Keep Drive Core or Give it to Morda

Maybe later. My goal, at least my Ryder's goal, is to find a home for my fellow humans.

Both choices are stupid because most Krogans are idiots, and so are most humans, oh well...

At least a Krogan alliance can yield more productivity in the long run.

You keep saying 'lets just use it for defence' but you're not actually saying how, and in a question where keeping it brings with it very real, quantifiable consequences, it isn't good enough to just pretend it's a giant win gun. Not if you're arguing that it's the rational choice. That's actually irrational. Simply having a power source does not inherently make anything more defensible, particularly not when it doesn't appear to have any issue powering what it already has. The fact 'no one mentioned this' is not intended to be 'proof' of anything, it's meant to point out that this is an argument that you're making and therefore you can't expect anyone to take it seriously unless you explain it.

I don't doubt that Morda is politically strengthened by getting the core, but that result is a side effect - she initially formulated the plan to acquire it while in power, so regardless of how she comes out looking if you give it back to her, at some point she still identified a need for it. She was already in undisputed charge of the colony to begin with. That's the whole reason Strux had to carry out all that skullduggery in the first place, she was too strong to directly challenge. None of this affects the basic reality that you need power to run the hundreds of systems the colony needs to function.

As for whether the Krogan 'look' like they need it or whether they're lying etc - tbh that's neither here nor there. It's a known fact that the colony requires lots of power, will require more as it expands, and any power solution that needs to be located outside in open areas will be that much more harder to defend and prone to failure, regardless of how capable the Krogan are. Suggesting that it's essentially a 'luxury' when you can't even explain precisely why it would be so beneficial to the Nexus' defence doesn't make sense. And again, the need for the core doesn't stem from the colony's needs right now. It stems from what it will need to expand. I'm assuming you're not going to argue that the colony will always require the same amount of power regardless of how big it is, right?

As for blaming Morda for the weaponisation of a core that never even happened and was planned by someone else... that's absurd. Certainly not rational.

Sending more resources to the Nexus is important, but anything that may expedite the growth of settlements and creating some kind of infrastructure would be paramount, in my opinion. Love or hate the krogan, they are key allies to have and the Initiative is weaker without them.

It's been a while since I played this particular quest but in my memory, this was less about actual logic and more of a diplomatic power play. The Krogan were doing fine even without the core. They wanted to assert their claim on Elaaden by demanding something in return for "the permission" for the AI to establish an outpost there. It was a matter of throwing the krogan a bone or not.
You give them the core, you make a statement that you respect them and trust them. You don't, you make the opposite statement, that to me was the crux of the matter more than any material concern.

Yeah you can't have an outpost otherwise right? How does that affect the rest of the game?

Hmm I might do it then just to see the difference.

Ooo a pissed off Krogan?

True. But after Ryder stops Archie from getting Meridian, the Initiative should, or I would believe they would, know that the Kett could attack the Nexus at anytime. The reason why Archie didn't was because he was obsessed with finding Meridian. The drive core could, if it has the capability, be converted to providing shields for the Nexus or something that could be used to protect the Nexus. Don't know. If the drive core  is such a big deal for the krogan, have Ryder tell the robots to build them something that will do what they need it to do.

Yeah likely a Krogan sized hole in the Tempest.

Lol yeah not likely. Probably need a jacket.😋