy on the front lines. A strike wing of Sovereigns would allow for a quick reaction force to counter another Borg attack or any kind of Dominion breakthrough force that might take a crack at the Federation core worlds. The Breen attack on Earth did remarkably little damage, considering the kind of destruction we have seen from orbital bombardments in Trek, and most of the Breen fleet was destroyed. My head-canon for that was they ran afoul of Spacedock and it went full DS9 on them (note that both Borg attacks on Earth approached the side of the planet Spacedock was *not* on, and the carnage Sol Station exacted in Picard S3), but a wing of Sovereigns would be a brutally effective means of breaking up an attack formation. We know from the Second Battle of Chintoka that four quantum torpedoes will rip a Breen cruiser in half, and each Sovereign can lob a volley of four torpedoes from its quantum launcher. Depending how quickly the launcher reloads, multiple Sovereigns would eat through a Breen formation very quickly, and that is just via that one weapon system, much less all their other anti-Borg grade armaments.

The assumption that the Sovereign has minor firepower improvements over the Galaxy seems pretty wide of the mark to me. Most of info on these ships state type 12 phaser arrays compared to a Galaxy’s type 10’s. Also I remember reading something from the ship designer stating that the dual torp launchers on the engineering hull are burst fire. If so that’s an obscene amount of firepower.

I think the Sovereign would have absolutely been deployed on the front-line in the second half of the War had the Romulans not entered the War. The Federation-Klingon Fleets had a dearth of Capital Ships compared to the Dominion. The Dominion built 100s, if not a 1000, Jem Hadar battlecruisers whereas the Klingons only had a handful of Neghvars and the Federation a couple dozen Galaxy Class ships at best. Sure, the Feds-Klings had large numbers of heavy cruisers like the Vorcha and Nebula/Akiras, but none of those are 1-to-1 peers of the Battlecruiser, and their numbers off-set by the large numbers of Cardassian Galor Type IV Heavy Cruisers and Keldon IIIs. The Capital Ship imbalance was a problem and the grinding advance of the Dominion forces in Fall 2374 would have forced Starfleet to commit the Sovereigns. But, the script is flipped once the Romulans enter the War bringing with them 100s, if not over a 1000 D'Deridex Warbirds with them.

Interesting take. In my head cannon I thought maybe they were holding them back and hoarding them as a form of last ditch, strategic reserve if things got really desperate. I base this on 1) How we see the Enterprise used at the beginning of First Contact, patrolling the Neutral Zone even during a borg attack, 2) a reference made in “Strange New Worlds” (or was it one of the crossover Discovery Episodes?) about how the original Enterprise was deliberately kept out of the war with the Klingons because it represented “Starfleet’s best,” and 3) the fact that, despite having the energy dampeners, most of the Breen fleet that attacked Earth was somehow wiped out, maybe by Sovereigns being used to defend the capital, instead of the front line. It is a bit paradoxical to hold back your best, but we have seen similar naval strategies at times even in real life during the two world wars for example.

There weren't enough Sovereign-class vessels around. Those that were around (like the E) were reserved for special assignments, like stopping the Borg from assimilating Earth in the past and obliterating the timeline.

[The real world explanation the E was away being general Rick Berman reasons]

Brilliant, especially your IR analysis. Thank you! 👍 13:27 Reminds me of the Ambassador-Class Enterprise-C: "One more ship will make no difference in the here and now. But 22 years ago, one ship could have stopped this war before it started."

In tems of use I also think that a lot of it was that they were needed as part of the Home Fleet to protect Earth, Vulcan, Andor and Telar until more numbers were available. I think that works well with your Battle of Benzar piece where they are able to dispatch the Enterprise and a fair propartion of the fleet to work with the Romulans as the tide is turning. Although I wont discount Picard being sent to meet Tomalok as a diplomatic move to say we can still throw down even if you are our allies for now. Also helps explain how they are involved in the liberation of Betazed in the BEta canon. You said you thought of them as Dradnoughts I would say they are more like Queen Elizabeths if the Galaxies are Dreadnoughts then the Soeveigns are your apex of seapower true super dreadnoughts with bigger guns armour and speed(although they equally could be King George V's and the Queen Elizabeths Galaxies given the speed is higher and armour/shield better but not necessarily arnament just different . At Jutland as per your example Jellicoe isnt on a QE he is on the last generation of ships so that makes sense Good enough whilst the QE's are with the battlecruisers to back them up. I can see the Sovereigns doing that following up the attacks of a Parliament class wingif you have to use them move them around but not quite have them involved in the peak of a battle unless you have to commit them to get out of trouble or exploit a breakthrough whilst destroying anything fast enough to keep up with them.

