Very true, completely agree here.
That is also why, in my own Your Opinion on (Providence) NRDS thread I asked the question if " * … it (is) a shared responsibility of the major blocs (panfam, imperium, legacy, etc) to keep the zone more or less intact when it really matters ? Is it in their interest ?"
A positive answer to that question (which was not popular, btw) would probably be a modest way to find some semblance of balance for the aspect you raise.
Of course, from within the game it doesn’t make any sense at all, any region should be conquerable in some way, and some small bloc should not get preferential treatment.
On the other hand, looking from outside of the game, on metapolitical level, Provi bloc has survived that long undoubtedly because the large entities allowed it to (and because Provi didn’t hold any really valuable resources, of course). These large blocs seem to have forgotten having NRDS nerds around was actually beneficial to them and the game itself too, lost interest, changed leadership or whatever other reasons.
But I do believe that it still is in the interest of the game to have NRDS in some way, shape, and region. It requires some self-restraint on the part of the biggest entities, evidently.