10 More Crazy Star Trek Fan Theories
9. The Zhat Vash Secretly Supported Shinzon's Coup
Star Trek: Picard introduced us to the Zhat Vash, a centuries-old secret Romulan organisation that covertly worked to "protect" organic life from it's eventual demise by suppressing artificial lifeforms.
In the first season they were revealed to have orchestrated the synth attack on the Utopia Planitia Shipyards at Mars, showing that they're not afraid of breaking rules to achieve their agenda, but many don't realize that this agency has actually been around during all Trek shows before Picard, and has likely been the cause of a lot of the struggles artificial lifeforms have dealt with.
Some fans even theorise that the Zhat Vash were secretely involved in Shinzon's assassination of the Romulan Senate in Star Trek: Nemesis. Perhaps the Zhat Vash knew that Shinzon needed a complete blood-transfusion from Picard, and thus would lure him in to capture him, which would, by extension, lead to the capture of Data, the most advanced android in the Federation. Eventually Shinzon's attack led to Data's death, greatly hampering research into positronic brains.
It may seem more likely that the Zhat Vash would simply try to assassinate Data directly, rather than sacrificing their entire senate for the chance of taking him out, but maybe, fearing the new collaboration between the Romulans and the Federation following the Dominion War, the Zhat Vash may have wanted to install a new puppet-senate that was more isolationist and anti-AI.