Ok, so in my opinion Sovereign was a Command Cruiser. It was a ship specifically designed to command anti-Borg strike groups. So it was not strictly a battleship, as Federation was not exactly making those. But more a fast Battlecruiser. Which was not really meant to participate in direct combat, but still was capable to defend itself. During Dominion War Federation was doing mostly static defense and as such didn't need such ship, what was mostly doing patrols on the frontier, in case if something would show up. At the same time Galaxy was basically designed as mobile base. But due to they size they could and were turned into makeshift Battleships. What could be refitted and reused as regular Explorers after the war. Sovereign was though more specialized design. Intended for more specific tasks, then direct combat.

Seems like one of the federation's big issues is they can't stick with one type for long periods of time. There's alot of benefits to having many ships of the same type, perhaps with incremental upgrades. After all, being able to setup an assembly line and build them mass production style has huge benefits for being able to get quality, quantity, and speed all at the same time since you can use jigs and setups you built from one to help build others. You can also justify building custom rigs and automation to speed production and you can use information learned from building one to build future copies. It also makes training so much easier when crew members can easily move from one ship to the other. That's how we do this in the real world. Places where you build everything bespoke, yeah, you have to make alot more tradeoffs. It's part of why we like mass manufacturing so much - we can get economies of scale. Now, the reason the federation has this issue is simply that nobody wants to see 50 of the same ship on screen at one time - it's just boring and looks copy pasted. But that's what they'd do in the real world. They'd periodically produce prototypes to address various concerns, then settle into building mass copies of the prototypes that worked well. Though one thing I've long wondered is why the Federation doesn't basically replicate the vast majority of their ships. We know they can replicate many engineering components and basic stuff like hulls and we know they have industrial replicators. Seems like they ought to be able to build replicators capable of building entire ships or at least large sections nearly fully fitted out. Once that's done, do some fit out with the few components that can't be replicated, maybe some final assembly, and they should be able to churn out ships incredibly fast. Especially if they focused their ship designs on being able to replicate as many components as possible.

Great video! Another consideration is that a Sovereign-class ship is powerful enough to defend itself and fast enough to outrun any ambush without the need for an escort. This frees up the escort ships for combat missions.

The sentiment at the end about "we're advancing, we're evolving" with them being combative diplomatic ships and a show of technology is probably the most important point in this entire video.

Another factor you didn't mention is probably the warp speed of the Sovereign. It and the Intrepid were both significantly faster than most of the ships we see in canon fleet engagements during the war. Fleets can't keep up with them, so I'm vetting they were used more away from the front lines because they were powerful ships alone, with the speed to disengage from anything they can't beat. If they had to travel with excelsiors and Miranda's they wouldn't be able to respond as fast or escape without leaving slower ships to die.

The Sovereign being a diplomatic ship makes sense (to me at least) because of its overall tactical power. A single ship sent on its own to talk or negotiate might be a problem if things go south, so the regenerative shields, sharp teeth and high mobility are excellent.

Real world answer, it was a movie-exclusive at the time. In-story, Enterprises almost always sit out major conflicts because it's the flagship. And losing it would be a serious blow to morale. Still my favorite class of ship. Was happy to see so many in Picard season 2 and 3.

In the season six premier episode of Deep Space 9 the Defiant bridge crew are discussing the Seventh fleet. I always assumed that the Enterprise E was the command ship of the Seventh fleet. That is if Picard could put up with an Admiral on board his ship.

At Earth as in STO we hear the Enterprise defend Earth from a Breen attack. We end up in the Dominion war due to time travel.

This is such a great breakdown! I’ve always wonder that, but never considered the issue of them being a target. Instant subscribe!

I love the idea that the Sovereigns were kept back to defend the core worlds and only committed when the situation called for it. Unlike the Excelsior, Miranda, and to a lesser extent the Galaxy was available in more numbers and were better deployed on the front line.

Don't remember where I read this but it was said one of the reasons for so few Sovereign class ships was because the warp nacelles were lined with Victrium, a hard to find and mine material that was used to either absorb, diffuse or contain the warp radiation that travel at warp creates which damages space.

Worf did say he preferred the weapon systems of the E more than the D.

Interesting analysis, I'd often wondered about exactly this question, but couldn't make an explanation that would work for me. Congratulations! You have been accepted (on this topic, anyway) into my head canon! Thanks!

