Rather than smaller, less-capable vessels, what Starfleet desired were larger, more powerful ships to patrol and defend the ever-expanding borders of the Federation. Starfleet Command believed that any decrease in reactor size would necessitate decreases in reactor safety, power output, and reliability as well as decreases in ship size, performance, and functionality. The smallest of these ships displaced some 30,000 t, only slightly larger than the Daedalus-class ships of Romulan War vintage. A factor in this lack of interest was that Starfleet saw no need for M/AM-powered ships any smaller than the escorts and scouts already in service. Furthermore, technology analysts predicted that Federation reactors would continue to be superior to reactors fielded by any identified potential adversaries for two to three decades.īecause Starfleet was quite satisfied with the ever-increasing power of standard cruiser reactors, it had little interest in making smaller, less powerful reactors. Although both ships and reactors were also increasing in size and weight, these increases were not seen as necessarily disadvantageous and had not yet hampered performance or decreased fleet strength or readiness levels. As a result, Starfleet cruisers were becoming ever more capable, achieving greater speeds and ranges while carrying more extensive weaponry, sensors, and scientific equipment. Reactors designed by Earth and her allies were continuing to double in power output roughly every 15 years. In the first decade of the 23rd century, Federation engineers could look back at the first 50 years of M/AM-powered spaceflight with great satisfaction.
Although several Yorktown carriers were inherited by the newly established United Federation of Planets' Starfleet in 2161, all were retired from service within 5 years.įighters and Carriers in the Early 23rd Century Most importantly, the Minotaur/ Yorktown system was an extremely effective weapon that allowed the UESN to go on the offensive in the middle years of the Earth-Romulan War. Furthermore, these fuel cells did allow Minotaurs to be considerably smaller and require a far smaller crew than Comet-class cruisers, the smallest contemporary ship with a standard M/AM reactor. The fuel cell was admittedly less efficient and less tactically flexible than M/AM reactors, but was more advanced than any power source in service with the Romulans or, for that matter, the Klingons, both of whom used only deuterium reactors until the early 23rd century. Therefore, Minotaurs were incapable of independent, M/AM-powered interstellar travel.
Although mechanically simple and relatively safe, each of the 6 fuel cells carried aboard a Minotaur allowed only a single nearly straight warp jump of 100 au at wf 4.5. Once a fuel cell was started, it would continue to function until its reactants had been depleted. Minotaurs were primarily powered by newly developed M/AM fuel cells, which were self-contained modules in which small quantities of deuterium and antideuterium annihilated each other at a low, fixed rate. Minotaurs were carried internally by Yorktowns into enemy territory on high speed runs (wf 3.9) lasting up to 5 weeks, then launched to attack Romulan sensor complexes and fleet concentrations with warp-capable, nuclear-tipped missiles. Later in the war, these ships spearheaded the offensives that directly threatened the Romulans' homeworlds and forced an end to the hostilities.
This weapons system, which combined ships with two different types of M/AM power source, allowed Earth forces to attack targets deep within Romulan territory. In 2158, the third year of the Earth-Romulan War (2156 to 2160) the United Earth Stellar Navy (UESN) introduced the Minotaur strike fighter and the Yorktown-class carrier. In contrast, the revolutionary Penguin fighters were made possible by dramatic advances in small matter/antimatter (M/AM) power plants in the 2220s.įighters and Carriers in the Earth-Romulan War Al-Burak carriers were based on the Valley Forge-class cruisers, which were introduced in 2227. This weapons system provided Starfleet with its first effective, long-range, carrier-borne strike capability in nearly three-quarters of a century. Al-Burak-class carriers and Penguin-class attack fighters entered service with Starfleet in 2232.
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