Truth OR Myth? BETA - The Vengeance Class

Truth OR Myth? BETA – The Vengeance Class

Hello and welcome to another episode of Truth OR Myth Beta Canon,  a Star Trek web series that dives into the history of any given topic using Beta Canon sources and my own imagination to fill in the gaps.  In today’s episode, we’re taking a look at the Vengeance Class of Starfleet Starships, where Ill endeavour to create a cogent narrative to explain how this Amazing Class of Starship came to exist.

Because this IS a Beta Canon video, all information relaid should pretty much be taken with a grain of stardust, and only considered a little bit of Star Trek Fun!  And so, with all that out of the way, let’s begin.

With Admiral Alexander Marcus’s successful launch of the U.S.S. Enterprise and the redesigned Constitution Class, he began to set his sights even further to the future for a starship class that would outperform the Constitution Class at every turn and ensure the protection of Starfleet and the United Federation of Planets, and this class would be named the Vengeance Class…

The Redesigned Constitution Class was a complete success, even before its shakedown cruise, the amazing class of Starfleet Starship had saved Earth from destruction by an advanced Romulan Starship from the future, and Admiral Marcus couldn’t be happier.

Kelvin Constitution Class
(Paramount) The Kelvin Constitution Class

This success meant that Admiral Marcus now had the complete support of Starfleet Command to continue his experiments and developments in starship designs and technologies to protect the Federation. With this support, Admiral Marcus began to look at potential threats for the future surrounding Federation Space and came to the conclusion that there were only one species that posed any risk to Starfleet and that was the Klingon Empire.

In 2256, 2 years prior to the Enterprises Launch, the USS Shenzhou under the command of Captain Phillipa Georgiou, had been confronted and subsequently attacked by a large force of Klingon Starships, sending their own fleet of starships in to repel the Empires Attack, Starfleet’s Forces would be victorious thanks to the upgraded technologies included in these starships from Starfleets efforts to reverse engineer the technologies of the Narada, though Starfleet did suffer major losses including that of the U.S.S. Europa and Fleet Admiral Brett Anderson.

But even with these losses, the Klingon forces had been beaten back, and Captain Georgiou would receive a commendation and a promotion to the rank Admiral, assuming the position of Head of Fleet Operations, the post formerly held by Admiral Anderson.

Commander Michael Burnham was then promoted to Captain of Shenzhou and placed on patrol duty of the Klingon Border. Although, the Klingon Empire had been quiet on all front since the Battle, Marcus believed they would be back, and was determined to ensure the Federation Fleet was ready for this inevitable outcome. As a result, he would speed up refit and construction of all Starfleet Starships, and send out several Starfleet Vessels on specialized missions, with specialized officers,  to seek out and acquire any and all defensive and offensive technologies to help the Federation.

Using his new found status with in the Federation, Marcus would also cancel several scientific projects which he felt were unnecessary and divert those resources to his cause.

Crossfield Class
(CBS) The Crossfield Class

One of these projects, a new form of space travel using what its scientists were calling the Spore Drive, was put on hold indefinitely.  And the 3 Starships constructed on that class, the U.S.S. Crossfield, the U.S.S. Discovery and the U.S.S. Glenn was sent to remote, unexplored areas of space with the aforementioned mission of seeking out the technology.

While on one of these missions, the U.S.S. Discovery, Under the Command of Captain Gabriel Lorca, came across a derelict starship containing sleeper pods from the year 1996. Aboard this ship, in one of the pods was Khan Noonien Singh, one of the genetically engineered tyrants of the Eugenics Wars of the 1990s. Seeing an opportunity to utilize Khan as an expert tactician given his genetically engineered brain, Marcus ordered the pods along with the Super Khan returned to a secret facility in orbit around Io, one of Jupiter’s moons.

Once there, Marcus would convince the now revived Khan to assist him and Starfleet, promising the resurrection of his genetically engineered crew as payment, once Operation Vengeance, the code name Admiral Marcus gave to the entire project of defending against Klingon aggression, was complete.

To allow Khan to work with Marcus’s teams without question, he would even go so far as to physically alter his entire look and giving him a new name and identity that of John Harrison.

At the IO facility, Marcus was developing an even more advanced and impressive starship he named after the project, the U.S.S. Vengeance.

The Vengeance Class
(Paramount) The Vengeance Class

He had been very close friends with Admiral Brett Anderson, and when his friend was killed at the Battle of the Binary Stars, Marcus felt the name Vengeance would fit his plans for the Klingon Empire perfectly. Having Khan help design the starship, he felt would give this new massive vessel the edge it needed to bring the Klingon Empire to it’s knees.

Khan for his part would implement several technological development projects which would see the U.S.S. Vengeance becomes one of the most amazing dreadnoughts ever designed in Starfleet history. One of the biggest projects implemented by Khan involved the almost total automation of the starship itself.

Khan felt Starfleet’s current starship designs, though remarkable, simply required too many Officers and crew to operate them, he realized, that during war times, crew would be at a premium, and he saw this as a flaw in Starfleet’s designs.