I will add a few things from a historical and strategic point of view: 1) The relatively few numbers of the Sovereign Class is a valid reason to not employ them unless the Dominion revealed a new capital ship that the current line-up of Alliance capital ships couldn't handle. For the first part of the War this was the case. The Jem Hadar Battlecruiser was a formidable vessel, but nothing a Galaxy, Neghvar or D'Deridex couldn't handle. However, once the Jem Hadar Dreadnaught's existence was revealed, it could require the presence of the Sovereign. That said, so few Dreadnoughts, and Hutets, were built that again, deployment of the Sovereign wasn't necessary, especially since the Alliance already had a pronounced advantage in the number of capital ships thanks to the Romulan entry to the War. 2) It is possible, and credible, to say that the Sovereigns were so advanced, and resource intensive, that they took too long to build and that ceasing to build them in numbers saved shipyard space for other useful, and faster to build, ships. This is the reasoning the Germans had in building small numbers of Tigers and Tiger IIs so they could build more Panzer IVs and StuG III-IVs. And due to the small numbers, Starfleet preferred to use them in Home Fleets. 3) Beyond those reasons, it really doesn't actually make sense to keep them off the line. Sparing newest, best ships is something nations on the defense with smaller fleets do because they can't spare them tactically nor for reasons of prestige. The Japanese kept the Yamatos safe until they had no choice. The Germans kept Tirpitz safe because it was the last operational battleship they had left and it was valuable as a Fleet In Being. The Austro-Hungarians kept all their dreadnoughts in harbor because they were so outnumbered. Etc. *This is not the case for Starfleet.* Like the US and the UK, with their Iowas and King George Vs, the Sovereign should have been on the front-line because lost ships could easily be replaced. 4) My Conclusion: I believe that all three of the above could be true. And I think that the Sovereign would have absolutely been deployed on the line if the Romulans had not entered the War, and bringing with them large numbers of capital ships. Without the Romulans, the Alliance Fleet has a large deficit of true capital ships thanks to the small numbers of Neghvar and Galaxy Class ships compared to the 100s of Jem Hadar battlecruisers. Entry of the Romulans flips this.

I love the video. We all know the real reason why we never saw Sovereigns in Deep Space9. they didn't want TNG stuff in there anymore. Hell were lucky we got the Defiant in First Contact. In real life we should have seen everything in that war. As we all know the US Navy sent the newest battleships/carriers from Iowa's/Essex to the tired old girls like the Texas and Saratoga.

It was kind of explored in Discovery too the Admiral said to Pike that the federation doctrine is to have their best and brightest and most advanced continuing Starfleets primary mission no matter the situation. A fast battleship is not a bad name for the sovereign I think too because of the armour it pushes it out of the battle cruiser segment which you would assume perhaps with the high manoeuvre ability😅

Another awesome video! I am wondering if you may at some point consider doing a video about the Typhon Expanse that was covered in some of the Star Trek novels? There's some great content there to discuss. Thank you!

Another quality video, always enjoyable

Dont forget, the Sovereign Class is the answer to the Borg together with the Akira Class, also its still had the science capabilities and was used for diplomacy missions as well as protecting the Neutral Zone to keep it far away from problems until really needed, like you said the Sovereign would be attacked pretty quickly, also they had improved Phaser and the hull was designed to minimize the damage to the space time while going warp, thats mostly everything I could find out about it

In Eve Online there's a battleship that moves like a cruiser - a Machariel. When you properly know how to utilize it's strengths, you can take on 10 opponents and hold your own. Basically, it can out punch most everything, and out-fly anything that can outpunch it.

Could we get the "Gorn-Federation Policing action" (A star trek version of the indochina wars Korea and Vietnam). You don't hear much because it was mostly a ground based war and while it had supporters like Adorians and Telkites, it had detractors like the Vulcans, and most members were split with Captain Kirk saying such an intervention would be a mistake while Commodore Stone saying it has to be done. Other players got involved with the Romulans providing plasma torpedoes to the Gorn, support for the intervention waned, protests on Andor started the withdrawal, and the Star Fleet Marine Corps being reorganized into the Star Fleet Security Corps, along with the color switch between Officers from Red to Gold and Security and Engineers moving to Gold Uniforms.

Insurrection was just after the Dominion War. This is implied right in the movie. There is a scene where Riker and Troi are conducting research on the Son'a. Riker uses the past tense saying that the Son'a had sided with the Dominion during the war. Troi then replies asking why the Federation is doing business with the Son'a. The events of First Contact however took place during the Dominion War so the question remains where was the Enterprise and other Sovereign class ships during the war.

Smart video, like the analysis!

