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In Star Trek Nemesis, if Shinzon had succeeded in destroying Earth with his Thalaron radiation weapon, would the other Federation worlds have surrendered or gone to war?

I would assume that his next targets would have been Vulcan and Qo'noS?

From what I gather Shizon's goal was to rule the galaxy.

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The entire Federation would have most certainly struck back regardless of Shinzon's next actions, since the existence and safety of the Federation depends on its commitment to the protection and well-being of all its members, much less a key member like Earth. Without this commitment, neighboring superpowers would be free to invade any Federation world without fear of reprisal, and there would be really no purpose to being a Federation member.

However, Shinzon only had a single ship. It was an impressive ship capable of committing acts of genocide on a planetary scale and with state-of-the-art cloaking technology, but it would still be no match against the collective fleet of the Vulcans, Humans, Andorians, Benzars, Bolians, and numerous other Federation members. And that's not even taking the Romulans and Klingons into account.

So I wouldn't necessarily call it a war so much as a hunt for a war criminal or rogue warbird. Shinzon is a brilliant enough tactician to probably destroy a considerable number of Federation and Romulan vessels, but without the backing of the Romulans, he really has no chance, never mind the fact that he was dying of cellular breakdown.

So as soon as Shinzon's Romulan supporters backed out, the Federation was no longer at risk, just Earth. If he had unleashed his weapon on Earth, it would undoubtedly change the course of history, but he wouldn't have gotten much further than that.

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  • There is the scene where the Enterprise and Shinzon's Scimitar are in the middle of a battle and three warbirds appear under the command of Donatra. Why did she only bring three I wonder? Why not bring a fleet?
    – user16416
    Sep 2, 2013 at 19:47
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    @user16416 I'm pretty sure it was only two. Second, she was on a mission to destroy the praetor, so she had to act under the radar. If shinzon found out about her betrayal, he would have crushed her before she even acquired one warbird.
    – ApproachingDarknessFish
    Sep 2, 2013 at 21:18
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    @user16416: There could be numerous reasons. She had very little time to assemble ships to intercept the Scimitar before it reached Earth. Standard Romulan cloaks aren't nearly as effective when a large fleet is massed together, so even if the fleet had already been assembled, and especially if they were searching for the Scimitar, it might have been spread out. Donatra's instincts may have led her to follow the Enterprise, but once she found the Scimitar, she still had no way to contact the rest of the fleet.
    – Lèse majesté
    Sep 2, 2013 at 22:13

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