There's the postings on the pros and cons of the starships in the SOM here somwhere; you can get a good idea from that.
http://forum.trek-rpg.net/showthread...&threadid=7232
"War is an ugly thing but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feelings which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."
John Stuart Mill