Makes sense, such a conspicuous vessel on the front lines probably would come under focus fire a lot. There’s also the speed part you mentioned which could be why we did not see the Intrepid class on the front lines either, the fastest ships were used on deep space missions carrying VIP’s, diplomats, ambassadors and such, like we saw in the DS9 episode with Sloan and the Romulans. It is what I would do in a war situation like that, you want your most important on a well armed but fast ship which can get away if need be.

I believe that it took an active part in the world. Due to the loses being taken it patrolled around within federation territory putting out penetrating threats. This would free up large amounts of ships to act on the front. This would also protect it because it was very difficult to replace if lost.

You did make some really good points in this video… things, I didn’t even notice I am a big Star Trek fan

There's historical precedent for keeping your best assets out of the war. Tons of it, it's actually rare to have your best ships on the front line.

Good video. I thought it was like the IJN Yamamoto. Just kept away and waiting for the decisive battle.

do remember in some novels, the Cardassians-Dominion put a bounty on the Enterprise-E, so I can see why many Sovereigns weren't in most of the battles

What do you do with a Sovereign class? Slap the name 'Enterprise' on it, give it to Captain Jean-Luc Picard, and tell him to NOT let Deanna Troi drive.....

Though IRL it comes down to the TNG cast being commited to the films and Paramount not having the money to have the Enterprise E and crew appear on DS9 during the war, also not wanting them to overshadow the DS9 cast and being too cheap to build and use Sovereign models on DS9 but in canon their absence from the war can be explained as the Federation not wanting to risk the loss of the Flagship and their most advanced ship. The blow to morale could be catastrophic. We see parallels IRL during WWII with Germany especially keeping Tirpitz anchored in Norway after the loss of Bismarck. And the lengths they went to trying to get Bismarck into the Atlantic safely, knowing the Royal Navy would throw everything at it. The Dominion would send waves of suicide attack ships at the Enterprise if they got the chance.

It's great to hear your analysis of the ships, but the premise behind this video has never been an issue in my head canon because Sisko and his buddy Admiral Ross were the ones planning the Federation side of the war, and we all know Sisko hated Picard so it makes sense Sisko didn't want Picard around. It can be that simple.

you are making a lot of sense, thanks for the great vid

To answer your question about "What do you do with Sovereign class ships?". I'd say they would be reserved for high risk, high reward targets. For example taking out a Dominion space station, ship yard, or a planetary assault. They would hang back, directing the assault, and if the opportunity presented itself, they would unload the big guns on the target. I'm also considering that they would be modified for a purely combat role which means a lot of their resources that are used for exploration would be removed, and replaced to suit it's role as a pure war ship.

I liken a Sovereign Class to a Super Carrier, like The Gerald R Ford. Not many are in service. It also functions as a command and control ship which the Ford does

would be great if you could do an analysis of the fleet composition seen in Picard season 3. whilst i think they state that its nearly the whole star-fleet, i which i doubt, i would consider it the 'Home fleet' to bed more likely. or even better yet the newer designs that were taken from sto would be great aswell! thanks for the vid!

I agree with most of what you said. I also think the sovereigns on the other side of Federation space doing diplomatic missions and patrolling keeps them safe from being targets while allowing a display of power to stop anyone on the other side of their space getting "notions" also it allows other ships that would be in the area for patrolling to be redeployed into battle fleets, as the speed and fire power makes the rapid response to any small incursion or pirate attacks over amuch larger area

Okayokay.... hear me out, and I know I've done goofed on this a few times so SHUSH... but here's my take. Sovereign is a Battlecruiser. Like Hood or Repulse. Why? She's fast! Faster than the other slow-ass battleships out there, like Hood was faster than Warspite. She carries equal armaments as the battleships. And she is instantly recognizable, which is very useful in intimidating the enemy. Repulse was able to put down the Haifa rebellion by her mere presence in the Med. Hood was the living nightmare of the Kreigsmarine. So you send out a Sovy to say, some uppity colony or a border skirmish, the enemy is gonna *know* that shits on! Fantastic as usual, and I love my favourite ship getting the attention she deserves. (PS, I recoginze one of those sovys....)

It's probably a consideration that the Soverign class is brand new, and Star Fleet knows from experience that they always miss things during the design and comissioning process. Compare and contrast the early run of the galaxy class with the later fully developed varients we get during the dominion war. Probably better to test for weaknesses during relatively safe missions in safe territory than do so on the front lines, where you risk the tech being captured by the enemy. Compare and contrast: In WWII, the most advanced aircraft on both sides (the jets) were used defensively, far behind the front lines.

