Youre not close to wrong on the disassociater. Later on it is described as a weapon created from captured Romulan tech, from the first Romulan war.
The Terran Empire used it to blow up Remus, supposedly it turns the planet into what I would consider chunks in a more portable form. Actually if you consider the Terran Empire as Ford's Klingons, you wouldnt be far from wrong.
