Starship sales

[Unicron]

Some of the older sources, FASA especially, talked about the idea of the stellar powers occasionally selling older ships to other groups (the Orion fleet in the FASAverse is largely of Klingon designs either bought or stolen). Naturally any important equipment would be removed.

How common do you think this would be, and what might be gained by a government like the Federation which doesn't seem to use currency?

 

[Avro Arrow]

I admit I had no idea what this thread was going to be about when I clicked on it. I thought perhaps it was going to be a question about overall sales for the Art Asylum/Diamond Select models!

I don't know for sure how common it would be in the Star Trek universe, but it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it would happen. Except for that one (?) book, FASA was set firmly in the TOS era, which did seem to use currency. But perhaps the Federation also sold ships for access to rare commodities such as dilithium or topaline?

IIRC, the novel The Ashes of Eden depicted the Enterprise-A being sold to the planet Chal after being decommissioned.

Presumably, FASA included this type of thing in their manuals because it happens in real life with naval ships, so they figured it would probably happen in Star Trek too.

 

[Dukhat]

Some of the older sources, FASA especially, talked about the idea of the stellar powers occasionally selling older ships to other groups (the Orion fleet in the FASAverse is largely of Klingon designs either bought or stolen). Naturally any important equipment would be removed.

How common do you think this would be, and what might be gained by a government like the Federation which doesn't seem to use currency?

The problem is that when FASA made those books, the Federation did use currency. Or at least there was no information to the contrary. I would think that this is simply incompatible with the Federation of TNG's time.

 

[Timo]

Of course, the Federation might give out combat vessels as charity, too. Say, the Estonian Navy is in practice built out of donations, ships transferred for purely symbolic monetary compensation; many young navies are, as outside parties have an interest in supporting or opposing the emergence of a new player in the field.

We often see a specific type of spacecraft operated by several different nations or agencies. Outright sales for profit? Recycling of ancient but durable vessels at minimal cost? Military support for allies or vassals? When one of these types is also seen in UFP hands (such as the vessel first seen in "Heart of Glory" as the Talarian-owned Batris), the possibility arises that one of the UFP cultures is the originator and this is indeed (military?) surplus being sold or donated abroad.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Ithekro]

Friendly star systems that are not part of the Federation might be supplied with ships if they are threatened from a power the Federation has issues. Distance or politics might keep the Federation from setting up a starbase in the area or for tha system from joining the Federation. The system would likely have the ability to make starships, but might not have the capacity to bolster its forces due to time, or specific resources.

Starfleet would likely remove anything that is overly sensative, or outside the other culture's ability via the Prime Directive. That culture would reinstall their own components, or buy stuff from someone else (like the Ferengi).

It also might be that Starfleet only hands out outdated ships, or just science ships and freighters, rather than starships. Or they hand them over to member nations for planetary defense or other purposes after Starfleet is done with them.

Can you imagine Farpoint Station with a pair of old Miranda-class ships in orbit belonging to the local government? Or an old NX-class patrolling around Izar to keep down pirates and smugglers?

 

[USS KG5]

The problem is that when FASA made those books, the Federation did use currency. Or at least there was no information to the contrary. I would think that this is simply incompatible with the Federation of TNG's time.

Nothing stopping them being given in trade though, as the Feds do barter with other spacefaring cultures, all that has been definitively established is that for everyday transactions in the Federation, a post-scarcity economy, the exchange of currency is not considered necessary.

But, as others have posited, there is no reason that some Federation allies might get old hulls in return for scarce resources, if you forget the events of the novels, post Dominion War Starfleet must have a lot of old crap kicking around.

 

[Timo]

Does it, now? Curiously enough, we have no evidence of shipbuilding taking place during the war, nor of Starfleet swelling in size due to the conflict. The organization is short on starships in peacetime already, and making do with all kinds of antiquities; this in all probability indicates it's incapable of escalating at all or it would have done so already.

Possibly, it takes a decade to complete a starship, any starship (or, say, three years to complete a Defiant), so shipbuilding is not a viable response to a war of attrition. Or then there are other limiting factors, such as shortage of dilithium or warp coil vertenium or whatnot.

Perhaps after the war, Starfleet would actually be purchasing alien ships from left and right, to fill the gaps until the shipbuilding initiated just before the war finally bears its first fruit?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

Starfleet would likely remove anything that is overly sensative, or outside the other culture's ability via the Prime Directive. That culture would reinstall their own components, or buy stuff from someone else (like the Ferengi).