I think they pretty much answer the question of where the Sovereign class ships (although smaller number of ships in service at the time) are during the war at the beginning of Insurrection: they were bringing other warp capable races into the Federation. Diplomatic missions to swell the ranks and allies of the Federation. Experienced captains like Picard were tasked to build bridges.

I personally view Insurrection after DS9 7x12 "The Emperor's New Cloak" . Worf was only briefly seen in 7x10 while the character was completely absent from 7x11-7x12, I see that as solid point when he can be on his mission away from Deep Space 9 that leads to his reunion with the Enterprise-E crew.

The Sovereign is on the borderline between fast battleship and battlecruiser in my book. She fits the classical battlecruiser doctrine of "what you can't out gun, you can out run", but she has battleship levels of survivability. I'd happily concede she's a fast BB instead of a BC. As for why they weren't used, I'm going to say that there's also a morale aspect. The Sovereigns, and particularly Enterprise, are like HMS Hood, The Mighty Hood: the poster ships of Starfleet, they're held in high regard. Imagine losing the pride of the fleet. When Bismark sunk Hood at the Battle of the Denmark Straits, it was shocking for both the Germans and the British because both sides considered Hood to be such a powerful ship. Even though the RN got their revenge and sent Bismark to the bottom, there was a definite hit to morale for the RN with losing their flagship. Starfleet probably wanted to avoid that scenario. Even if a Sovereign could take out enough Dominion ships to make the material cost worthwhile, would it be enough to pad out the morale loss of one of your most powerful ships? I don't think anything short of a war ending amount of Dominion losses would've been enough to make it worthwhile.

Great video, cheers.

Insurrection was 2375 i belive. The galaxy in the war,was totally a warship by then. The sovereign was a warship also. Galaxy classes where like the south Dakota,king george v class and sovereigns where like hood and Iowa class. But the war kinda made all ships cannon fodder,compared to how all battles had happen before and after. so its really hard to compare the lores.great video.

My theory is that the Sovereign class and the Defiant class, both coming out of Starfleet's anti-Borg research, were designed as specialist ships, which Starfleet can't produce in great numbers quickly, which ties into the video's remarks that they'd be juicy targets. Indeed, the original Defiant, which was only on the front lines because Sisko wanted it as his command ship, got murked at Chin'Toka, and the Valiant was on a special mission, was effectively renegade from Starfleet Command, and also got taken out. The reason we see a crapton of Galaxies, Nebulas, Akiras, and even the older Mirandas and Excelsiors in the Dominion War is because those are the "generalist" builds put out by Starfleet. The Excelsior itself is basically Starfleet's B-52, able to be adapted to use weapons created a century after the class first rolled off the assembly lines (the Lakota, for example, was stated to have quantum torpedoes in its magazine, able to put up a good fight against the Defiant, and this was well before the outbreak of total war). Beta canon sources mention that the Akira's "pod" between its nacelles was repurposed to make the craft an escort carrier of sorts, while the Galaxy's immense hull size allowed the ship to transport thousands of ground troops (albeit with much more spartan accomodations than you see on the Ent-D) while still providing the backbone of Starfleet's firepower. In such a scenario, the only reason the Ent-E was even a Sovereign class to begin with was because the D got taken out at Veridian III. Had the D been around for the Dominion War, it may have done some logistical operations, but Starfleet rightly recognized Picard's prowess as a diplomat, which is why the E was doing diplomacy missions on the side. As for the military perspective, from what I can tell, the Sovvies were kept in reserve against a 3rd party (such as the Borg, or the Romulans before they entered the war on the Federation's side). When the Borg came in 2373, the Enterprise was left out all on her lonesome on the Romulan Neutral Zone, which Picard and all the senior staff recognize right away as a mistake from the brass that still mistrusted Picard because of Wolf 359, and end up violating their orders. The TNG relaunch novel "Ship of the Line" actually had Captain Bateson getting command of a Sovvie (and it being retitled Bozeman-A), the implication Starfleet DID commit at least one other Sovvie to the battle of Sector 001, though it wasn't seen on screen.

I think the answer is that firstly there wasn't very many Sovereigns built by the time the war broke out. Secondly it makes more sense to build 2-3 Akiras to every Sovereign. Also I think the Sovereign had vastly more firepower than a Galaxy. It had Starbase grade phasers and double the Galaxies Torpedoes before the Quatunum launcher. Also to note. There was some great fan writing a few years ago that stated. The largest Fleet in starfleet never saw combat, until maybe the final push towards cardassia. In Cannon the Alpha Centuri system has the largest population of any in the Federation. The 1st fleet was stationed there. The Dominion never got there. It was the First fleet arriving at earth to relieve 3rd fleet that beat the breen back. The first fleet was massive and likely had a few Sovereigns.

