Starfleet Marine Corps

[Longinus]

I really don't like the idea of either Starfleet Marines or an unified Federation Army, both seem too militaristic.

Technology has rendered large scale ground combats mostly irrelevant anyway, and for small assaults Starfleet has their security teams.

Member planets can possibly have their own ground forces for peacekeeping and to defend against an unlikely ground invasion, but these forces would be more like US National Guard. If there really was need Federation could form peacekeeper units out of volunteers from these planetary defence forces to be send to where needed.

[The Wormhole]

Longinus wrote:

---

I really don't like the idea of either Starfleet Marines or an unified Federation Army, both seem too militaristic.

Technology has rendered large scale ground combats mostly irrelevant anyway, and for small assaults Starfleet has their security teams.

Well, there are plenty enemies of the Federation that have large ground based armies, the Klingons, the Jem'Hadar, even the Cardassians have enaged in a good many ground battles.

Hmm, for that matter, Chief O'Brien has an unpsecified background as a "soldier." We know he was in many ground fights against the Cardassians, and as of DS9's second season him and Major Kira were the only ones on the station considered to have any real combat experience. O'Brien's obviously not a Marine, so maybe Starfleet does have a ground division that exists as part of its rank structure?

[R. Star]

A majority of the Star Trek rpgs and sims have some sort of Marine Corps equivalent for practicality. These of course are fan creations, but it does set a trend of what fans expect.

Starfleet is a military organization, however loose and whatever other purposes they serve. Even the most utopian definition of Starfleet states one of their purposes is defense. If they don't have a trained ground combat unit, they are stupid.

[Longinus]

I think the references about O'Brien being a 'soldier' merely meant that he had seen his fair share of combat, and not a refernce to an actual position.

[King Daniel Into Darkness]

For what it's worth, the cancelled Romulan War movie Star Trek: The Beginning had the United Earth Stellar Navy (previously unheard of; basically short-range fighters dedicated to Earth's defence) merging with the expanding Starfleet in the wake of the formation of the Coalition of Planets.

That's the closest you're probably going to get to canonical evidence of Starfleet absorbing other military roles.

[LobsterAfternoon]

Also on the "absorbing military" front, we know Shran would've joined the Enterprise crew if ENT had gotten a season 5. Whether that would've meant him joining Earth Starfleet or if it would've been the early stages of a Fed Starfleet, we dunno.

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ I always assumed that Shran would have become the leader of the MACO detachment. He is an experienced soldier, so that'd be a perfect fit for him. Whether he would have adopted a MACO uniform, though, is not clear.

[LobsterAfternoon]

That woulda been great.

[Darkwing]

Longinus wrote:

---

I really don't like the idea of either Starfleet Marines or an unified Federation Army, both seem too militaristic.

No such thing as "too militaristic" when it comes to the existence of a force, only in how it's employed.

Technology has rendered large scale ground combats mostly irrelevant anyway, and for small assaults Starfleet has their security teams.

Read Starship Troopers, Heinlein argues that there will always be a need for the poor, bloody infantry to actually be on the ground.

Member planets can possibly have their own ground forces for peacekeeping and to defend against an unlikely ground invasion, but these forces would be more like US National Guard. If there really was need Federation could form peacekeeper units out of volunteers from these planetary defence forces to be send to where needed.

The US experience with that showed that an overall organization was needed, or they wouldn't work together and coordinate well. It's part of why we no longer raise a unit and leave it at home. We raise a unit, station it, then rotate the personnel between units for turnover and to cross-pollinate. Everyone gets the same training and keep levelling out local ideas so all units are more or less on the same page. I'd argue that an army would prove necessary just so different worlds didn't have better or worse local defenders, and so that those troops would be loyal to the whole UFP, not the local gov't, and therefore less likely to seem a potential threat to other member worlds during tense political crises.

[LobsterAfternoon]

@ Darkwing - I've read Starship Troopers, and while it's a great book and I think (unfortunately) a more realistic view of the future of the military, a lot of Trek renders a lot of Starship Troopers null and void. The ability to precisely beam people in, the crazy targeting and sensors Trek has, and the ability to resolve a lot of problems with either diplomacy or technobabble make it sorta hard to apply Starship Troopers lessons to Trek.

[General_Phoenix]

Starfleet Command and (I think) Klingon Academy had the marines. Knock the enemies shields out and beam over a team to knock out internal targets, was fun imagining the battles raging inside a starship when beaming a marine force over, or, the battles raging inside your own ship if your enemy chose to beam their troops over.

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Transporters and sensors can be disabled by the enemy. So those are not going to obviate the need for marines. And much of the time, diplomacy simply doesn't work.

[Longinus]

Darkwing wrote:

---

The US experience with that showed that an overall organization was needed, or they wouldn't work together and coordinate well. It's part of why we no longer raise a unit and leave it at home. We raise a unit, station it, then rotate the personnel between units for turnover and to cross-pollinate. Everyone gets the same training and keep levelling out local ideas so all units are more or less on the same page. I'd argue that an army would prove necessary just so different worlds didn't have better or worse local defenders, and so that those troops would be loyal to the whole UFP, not the local gov't, and therefore less likely to seem a potential threat to other member worlds during tense political crises.

I understant that it wouldn't be a stratetigally best possible arrangement, but I still think it would be something Federation might do. I could easily believe Federation not expecting needing an army.

UFP is not an unified nation state but an alliance of different worlds. It's more like EU than USA. Member worlds might not like the idea of large numbers of UFP troops permanently stationed on their territory. And yes, having a permanent army would make Federation more militaristic.

Oh, and NATO and UN forces kinda operate the way I suggested, and they seem to work just fine. NATO has no army, UN has no army. Their member nations have armies that occassionally perform joint operations.

[Longinus]

Mr. Laser Beam wrote:

---

Transporters and sensors can be disabled by the enemy. So those are not going to obviate the need for marines. And much of the time, diplomacy simply doesn't work.

Since when has Federation prepared for their constantly failing technology failing? That's not what they do. They expect everything to work perfectly, and when it once more doesn't, they concoct some ad hoc solution on the spot.

[Lieut. Arex]

the background information on tmp describes the arcturiansproviding infantry for the federationbecause of their large population and ability to vlone millions of troops in a short timenot technically canonical of course but at least conformation that behind the scenes the s the concept of fedration ground forces had been given some little thought