Yeah, the Makudan are big enough to hold their own. Of course, maybe a tiny bit of diplomacy would help them a bit. I know they're not much for it, but still. I could always have the Federation reach out to them diplomatically.

On the subject of Dark Energy, we could always retcon the extreme differences of it between nations as the separate nations giving the same name to different substances. Then we could all use our different ideas! And then we could bring in actual Dark Energy (Matter).

And yes, Robert must have evil plans of evil evilness based off of being... not actually that evil. Just misguided in AIF terms.