I personally think people underestimate how powerful the Galaxy war refit is. As you said they have pretty comparable firepower. The maneuverability aspect isn’t all that beneficial in a line battle. In a 1v1 then yes maneuvering is important, in a fleet battle fighting in your battleship squadron the extra speed isn’t that important the galaxy is well fast enough for fleet formation maneuvers. Further more the battleship wings are there to anchor a fleet, smash what it can and absorb fire…being hard to hit dosen’t helps absorb fire. When I consider the two, the galaxy class, in numbers, makes a far better battle line. Of course I mean when all the useless civilian crap is stripped off and converted to military modules. The galaxies made a good, relatively quick build and easily salvaged/maintained and are powerful in their own right. I doubt there is much difference between 3 galaxies stomping you vs 3 sovereigns stomping you.

It kind of reminds me of the civil war arc in season 4 of Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda where despite the Andromeda Ascendant is only shown participating in one or two major engagements, one being the first engagement, despite being one of the most powerful ships in the setting. Mostly she was running from pursuers, intelligence gathering, or performing covert ops. I honestly think the Sovereigns were active in the war we just didn't see them because of the RL conflicts.

Good information

I view the Sovereign Class as a Cadillac battleship; essentially the love child of the Defiant and Galaxy classes. The Sovereign is powerful, advanced, and... expensive to build. Starfleet can pump out out Galaxies, Excelsiors, and Mirandas like McDonald's burgers. The Sovereign takes a lot of resource and QC to build right. That's why the Enterprise-E was out doing solo missions where it can fend for itself just fine while the other classes were relegated to the war effort. At least, that's my fan theory. We know what the real world reason was, though a Sovereign cameo would have been cool to see in the DS9 finale.

It had more firepower than a Galaxy class. Worf clearly states so in the 2nd to last episode of Picard season 3.

I have had this conversation sooooo many times with friends... if you *must* make a large capital ship available for diplomacy it made no sense to any of us to send a Sovereign over a Galaxy class.

Amazing that I just finished a DS9 episode this video just got uploaded

The sovereign class was developed side by side with the defiant, steamrunner and norway classes as a frontline anti borg battlecruiser. It's important to remember that the true vastness and scale of the Federation and Starfleet cannot be grasped in any of the tv shows or movies with the exception of the starbase in Star Trek Beyond. The Federation's ability to manufacturer bases and ships is truly colossal. The Dominion, even more so.

Its a great analysis of the class. Too valuable to loose in a big fleet action, but she can devastate a raiding party due to her firepower and speed. I for one wouldn't want to be in a Jem'hidar battle cruiser 1v1 against one as the Sovereign can dictate the terms of the engagement or even being in a small wing of attack fighters as they are just going to die to quantum torpedo barrage. Can't wait for your take on the raid on earth as the Breen seem to be the perfect enemy for the Sovereign to go after, and from STO Enterprise made a mess of them as she chased them out of the Sol system.

In DS9 it was stated that Starfleet doesn't make warships. They have no battleships, its just they all can fight. And large ships aren't great in a fight where the enemy like the dominion are so dedicated that they will crash into any enemies to kill them. Lots of materials and personal lost in just one ship going down. The Sovereign could carry ambassadors for diplomatic reasons and get by with maybe only one escort ship and probably feel pretty safe, with luxuries and comfort for visitors

In the game 'Star Trek : Birth Of The Federation', the Sovereign class ship is categorized as a Dreadnought, as apposed to science, battle, explorer etc

Funny to say the Klingons would be keen on a Sovereign. If memory serves, the Klingon Captain in charge of Omega Force commands a Sovereign called the U.S.S. Houston in STO during some of the Task Force Operations going back years.

Idk if any new books mention it but sovereign also has ablative armor and regenerative adaptive shielding. Which gives her a pretty good edge in terms of defense. Its also safe to assume soverign has better flag spaces better C3ISR and power generation. As for combat use i see similar line to the use of iowa clas BBs and essex class CV early on im WWII. Too precious to send pit willy nilly untill support is assured for said ships so they arnt super vulnerable in combat. And tbf its gonna be really hard to kill a soveriegn.

I'd love to see a Galaxy class ship redesigned for war (during the dominion war). Armor plating like the Defiant, and all of it's resources designed for combat, not exploration. So much more shielding, and more power systems dedicated to phaser power, and more torpedo launchers.

