[Nate the Great]

O'BRIEN: I guess it's all this business with him and the Cardassians brought it back to me. You know, sitting with the staff this morning, I could tell there were people in that room who still don't like the Cardassians.
KEIKO: I imagine that's to be expected.
O'BRIEN: You do?
KEIKO: Sure. The war lasted a long time. That takes its toll on people.

We have no idea when the war started, beyond "before Setlik III in 2357." One thing I don't like is Miles acting like he's not one of the one who doesn't like the Cardassians.

You also have to wonder which of the senior staff has prior experience with the Cardassians. Riker probably knows most of the facts, but has little direct experience with them. We have no clue if the Potemkin fought in the war. This might be Worf's first experience with them. Troi and Geordi are too young to have much experience (and remember that Geordi was hanging around Starbases shuttling people around before the E-D). Who knows about Data. I get the feeling that Beverly hadn't served on a ship for awhile before the Enterprise.

DATA: It appears it be a Cardassian supply ship.
MACET: How would you know that?
PICARD: We are able to make that determination.
MACET: You can read our transponder codes.

Or, y'know, supply ships have a wildly different warp signature than Galor-class cruisers. Macet needs to dial it back a notch.

PICARD: Very well. Mister Worf, relay the prefix codes of the Phoenix to the Cardassian warship.
WORF: Sir, they will be able to dismantle its shields. The Phoenix will not have a chance.

Yeah, Worf, that's kinda the point. Stop being an idiot. Besides, you should be in favor of a traitorous ship being destroyed!

PICARD: Ben Maxwell. He must be quite a man.
O'BRIEN: He's a rare one, all right. I count myself lucky, sir. I've served with the two finest Captains in Starfleet.

I know he hasn't met Sisko yet, but seriously, Maxwell is getting way too much praise piled on him. Besides, the episode is half over and we haven't met him yet. At least in "Arena" we've met the Gorn captain (S'salk or S'slee, depending on who you ask) by now.

O'BRIEN: I'd say he took it well. Oh, I know he was broken up inside, who wouldn't be? But you'd never know it to see him. He never missed a minute's duty, always had a smile, a joke.

You know, it's really out of character for O'Brien to be this blind to the faults of his superior officers. It's not even like you can use the "he was young" excuse like Riker and Pressman, he is 39 at this point.

PICARD: You don't care for the Cardassians?
O'BRIEN: I like them fine. It's just, well, I know them. You learn to watch your back when you're around those people.

"Those people". You can tell Roddenberry is gone at this point.

PICARD: I think when one has been angry for a very long time, one gets used to it. And it becomes comfortable, like old leather. And, finally, it becomes so familiar that one can't ever remember feeling any other way.

A good line, but I can't help but feel that now isn't the time for it. Furthermore, if the idea is to start making O'Brien aware of his blind devotion to Maxwell, this isn't the time or place for it.

O'BRIEN: Kanar. I never could develop a taste for it.

That's because the stuff in the bottle is colored corn syrup. Alaimo and Biggs had problems drinking it.

TELLE: A lie, Gul Macet. I was studying the terminal interface systems. They're more efficient than ours.

Well, yeah, the Federation believes in big screens with full LCARS interfaces. DS9 doesn't have those.

MAXWELL: Then listen to this. The Cardassians are arming again. That so-called science station? Military supply port.
PICARD: How do you know this?
MAXWELL: Information comes my way.
PICARD: From whom? Where is your documentation?
MAXWELL: I know what they're doing. I can smell it.

So...you have no documentation. You just tried to start a war because of unsubstantiated facts. Have fun at your court-martial!

PICARD: You have killed nearly seven hundred people and you have taken us to the brink of war.
MAXWELL: I have prevented war, or at the very least delayed it a good long time.

How? The Cardassian fleet still exists, and they want to start the war up again thanks to you!

PICARD: And so all alone you decided to dispose of the treaty.
MAXWELL: I took the initiative.

Not your call, Maxwell. I hope Picard is recording this for the shortest court-martial on record.

MAXWELL: When it becomes clear what the Cardassians have done, I will be vindicated.

Yeah, no. The Cardassians will kill you before you can prove or disprove anything!

PICARD: I will permit you the dignity of retaining your command during the voyage.

This is stupid. Then again, if people known to be guilty of court-martial offenses are allowed to retain command, it would go a long way to explaining why Janeway has a ship.

RIKER: He'd never drop his shields and allow you to transport on board.
O'BRIEN: The Phoenix is using a high energy sensor system. It cycles every five point five minutes. Between cycles there's a window of a fiftieth of a second. Trust me, I can get through.

A fiftieth of a second? That's not enough time to even START initializing the matter stream! Besides, what does the cycling of the sensor system have to do with the shields? Are you telling me that the sensors are outputting so much energy that every 5.5 minutes the shields have to drop a bit to bleed off some of it?

MAXWELL: But he'd turn his weapons on a Federation Starship to protect the enemy?

What enemy? They signed a peace treaty a YEAR ago!

MAXWELL: We're not the same at all. We do not start wars. We do not make surprise attacks on manned outposts. We do not butcher women and children in their homes. Children who never got the chance to grow up. You were with me on Setlick. You saw what they did.

Whether Starfleet has done these things is another discussion. I don't know enough about Discovery, but I know that Enterprise once deliberately stole a warp coil and left a ship adrift. That was pretty awful.

Captain's log, supplemental. Captain Maxwell has turned his ship over to his First Officer and transported aboard the Enterprise. I have confined him to quarters for the return voyage.

When Maxwell disobeyed Picard the first time he forfeited the right to be confined to quarters. Throw him in a cell!

The Fiver

O'Brien: This is breakfast?
Keiko: Yup. Kelp buds, plankton loaf and sea berries.
O'Brien: Mind if I put some gagh on it to improve the taste?

What kind of gagh would be good with breakfast? Bithool has feet, Filden squirms, Meshta jumps, Torgud wiggles, Wistan which is packed in targ blood...

Keiko: This is supper?
O'Brien: Yup. Potato casserole with capers.
Keiko: Mind if I wash it down with some kanar?

Well, corn syrup would certainly cover the taste...

Memory Alpha

There were a number of deleted scenes, but oddly enough not any about Miles and Keiko resolving their images of proper breakfast food. What was the point of that again?

Nitpicker's Guide

* How come the Phoenix's dedication plaque is in the ready room?