Star Trek's United Federation of Planets is a sprawling, more or less peaceful utopia that seeks to nurture and develop the civilizations that make it up. Famous Federation members include Earth, Vulcan, and Andoria. This range of viewpoints means that the Star Trek superpower truly embodies the Vulcan idiom of "infinite diversity in infinite combinations".
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However, although it has an impressive track record, there are times when the Federation comes close to total collapse. From catastrophic natural disasters to crushing military defeats, the Federation sometimes finds it cannot cope with the horrors of the universe.
8 Destruction Of The USS Enterprise
The first Federation-affiliated USS Enterprise played a pivotal role in The Original Series, The Animated Series, and Strange New Worlds, and also appeared in several other franchise installments. As such, the starship's tragic destruction in Star Trek 3: The Search for Spock is more than just the loss of a vessel: it's a symbolic blow against the entire United Federation of Planets.
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The Federation was able to quickly respond to the Enterprise's destruction, and a replacement, the USS Enteprise-A, was soon commissioned with James T. Kirk in the captain's chair. Nonetheless, the destruction of the original Enterprise shows that even the loss of a single ship can have a catastrophic psychological impact even on massive states like the Federation.
7 Breen Attack On San Francisco
The Breen represented a significant threat to the Federation Alliance when they entered the Dominion War mere weeks before its climax. One major Breen contribution was energy-draining weapons, which defeated a Federation fleet during the Second Battle of Chin'toka. This event was catastrophic, as it included the destruction of the USS Defiant, but it was not the highlight of the Breen campaign.
The Breen were able to pull off a morale-crushing attack on Starfleet Headquarters in San Francisco shortly after entering the war. This not only established the mysterious aliens as a force to be reckoned with but showed that they would stop at nothing to gain the upper hand. While the Federation's defeat in this case was symbolic rather than tactical, the Breen rampage shook the state to it is core.
6 Battle Of The Binary Stars
Star Trek: Discovery's Battle of the Binary Stars saw the Federation face off against a resurgent Klingon Empire. The entire event was orchestrated by radicals within the Empire, who hoped to demonstrate their superiority over the Federation. Indeed, while the Klingon fleet took substantial losses (including the death of its de facto leader), it still remained victorious.
The Battle of the Binary Stars kicked off the Federation–Klingon War, a conflict that would bring the superpower to the brink of destruction. Although the Federation was eventually able to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, the Battle of the Binary Stars shows that things could have gone either way.
5 Destruction Of The USS Odyssey
Star Trek: The Next Generation spent seven seasons and one movie showing the superiority of the Galaxy-class starship. However, the spin-off series Deep Space Nine was always willing to deconstruct TNG conventions, as demonstrated by the way in which the series dispatches the USS Odyssey, an Enterprise-D lookalike.
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Despite the Federation's confidence that any threat from the Dominion could be countered, they received a rude awakening when the Odyssey was destroyed by Jem'Hadar fighters. While the Odyssey was only a single ship, its loss sent shockwaves through both the Federation and the Star Trek fanbase. If a ship like the Enterprise wasn't safe from the Dominion, what was?
4 Khan's Revenge
Sometimes, the line between victory and defeat is vanishingly thin. This is true in the case of Khan Noonien Singh's attempt on the life of James T. Kirk. Although Kirk did prevail, it is safe to say that he survived rather than emerged victorious. And, while Kirk lived, the cost was unbearably high for others.
Khan's revenge spree resulted in the death of the USS Reliant's Captain Terrell, many aboard the Enterprise (including Scotty's nephew), and Spock himself. That the legendary Vulcan figurehead was later resurrected does not detract from the catastrophic losses that Khan inflicted on the Federation's finest.
3 First Encounter With The Borg
While the Galaxy-class starship was by no means a battleship, Star Trek: The Next Generation had established the Enteprise-D as a competent vessel capable of holding its own against any opponent. While more esoteric challenges like the trickster Q proved difficult to overcome, the Enterprise rarely met a species it couldn't subdue.
This changed in "Q Who", in which Q hurls the starship into its first encounter with the Borg. The Borg are truly chilling in this episode, and the machine species is easily able to outplay the Enterprise at every turn. Although the Enterprise survives the encounter, the lesson is a chilling one: the Borg are unstoppable, and they are on their way.
2 The Burn
Although many threats to the Federation have come from other states or bloodthirsty aliens, one of the nation's most catastrophic defeats was, in fact, the result of an accident. The Burn, a galaxy-wide incident in which the warp cores of starships spontaneously combusted, devastated the Federation, causing many key members to secede.
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That the Burn was not an intentional attack against the Federation does not diminish its impact. It is possible to be defeated by environmental factors as well as by attackers, and the Burn was the threat that came the closest to totally ending the Federation. If not for the surprise arrival of the USS Discovery, it is likely that the superpower would have disintegrated completely.
1 Wolf 359
The Battle of Wolf 359 is perhaps the most important engagement in Star Trek canon. Its ramifications are felt not only throughout The Next Generation but also serve to motivate Deep Space Nine protagonist Commander Sisko. Even Voyager, which substantially neutered the Borg, owes a storytelling debt to the battle. It established the Borg as a terrifying threat to the Federation, and one which could not simply be outgunned.
The Federation assembled a task force of 40 vessels at Wolf 359 in order to intercept a single Borg cube. Because the Borg had gained tactical knowledge from the captured Jean Luc Picard, they were able to annihilate the fleet, and only one vessel survived. The Battle of Wolf 359 was one of the darkest moments in Federation history and forced the utopian superpower to return to a war footing.