What could be used as a theory for the script which is a plausible IRL reason for a reluctance to commit an advanced "game changer" weapon or platform to a war is the unwillingness and perhaps unnecessary need to risk losing such an advanced and currently rare thing to the enemy. What I mean by "lose", and in this case a Sovereign Class, is the successful recovery of an in-tact or damage example by the enemy. In wars, conflicts etc, weapons and weapons platform inevitably get destroyed, get shot down, get damage, suffer failures and need to be abandoned. Depending on where that weapon or platform is lost, it's not always possible to recover it, but very possible for the enemy to recover it. Since on the grander scheme of things given the absolutely ginormous sized fleets involved in this war by the Dominion and its allies, along with the Federation and its allies, a small handful of 6-7 Sovereign Class BB's wasn't going to turn the tide or outcome of such engagements or the outcome of the war. So simply put, why risk losing the advanced technology to enemies or even the likes of wavering allies like the Romulans or Klingons? Certainly the Dominion and its allies would recover and reverse engineer such advanced tech, but would it come as a surprise if an abandoned Sovereign was later recovered and cloaked by a Romulan recovery team? Probably not, the Romulans practically hate the Federation, certainly just prior to the Dominion war for all of the original and TNG series, and it wouldn't be a surprise if the Klingons or anyone else did either. So overall, that could be used as a very plausible and satisfactory "real life comparison" sort of reason the writers could add to the script.

Another argument against building more sovereigns at war time is, for every dry dock space you're using to build new ships, is a dry dock that won't be available to repair ships coming off the front line.

the sovereign was leaps and bounds more heavily armed than the galaxy class. galaxy class had 12 type X phaser arrays with a 5.1 megawatt burst. the sovereign had 12 type XII phasers with a 7.2 megawatt burst. the quantum torpedoes put it on a level above the galaxy too.

Issues with sovereign of the same problems that the pre federation United Earth has with the NX class during the Romulan war. Never had enough of them, only 6 ever produced and whenever they placed at the head of the allied fleets ended up Priority targets for destruction. Out of NX’s Enterprise, Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour, only Enterprise and Endeavour survived to the wars end.

It's not just a matter of the Sovereigns doing diplomacy during a war. It's the Sovereigns taking up the slack left by the hundreds of smaller ships thrown into the front against a numerically-superior enemy. The universe won't sit by and wait for the Dominion War to end before throwing more problems at the Federation, and where in normal peacetime you'd have the StarFleet ready in numbers to deal with all of that while your big ships are out on long-term exploration missions, in wartime, you flip the script. The Sovereigns are doing diplomacy, waving the flag within the Federation, and taking up the slack for all the smaller classes of ships sent off to fight on the front, where it's raw numbers that count, not necessarily wunderwaffen. That's why we never see Sovereigns on the front in DS9. Just because the Klingons and eventually the Romulans join in doesn't mean you stop patrolling your borders, so the Sovereigns do some of that too.

officially the Sovereign class was kept out of the war due to the fact they did not want their most advanced ship at the time going head to head with the dominion. the galaxy class came with type 10 phasers where the soverign class had type 15 phasers (which are 800% more powerful then the type tens and the type 12s on the Galaxy class refit) . another improvement was that the sovereign class didn't have to recharge and power each phaser emitter in sequence along the phaser strips. another thing is that the sovereign class's shields were 400% more robust compared to the Galaxy class and the photon torpedo and quantum torpedo's could be fired in a rapid fire mode (it had the fastest torpedo launchers in the fleet at the time) the Sovereign class also boasts regenerative shields which the new system that the Sovereign class was acting as the testbed for, the reason why Starfleet kept the sovereign classes out of the war because they didnt want the dominion to know the true capability of the ships since the Sovereign class was a part of the anti-borg line of ships, and if the dominion started fighting the sovereign classes and one survived with a sensor suite of information on the ships, the Dominion may start building even more powerful ships specifically to counter them. while it may give star fleet an advantage the sovereign class ships were technically kept in the reserve fleet and they did enter the war once in the battle of Betazed and were very effective against Jem'hadar but after that the ships were pulled back into reserve. technically speaking USS Enterprise E was sent to Volcan for a while but then sent to the Romulan neutral zone to patrol the boarder. the ships involved in the war were also given shield generator refits using the same shield generators as the ones used in the soverign class which was why federation ships adapted to Jem'Hadar fighter's disruptors also Startrek Insurrection is based 12 months after the war ended out of universe reasons is that CBS didn't have the budget to get access to the sovereign class model which was owned by paramount studios at the time so they came up with the idea that they were out there somewhere just not present in the battles the defiant was in.