It would make sense that the ship's computers would be stripped of large portions of their information files, leaving behind those files necessary to run the ship. Downgrading weapons, sensors, shields, etc. would depend on who's getting the ship. Close friends retain much of the ship's original capacities, people who are just good customers buying a ship would perhaps get less.

So planet Israel get a better ship than planet Taiwan, who get a better ship than planet Pakistan, who get a better ship than planet Argentina.

If a Federation Member had a home fleet but lacked the ability to build large starships of their own, I could see starships built in orbit of Mars and Earth being sold all over the Federation to other Member worlds.

I would think that this is simply incompatible with the Federation of TNG's time

The Federation was at one point going to buy a wormhole, so yes this idea would be perfectly compatible.

Nothing wrong with a little commerce.

 

[JES]

I don't see why Starfleet couldn't sell/donate/trade outdated ships that they were planning to scrap anyways, except maybe because they intended to harvest the ship for parts/materials. I could see them selling/trading to colonies or distant member worlds without their own dedicated defense force however.
Maybe those would get what is left of the old Mirandas and Excelsiors that survived the Dominion War, once Starfleet commissioned ships to replace their roles. By the Dominion War, they were little better than cannon fodder anyways. I doubt that anybody in Starfleet was very eager to serve on them by then, not counting the supposed new builds in STO and fan-made refits/redesigns.

Other possible popular ships to sell would be the NX, Daedalus, Constitution, Constellation, and Akyazi classes. At least those that survived, and weren't mothballed or converted into museums.

Those that were not as trusted by Starfleet would get lesser, smaller, less heavily armed ships, and might be left with ships stripped of weapons, and other sensitive equipment, and so be left to re-equipping the ships themselves.

 

[Unicron]

The problem is that when FASA made those books, the Federation did use currency. Or at least there was no information to the contrary. I would think that this is simply incompatible with the Federation of TNG's time.

You might be correct, but I'll admit I tend to put less stock in Picard's description in FC since the way it's phrased (money doesn't exist in our time) is clearly wrong since we've seen the Ferengi, Cardassians and others use the equivalent of money or currency. It might be true that the Federation in the TNG+ era no longer uses it, but I feel more comfortable with an economic model I understand better.

FASA also mentioned the Klingons capturing a handful of Federation ships during the Four Years War and putting them into service with the Imperial Fleet, and Starfleet tried (and failed) to use several captured Klingon transports in an intelligence mission later on (Operation Dixie, which failed due to a Klingon agent on one of them). I tend to agree that older ships not worth refitting would be more preferable as "downsized" ships for an allied planet or government.

 

[Avro Arrow]

I know there's no real evidence of this either way, but I would probably tend to think that the Medusan ship at the end of the TOS-R version of "Is There In Truth No Beauty" is an older Starfleet ship that was sold to the Medusans. Its lines just seem to be more "Starfleet" than "Federation civilian" (although, granted, we haven't seen a lot of examples of the latter).

 

[Dukhat]

Nothing stopping them being given in trade though, as the Feds do barter with other spacefaring cultures, all that has been definitively established is that for everyday transactions in the Federation, a post-scarcity economy, the exchange of currency is not considered necessary.

But, as others have posited, there is no reason that some Federation allies might get old hulls in return for scarce resources, if you forget the events of the novels, post Dominion War Starfleet must have a lot of old crap kicking around.

One instance of this that I can think of (thanks to TNG-R), is that we have a Federation (even Starfleet) vessel type potentially being sold to other alien races in the past, with both the Ornaran's Sanction and Okona's Erstwhile being the same class as the Federation freighter Arcos.

The Federation was at one point going to buy a wormhole, so yes this idea would be perfectly compatible.

But in that instance they were bidding against other paying customers, so obviously they needed some kind of leverage in that specific situation. That doesn't mean that the Federation buys things with money all the time. They may have just had a "slush fund" for situations like this.

 

[trekshark]

In Rascals did anyone state how the Ferengi had the bird of preys? maybe the klingons sold off older ones to the highest bidder.
There are also the re-used models, like the Talarian ships, that could be used as evidence of other governments selling their ships

 

[Ithekro]

There were those old Apollo-class ships in Unification that the Romulans stole from a yard. They had been in Vulcan merchant service prior to that, though supposedly Starfleet did use to use that class. Maybe they had been built for Vulcan, or maybe they were gifted after 30 years to Vulcan who used then for another 30 years then put them in a surplus yard.

