Assemble an away party to recon the ship. Assuming this is a warp capable ship they've found, flick the warp engines on and off in front of the locals - sort of like flicking a BIC lighter on and off in front of a caveman. Drive them mad 
What does the Prime Directive demand in the following scenario?
- Thread starter Lexx Shrapnel
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The OP didn't just specify ancient, but "belongs to a race that is extinct". Not likely a member of the Federation.
I guess if people are acting on behalf of the Federation either as a member of Starfleet or as an agent of the Federation i.e. in a civilian scientist role they might have to abide by the PD.
Nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.
That's an interesting concept I hadn't thought much about. Take Wesley Crusher's case, in at least the time he had resigned from Starfleet. His newly found temporal skills & such might be incredibly influential to societies. There's not really anything anyone could say or do if he chose to ignore Starfleet noninterference type principles, is there?
Well, people can say anything, obviously. But, no, no one could force him to respect the pd against his will. Convincing him it's the right thing to do would really be the only option.
Merrick is the interesting outlier here, as he is technically a civilian, yet Kirk claims he is entitled to arresting the man anyway. What separates the situation from that other "civilian castaways meddle in local politics for personal gain" scenario in "Angel One"?
1) One century, approximately.
2) Merrick is an Academy dropout.
3) Merrick worked for the UFP government.
We don't have much in the way of evidence.
- Nobody ever says the Prime Directive would have been drastically amended at any point. Not the 24th century heroes when they spit on their ancestors' barbarian memory, not the 23rd century ones when they chafe against the restraint imposed by the rule, not the 22nd century ones pondering what sort of a rule to create. And not the time travelers who get to examine the issue from many vantage points.
- Merrick did get five years of officer training, but Kirk never calls him on that. He does call Merrick "one of us", though. And if the PD, "one of our most important laws", is a rule for Starfleet only, then this defines "us" for the audience.
- Merrick went to the "merchant service" but commanded a "survey vessel" at the time of the adventure. Civilians no doubt survey and prospect, but perhaps the UFP economy is centralized so that such work is under government control. Or at least Merrick's was.
Arguing about the above three points will be required for settling this one special case and its relevance to the argument. Outside this, the PD never affects civilians in any century. It's not even quoted as the reason Kirk would wish to take down John Gill (who for his part does believe in the "non-interference directive" as an option, and just chooses to take the other one, that of totalitarian leadership based on massive interference).
Timo Saloniemi
1) One century, approximately.
2) Merrick is an Academy dropout.
3) Merrick worked for the UFP government.
We don't have much in the way of evidence.
- Nobody ever says the Prime Directive would have been drastically amended at any point. Not the 24th century heroes when they spit on their ancestors' barbarian memory, not the 23rd century ones when they chafe against the restraint imposed by the rule, not the 22nd century ones pondering what sort of a rule to create. And not the time travelers who get to examine the issue from many vantage points.
- Merrick did get five years of officer training, but Kirk never calls him on that. He does call Merrick "one of us", though. And if the PD, "one of our most important laws", is a rule for Starfleet only, then this defines "us" for the audience.
- Merrick went to the "merchant service" but commanded a "survey vessel" at the time of the adventure. Civilians no doubt survey and prospect, but perhaps the UFP economy is centralized so that such work is under government control. Or at least Merrick's was.
Arguing about the above three points will be required for settling this one special case and its relevance to the argument. Outside this, the PD never affects civilians in any century. It's not even quoted as the reason Kirk would wish to take down John Gill (who for his part does believe in the "non-interference directive" as an option, and just chooses to take the other one, that of totalitarian leadership based on massive interference).
Timo Saloniemi
Is he really the outlier if there are only two examples to go by?
The "Angle One" planet was not a pre-warp society. They knew about aliens, and had contact with them. OF COURSE the Federation is not allowed to just send their soldiers into their territory, even if only to retrieve their own!
A warp capable civilisation is also perfectly allowed to reverse-engineer an even better warp drive if an alien ship wrecks in their territory.As well as they can freely have diplomatic relationship with whimever they want, be it the Federation or the Romulans.
For pre-Warp civilisations the situation is different though. In this case, every time it has ever happened on screen, ANY form of interferenct had to be ommited or, if it had already taken place, tried to be reversed.
Exactly like interferences in the timeline.
Everytime ANYONE warp capable had contact with a pre-warp society, the effects needed to be reversed. Wether it were aliens affecting other aliens (ENT: civilisation), klingons secretly manipulating power struggles (TOS: A private little war), the effects needed to be reversed.
Would the people of Neural from "A private little war" had been warp-capable, they would have been free to ally themselves with the klingons. But since they weren't, they were under the protection from the PD to be left alone, even from the klingons, and any interference that had taken place had to be reversed.
Which means the PD is universal. Not just for Starfleet (which puts special emphasize on it - and is probably the main reason why even other species abide by it, the same way the U.S makes sure via the U.N. that international law is followed internationally).
When Kirk says the PD is "our" law, he doesn't mean only the Federation - he means all "enlighted" (aka warp capable) societies.
I really don't think he does. It has been called the Federation's highest law.
Friday's Child said:
And "pre-warp" has never mattered much when it comes to the PD. Indeed, it wasn't even mentioned in the context until DSC "Para Bellum". DS9 showed the warp-capable, interstellarly savvy Bajor to be under PD protection specifically in its internal affairs, until proof of Cardassian interference turned those to external affairs. TNG already showed Picard abstaining from Klingon politics because of the "principle of noninterference", even if the words "prime" and "directive" weren't spoken out loud.