I would argue the primary goal of the Soverign program is a more economical and utilitarian ship with the capabilities of the Galaxy. I think the Sovereigns weren't used because they are long endurance vessels that don't need escort or frequent logistical support and resupply. That frees up resources that can be dedicated to resupply of the fleet combatants.

Could you do a breakdown of the Galaxy Class vs the Sovereign Class?

While you made the comparison of starfleet ships to naval classes of the early 20th century. It could be argued that the Sovereigns were quite useful as tying up Dominion, Breen and Kardasians while standing as "a fleet in being". Much like the Tirpitz tied up Royal Navy assets in WW2 simply by being docked in the Fjords. It's likely that D'Deridex and Negh'va ships were utilised in the same way. The other option is that a Sovereign could relieve upto 4 Akiras in a patrol role, freeing them up for fleet duties.

I feel in terms of the Sovereign's in general and the Enterprise-E specifically, being kept away from the front lines and performing defensive roles and engaging in diplomacy is the same reason as Captain America touring and asking for War Bonds in the CA: The First Avenger movie. He's was a symbol as much as the E-E and her crew are. You don't risk your symbols unless absolutely necessary. I think in one of the Books, The Enterprise was involved in the liberation of Betazed (which is what Star Trek Insurrection should have been about, could have kept the same title and it would have worked) because Deanna was involved in the liberation of her homeworld. But the Sovereigns were not involved in Operation Return or both battles of Chin'toka (as far as I am aware) for that same reason, they were simply to valuable and not numerous enough to risk.

To me a sovereign class is a galaxy on steroids. Does all the same things but as an equal emphasis on battle as diplomacy

Leaving the sovereign class to diplomacy, means it can be sent to earth in case of a later attack.

I'd be more interested in how the bloody Dominion managed to make it out of the wormhole without being turned into debris. A good reason, that is.

I'd expect it to take a while for the Dominion to realize that a specific ship was more than a tactical weapon - it's also not sufficiently more powerful that it would especially deserve to be killed. And if you're going to sacrifice Jem'hadar, you may as well do more suicide runs on the regular galaxy class as well. (I also refuse to believe that the writers put very much thought into it)

I thought the USS Sovereign was renamed the Enterprise E after the death of the D in Generations. That may be Beta canon only though, I’m not 100% sure. I’m certain that the the phasers on the sovereign were actually newer than her predecessor and all ships in the fleet were getting upgrades specifically due to the war. On top of that the number of phaser banks were increased after each “mini refit” between films as they transferred to purely digital and continued to perfect the ship. She was meant to have major upgrades after Nemesis however thanks to the director and the story editors we didn’t get that. It’s a shame as it’s one of my fave ships and I’d have loved to have seen more of her.

If the Dominion war was so important in the Star Trek lore, imagine the show runners and writers create multiple tv shows, movies connecting and focus on the war itself. Sort of like Marvel studio did with their MCU. I know some of the novels and Deep Space Nine show had more in depth for the Dominion war that I know of. It would've been a massive undertake from a creative side, though. Still, I would've love to see it. Lol.

During the Dominion war, I believe the sovereign class was the equivalent to Rocky in Rocky 4. When he faced the Russian he had never been in better shape in his life and he could take a pounding. But he sure as heck could give it right back to the Russian. So I see The sovereign class as Sylvester Stallone in Rocky IV. Just a beast he can give as well as he could take in that movie. The same as The sovereign class against the Borg or even against the Dominion even more so

Always felt like the Federation should have had a dedicated defensive military fleet with technology where the gloves come off, I'm talking squadrons of defiants, dozens of vengeance type dreadnoughts, and some droned warp kamikaze ships full of tri-cobalt for good measure. Then have all the nice exploration, science, diplomatic ships in a separate fleet.

The Sovereign Class would have made an excellent flanking ship considering they're not in large number. Wait til the battle is engaged then attack from the side making swift hit and run attacks, and given how much damage it can deal, they would be devastating attacks.

Real world explanation is DS nine did not have the rights to the sovereign class. That’s why it wasn’t in any of the episodes.

Wait what was the real reason E couldnt be in last seasons of DS9? They already had the model no? I heard it was something to do with rights split between cbs and paramount but i cant be sure

I simply believe it was due to the loss of the D, as the flagship Starfleet didn't want to loose another Enterprise so quickly. Also why they used the "not trust Picard" excuse when it truly was much more emotional