 

[Unicron]

A lot of the offscreen materials written for the Merchantman model suggested it was a very common design, IIRC even before it was commonly reused for alien ships in TNG and later series. It would easily explain how so many planets seem to have them.

 

[SicOne]

I wouldn't think that the Federation would sell any starships to anyone. First of all, replicators have rendered money obsolete within the Federation, so the Feds don't need the money. Secondly, a sold starship might end up within unsavory hands that use it against weaker interests, thereby calling into reasonable question whether or not the Federation had anything to do with whatever incident said unsavory characters precipitate.

The ships used in "Unification", IIRC, were older Vulcan ships and may not have been actual "Federation starships". Clearly, they were not front-line starships of any kind and fell quickly to the Warbird.

I would think the Federation has learned the lesson that the United States should have learned long ago, that military sales have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass as your opponents hit you with your own weaponry, or that of allies. The French Exocet missile strike in USS Stark in the Persian Gulf in the 80s comes to mind.

 

[Timo]

The very fact that so many US enemies have Exocets is because the missile is thoroughly French and thus (unlike many "free world" weapons) free of tech export limitations imposed by the US. Not a good analogy for Starfleet ships ending up in enemy hands...

Besides, Starfleet doesn't seem to worry too much about that happening. The Stargazer was left behind and the Ferengi got her; this did not arouse protests or accusations of any sort once revealed to our heroes or to Starfleet at large.

Many of Starfleet's enemies have replicators, too. Nevertheless, Starfleet isn't bothered by convincing fakes of its vessels conducting piracy or provocation. Possibly the very ability to build fake ships with little effort is enough to preempt the possibility of convincingly using those for evil!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Ithekro]

Selling ships is slightly different than selling missiles. While it can come back on you, it likely won't be an issues, since the old ship can usually be identified easily enough, and whatever systems were on it back in the day are either obsolete, or have been stripped and replaced with whatever the locals put on them. An 40 year old American crusier was a threat to the Royal Navy in the Falklands for a tiny bit. And Taiwan and many other countries have older American ships. Some sold after their service to the United States, and some build for sale to begin with. Or even build locally using the American designs (Australia I think was building American frigates for a time). Iran almost got four destroyers the Americans were building for hem before 1979 (Taiwan now has them after they served the United State for 25 years). Iran did get several F-14 Tomcats and Phoenix missiles prior to 1979. They were the only country to purchase those systems outside the USA. This was a reason why the US Navy didn't use the F-14 over Iraq all that much. The Iraqi were too use to them from fighting the Iranians for eight years.

Starfleet can likely make sure the ship's transponder is set so that they can easily check on old ships. And also keep weapons tech out of the hands of races that generall don't already have access to said weapons. Though they aren't above pushing a few weapon improvements that help Federation interests (they did aid the Cardassians in improving weapons technology against the Klingons and later helped the rebellion against the Dominion. More aid than they gave Bajor at first).

 

[SicOne]

Good points, Timo and Ithekro, on the sales of French and American weapons technology. I am also reminded that we refused to sell AH-64 Apache helicopter gunships and AGM-114 Hellfire missiles to Iraq, for concern that such advanced weaponry might fall into the wrong hands, a solid decision reinforced by the rise of the Islamic State.

I just don't see a need for the Federation to sell used starships in the current era. I know that in "Ashes of Eden" they sold or gave the Enterprise-A to the planet Chal, but even though the idea of starship sales may have been more likely in that era following the greatly reduced threat of the Klingon Empire, (1) I didn't see that as any more than a plot twist to get a decommissioned E-A into Jim Kirk's hands somehow and (2) this story might have occurred before replicator tech became commonplace in terms of fabricating materials to construct starships.

Then again, seeing how security was sorely lacking at the starship supply depot in "Unification", Starfleet couldn't have been too worried about others getting hold of older starships/tech...

And while replicators can replicate many things, they can't replicate EVerything, so it is entirely possible that older/obsolete starships or related tech might be bartered to other polities in exchange for rare, unreplicatable goods.

So, shit, I guess anything's possible.

 

[Timo]

I could well see the UFP setting up a fairly conventional trade agreement with a more primitive culture, and then using that as a weapon: it would cost them nothing much to either abruptly terminate all trade, or then suddenly flood the market with free-of-cost goods the other side couldn't dream of producing, let alone economically mass producing...

Timo Saloniemi