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I think it will depend on who was writing, who was producing, and when the series was produced. The Klingons have served as stand-ins for China, which inspired their original appearance. In the 6th movie, they clearly meant to represent a post-Chernobyl USSR, though the strength of the analogy is questionable.

My theory is that when the Klingons were brought back for Deep Space Nine's 4th season, they were intended to represent the USA, whereas the Federation was now more analogous to the USSR. The Federation had largely eliminated class conflict, while the Klingons were still ruled by wealthy noble families. They Klingons couldn't take a shit without talking about how brave and honourable they were, but they snuck around in cloaked ships, and showed no hesitation in killing civilians. When the Cardassian fascist military government fell and was replaced by a democratic assembly, the Klingons immediately declared war on them. Feels pretty American to me.

I think where the disconnect happens is that the overall geopolitical situation in Star Trek is meant to be somewhat analogous to the conditions during the Cold War, but that Romulans and Klingons aren't directly analogous to any specific group or nation. There are comparisons that could be made, but those are left to the audience. They did a similar thing with the Cardassians and Bajorans, where they aren't meant to represent specific groups in a specific conflict, but the audience can clearly draw comparisons to various parts of human history.

Then there is the Klingons, again, the Klingons are nothing like communists,

I'd be more inclined to believe that the Klingons were just orientalist stand-ins for "Asiatic Hordes" more than Communists.

Gene Roddenberry's wife said he was secretly a Communist, but if that's true he would have had to hide that REALLY deep while working in TV in the 60s-80s, especially the 60s, and taken a pro-America line. That's not a direct answer to your question, but it's probably why Star Trek seems very socialist in some ways and in some episodes, and very patriotic American in others.

I've never once thought of them as a stand in for a nation, so much as stand ins for archetypes of human flaws. Klinks with their fascistic war mongering, worship of the military/state, mythology, etc. Romulans that operate with a sense of cloak and dagger manipulation. It's the sly trickster and the bullish brute.

Now the Ferengi... Like... Was Rodenberry antisemitic?

Edit: I picked it up the term "Klink" from formerly playing Star Trek Online (come to think of it, I played with some chuds). As some others have pointed out, this is clearly a slur of the fictional race. While it's not hurting the non-existent Klingons, the concept of slurs finding a way into our fictional vocabulary is clearly shows how fascistic ways of thinking can permiate our culture. Not only that, but Klingons can be a rhetorical stand in for real peoples to marginalize and malign. Unless there's a consensus that it should be deleted, I'm going to leave it up for now. I think of it as a call to be vigilant against how these larger systems can colonize our own ways of thinking.

Well Star Trek was made by liberals. (Therefore it's absolutely fitting to call it FALGSC 😉)

the soviet thing is strongest in undiscovered country and in kirk's rivalry with specific klingons, but it's more about the international political relations rather than the actual ideologies of any of the players.

They were both created in the sixties and next Gen retcons most of it. The Klingons were stsnd ins for the Soviets in a strictly plot sense in that in TOS they were in a cold war with the Federation and a lot of TOS episodes featuring Klingons explored cold war stuff allegorically but culturally they were more of an old timey Asian stereotype during TOS than anything that could be meant to represent the ussr or Russia.

As far as the Romulans go, they were based on Rome and communist China never played into it aside from the one interview that Gene said that, according to his wife he was a Maoist when he died as well. Gene was what we call absolutely full of shit and would just make shit up in interviews or convention Q and As based on what he thought the recipient would like to hear. By the 80s he was believing his own bullshit and that's why the first 2 seasons of tng are weird as hell. I'd recommend the feature length documentary entirely about how fucked up those first 2 years were for production, it's called Chaos on the Bridge and it's a wild wild ride.

I'd love to see some gay klingons

I think gene roddenberry was just a sectarian maoist

It's too all over the place to many any one particular thing. I remember one episode where they being back a ancient klingon and he is just a rad punk/heavy metal biker kinda guy. He throes shade at all the other klingons for being too much about honor and not partying. That would be a good direction for a space warrior race that could use a replicator to fix broken bones instantly you know? Plus Gene Roddenberry would have liked the excuse to get more weird fuckin' in the show. Like all the Sci fi writers of the time he was hornt more than you can imagine. I am pretty sure that is how he got Into Hollywood.

I always thought the Klingons were more like an absurd caricature of imperial Japan circa 1942

I have two somewhat incompatible ideas about klingons

1. when i was watching one of the newer "viking" TV shows it was like watching one of the klingon court intrigue episodes. then someone told me klingons were meant to be like vikings but I never looked into if that was at all true but I tihnk it's funny.

2. It almost seems like "klingon" doesn't refer to a species so much as a class, ethnicity or subculture of a minority within a species. it isn't plausible for all the attitudes about "what is a klingon" to be pervasive through a large population. you need to own land. you need to have something to do with the high council which is like 8 people. you can't have an even nominally productive job. famers, lawyers, cooks, scientists: all are disgraced.

we do occasionally meet people who don't fit that mold but they spend the whole time crying about how they are outcasts from "klingon society" but it would really be like 95% of people. OTOH if "klingon" was just a single, small group that was extremely powerful it would make more sense. "klingon" is a group more like "catholic clergy" than like "humans".

I like Diane Duane's Rihannsu concept of the Romulans that merges both the Chinese and Roman mythos into something unique and actually interesting. Gene hated it but the Enterprise writers loved it and wanted to incorporate it where the Romulans militarised their entire society in panic upon first contact with humans (Vulcan first contact was an invasion by Orion Slavers and Romulan experiences during the exile didn't help) and stole the federation ship's warp drive, having fled Vulcan on sublight ships.

Much of the fandom accepts Rihannsu as the "supercanon" Romulans and Star Trek Online uses them, with a fig leaf that some of the missing exile ships survived and formed similar factions that have all been conflated.

Keep in mind, most of the TOS Klingon and Romulan episodes don't have them as straight up villains - they're always explicitly comparable to the Federation.

Errand of Mercy, the episode in which the Klingons first appeared, ends with an semi-omipotent being saying that one day the Federation and Klingons will be allies.