With Deep Space Nine under the control of the Dominion, the situation around the wormhole is out of the Federation's hands. Their only trump card is the mine field, which will continue to create new mines as others are detonated when any ship attempts to enter or exit the wormhole in the Alpha Quadrant. Three months later, the new residents of DS9 are having trouble disabling the mines. Fortunately for them, the three-month-long Dominion War finds them in a better position as Federation forces continue to lose ground to the new force in the Quadrant.
When the Cardassian occupation of Bajor ended in 2369, the mining space station Terok Nor was left abandoned, its systems ripped out. By invitation of the Bajoran provisional government, Starfleet stepped in to oversee the rebuilding and day-to-day operations of the newly christened Deep Space Nine.
The years of Starfleet's nonintervention into Cardassian matters, however, had taken its toll on relations with the Bajorans. Consequently, Starfleet's position was a tenuous one; many Bajorans, suspicious and hostile as a result of decades of Cardassian oppression and brutality, did not greet the Federation's presence with open arms. The Federation's assistance is put to the test as DS9 becomes a center of travel and commerce that stretches into the Gamma Quadrant.