Vas'Calanam Defense Outposts served as the linchpin in the Romulan Star Empire's border defense network, with dozens of these bases lining the Federation/Klingon borders. The bases served as listening posts, charged with monitoring their neighbors and gathering any information they could about them. They were never upgraded to use newer technologies, and very few remain in service into the present era. Like most Romulan bases, the Vas'Calanam Outpost does not have a cloaking device; the Romulans knew that anyone monitoring their fixed defenses would easily discover the bases presence, anyway, and the immense power drain of such a cloaking device would have had adverse effects on the readiness abilities of the base.