The problem was though, no Starship Computer Core currently in service had the ability to handle the automation required to allow for a very small crew to operate a starship. Reviewing reports on the breakthroughs in the Narada  tech, Khan was impressed by the 21 year old who had practically cracked the entire case wide open, Dr Richard Daystrom, setting up a meeting with the genius, Khan presented the Computer Problem to Daystrom and asked if he could solve that problem.

Richard Daystrom
(CBS) Richard Daystrom

Richard Daystrom, who had created the Daystrom Institute with Marcus’s blessing after his solid work on the Narada Problem, simply stated that he believed he already had, Daystrom had been working on a brand new Computer Core and operating system he termed M-1. Using Duotronic Components mixed with Narada Tech, Daystrom believed he had finally made a major breakthrough in Computer Technology.

By utilizing his own brain scans, then imprinted into the core, Daystrom had basically created a living Computer, one which would allow a starship a minimal crew to operate it as the new core itself could virtually run all systems aboard any starship. Reporting this all back to Admiral Marcus, Khan was immediately given the approval to have Daystrom construct and install the new computer core aboard the U.S.S. Vengeance.

Khan also saw another potential advantage that Starfleet Could Utilize… With the Breakthrough in Transwarp Technology, as well as standard warp technologies at the time, it was practically impossible to attack a starship while it was at warp. This was because each vessel while at warp essentially created its own bubble or pocket universe in which it would travel in allowing for the great speeds which space travel required to be achieved.

To attack a starship while at warp velocities required very extensive calculations to achieve, as a starship would have to match the course of a vessel exactly, then increase velocity to a point which would allow the starship to overtake, but not over shoot the vessel.

Vengeance Class Attacks
(PAramount) Vengeance Class Attacks While At Warp

Then the starship would have to enter the Warp Field of the enemy starship, which meant matching the exact frequencies that the enemy starship’s warp fields were operating on, while simultaneously ensuring exact power levels to not collapse your own warp field bubble sending your own starship careening back into normal space at such velocities that the starship itself would most likely end up destroyed or severely damaged.

But, given Daystrom new M-1 Computer Core, Khan wondered if the possibility might exist to allow a starship to finally attack an enemy vessel while at warp.

Again approaching Daystrom with this problem, Daystrom would simply raise an eyebrow a Khan and tell the Genetically Engineered Superman, that he loved a challenge and set one of his best teams the problem of making Khan wish a reality… And by 2259, Daystrom and his teams believed they had solved all of Khans and Marcus’s problems.

Other advanced weaponry such as specialized long range torpedoes had been designed by Khan and his team, these torpedoes, Tricobalt in nature, could be launched from the edge of Klingon Space with a preprogrammed target input in to it’s data banks, and virtually unseen, thanks to developments in stealth technology, could hit it’s target bringing intense devastation.

In fact, if worse came to worse, Marcus intended to use these Torpedoes on the Klingon Home World itself, as a Doomsday Weapon, to whip out the entire Empire. With construction of the U.S.S. Vengeance complete by early 2259, and the great revolution in Starfleet Technology and design preparing for it’s shakedown cruise, Khan approached Admiral Marcus to fulfill his end of their bargain, but Marcus refused.

Alexander Marcus had never had any intention of allowing Khan or any of his followers free roam within the galaxy.  And seeing the potential of the genetically engineered superhumans, as Khan himself had demonstrated on Project Vengeance, Marcus decided that it was time to end the partnership and have Khan terminated.

Advanced long-range torpedo
(Paramount) Advanced Long-Range Torpedo

Placing Khan under arrest, it was Marcus’s intent to have it appear as though John Harrison, had been killed in an unfortunate accident.  Then he would revive another of Khans crew and go through the entire procedure again, placing them in charge of another project, but Admiral Marcus made a huge mistake.

During that meeting with Khan, Marcus, perhaps believing that it would make Khan more controllable, proclaimed to Khan that he had had all Khans remaining followers killed, and then using a surprise attack, Khan was believed to be rendered unconscious and then dragged off for his horrible accident. It is unclear whether Khan himself was actually unconscious at all, but shortly thereafter, while en route to an engineering lab, Khan effected an escape in one of the bases shuttles seeking his own revenge on Marcus and Starfleet Command.

It was only after Khan enacted his plan for revenge later in 2259, was true depth of Admiral Marcus’s deceit and mental instability revealed, and the U.S.S. Enterprise would be forced to battle the starship and would eventually win against the U.S.S. Vengeance, recapturing Khan while the U.S.S. Vengeance and Admiral Marcus would be lost in the attempt.

Admiral Phillipa Gorgeou, promoted to Marcus’s previously held position, and shocked by what had transpired right under Starfleet Commands noses, would put an end to project Vengeance, sealing the Starship Design in Starfleet Commands Highly Classified archives never to see the light of day again.

Although an uncomfortable end for the Vengeance Class Dreadnought, no one can deny the impact this starship had on Starfleet’s best scientists… It proved that once pushed, the Federations Best and Brightest could solve virtually any problem, creating a Starship Design the likes of which no one, had ever seen before…

Thank you for watching today’s episode of Truth or Myth Beta Canon, did you enjoy the story I created here to explain the Vengeance Class Dreadnought?  Would you like to hear more stories like this one?  Well leave your comments in the section below and don’t forget to like the video and subscribe to the channel.

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Thanks again for watching, Live long and prosper…

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