But that's the very thing they were allowed to do: they sent their armed personnel to meet the castaways. Said personnel just didn't have the right to act.
Not in "Angel One". And that's about the only time interference by civilians would have been the issue: otherwise, we just hear of this rule saying that Starfleet can't play god with its superior tech and firepower.
I don't think there's a single case of this happening, really.
But that's in ENT, before the PD issue arises.
Nope, they were compounded, to make sure the Klingons didn't win. Secret manipulation was fine - Kirk had been doing that the previous time he was on the planet, telling his local buddy about the stars, the Federation and all.
Naah. No interference was reversed - the Klingons stayed, and all they had done stayed as well. The Feds just turned the place into a battleground for a proxy war. Warp capability did not figure in this in any fashion.
It means the exact opposite - the PD doesn't even tie the hands of Starfleet if wars can be won by ignoring it.
This doesn't match the evidence at all. Nobody but Kirk is ever shown following this law in TOS. And nobody but Kirk's colleagues (including erstwhile ones like Merrick and Gill) ever gets accused of not following it.
The whole idea of "enlighted" societies agreeing on a law is absurd to begin with. Even within the UFP, there is no all-encompassing law, so that slavery is fine on Ardana and duels to death on Vulcan, but Earth has no truck with those. Surely any law the UFP would come up with (after watering it down with internal squabbles) would immediately be declared a crime by the many opponents and competitors of the UFP, just because.
Which is especially true of the Prime Directive of noninterference, a concept that keeps alienating the Vulcans from our heroes (and from a number of other players) during ENT.
Timo Saloniemi
The Omega Directive is a special case.
If some race is experimenting with the Omega particle and something goes wrong, it can make warp drive itself impossible. That alone makes Omega more important than the PD. And it justifies Starfleet doing whatever it can to eliminate all traces of the Omega particle.
It's not just for the Federation's good. It's for the good of ALL races that Omega be destroyed. Whatever the cost.
Huh? Who is the Federation to be making decisions for races they aren't governing?
Did you read my post? If there's a disaster involving Omega, it makes all use of warp drive impossible. Do you have any idea what kind of chaos that would cause? That's the reason the Omega Directive overrides everything else, including the PD.
Anyhoo, regarding the original post...no, Starfleet would have no reason to interfere. Until the aliens master their warp drive and venture out into space.
Well, today people go to jail for not making such decisions: if you don't stop a dangerous activity or crime, you are guilty of negligence, regardless of your exact status vis-á-vis the person who's the root cause of the danger. (If you're her dad, it's all the worse, of course. But the UFP need not have paternal pretensions here: negligence is bad enough among peers.)
Timo Saloniemi
Timo Saloniemi
Within a certain sphere. If it isn't Federation territory, the Federation shouldn't have a say in it. This is just American thinking that we must know what's best for everyone.
But they do, nonetheless.
Perhaps. But in this case, it happens to be correct. Warp capability is essential for interstellar travel and commerce. It MUST be preserved - at all costs.
It also depends on what level the pre warp planet is yet.. Say a ship crashes. right now.. we have the tech to reverse engineer the ship, since we're so close.. a "federation" might leave us alone, or it might make contact and help us since we might blow ourselves up!
Now.. say the planet was at say.. 14th century tech.. and a ship crashed in an area with few people, then yes, we'd go in and recover or destroy the ship, maybe mind wipe the villagers.. But say it crashed near a "big" city.. then our options start to dwindle.. go in and take it, screw the consqueinces.. blow it up maybe.. planet is contaminated.. just have to mitigate the fallout..
Now.. say the planet was at say.. 14th century tech.. and a ship crashed in an area with few people, then yes, we'd go in and recover or destroy the ship, maybe mind wipe the villagers.. But say it crashed near a "big" city.. then our options start to dwindle.. go in and take it, screw the consqueinces.. blow it up maybe.. planet is contaminated.. just have to mitigate the fallout..
In the Delta Quadrant? I could see that thinking applied to something happening on your border, but 70,000 light years away?
It would help with such speculations if our heroes actually at least once did try and hide evidence, or reverse effects, or eliminate witnesses.
But they don't. Not unless it's their own doing, or their own hides are in the fire unless something gets done. They may do stuff to allow them to withdraw with minimal further losses, such as in "First Contact" the episode. Or they may decide that further interfering will be beneficial, such as in "A Private Little War", or that the gates have been opened by accident or by somebody else and contact is best made by further meddling, such as in "Errand of Mercy".
But they don't try to just mop up after a meddler, leaving the natives thinking that nothing happened. Unless absolutely forced to, as in "Homeward". And they don't try and turn back the wheel of time even if they do go in and get their man, such as in "Bread and Circuses" or "Patterns of Force".
Timo Saloniemi
But they don't. Not unless it's their own doing, or their own hides are in the fire unless something gets done. They may do stuff to allow them to withdraw with minimal further losses, such as in "First Contact" the episode. Or they may decide that further interfering will be beneficial, such as in "A Private Little War", or that the gates have been opened by accident or by somebody else and contact is best made by further meddling, such as in "Errand of Mercy".
But they don't try to just mop up after a meddler, leaving the natives thinking that nothing happened. Unless absolutely forced to, as in "Homeward". And they don't try and turn back the wheel of time even if they do go in and get their man, such as in "Bread and Circuses" or "Patterns of Force".
Timo Saloniemi
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