Mostly "customary international law" and globally recognised treaties I would imagine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimes_against_humanity#Types_of_crimes_against_humanity would probably be a good place to start, as would most of the missions of the US Coast Guard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Coast_Guard#Missions
Is Starfleet the only Navy in the Federation?
- Thread starter SG-17
- Start date
Mostly "customary international law" and globally recognised treaties I would imagine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimes_against_humanity#Types_of_crimes_against_humanity would probably be a good place to start, as would most of the missions of the US Coast Guard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Coast_Guard#Missions
The defacto assumption is that laws are fairly universal on earth - it is a single planet-nation, with a single president, cabinet, courts etc. Crime is virtually non-existent.
So "Starfleet Police" would, presumably under my theory, just be regular civilian law enforcement but have to wear Starfleet Uniforms because bureaucracy (and Wardrobe Budgets).
"Starfleet NAVAL Security" OTOH would be the Worfs, Odos and Tuvix's responsible for maintaining law and order among starships and naval bases, call it a combo of MP and Marines.
Probably not "Odos." I believe Odo was employed by the Bajor government, and while he interfaced with Starfleet, and recognized they were the stations administrators, he didn't actually work for Starfleet.
We see a civilian security officer in ST III (he takes McCoy into custody at the bar). He identifies himself as "Federation Security" but is not a member of Starfleet and doesn't wear a uniform.
And of course there's the cop on the hoverbike in ST09. It looks like he does wear a uniform, but that's understandable, since he's a patrol officer.
Correct. IIRC, Odo is formally a member of the Bajoran Militia.
Last edited:
The Kobayashi Maru's registry of "ECS-1022" means the Earth Cargo Service still operates ships, they just add their overall numbers into the main fleet. The Raven was "NAR" and operated by civilian scientists more like Stamets was before Lorca drafted him. NCC may just mean Starfleet proper, with other registry codes being subfleets.
That would help account for the higher numbers too.
That would help account for the higher numbers too.
That was my headcanon. Feel free to apply your own!
Generally identified in Treklit as the Federation Security Agency, a hybrid of the CIA, FBI and Secret Service.
Jaresh-Inyo is quite clear that Leyton's request to allow Starfleet to 'get men on the street immediately' is akin to 'declaring martial law'. While this doesn't conclusively prove the 'Starfleet is a military' argument (similar off-the-cuff comments contradict it) it does make it clear that as you suggest, Starfleet is not the primary law enforcement agency for civilians on Earth. At least one TrekLit entry has speculated that overall investigative authority for Earth would normally be covered by the global United Earth Police, I haven't seen anything on local arrangements, but a combination of combined "public safety agencies" (mostly fire-EMS but with arrest powers) and "court officers" akin the original US Marshals would seem to be an obvious minimum.
Last edited:
Why? Replace Starfleet with X. X has to have some value. Why would "Starfleet" be less acceptable as a value to X than something else?
The lowliest cop on the beat in Bumfuckski, Omsk, did have to be Soviet Army. Nothing wrong as such with having law enforcement be ultimately supervised by the Ministry of Defense rather than the Ministry of Interior; it's not as if the Ministers ever do the beat anyway. The organizational level closest to the beat cop would be pretty much the same in both cases.
...And then delivers McCoy to a Starfleet gaol where the guards very much do wear Starfleet-marked uniforms, and the place gets rushed by Starfleet troops when our heroes do their jailbreak.
I gather people in San Francisco would be much more worried by being abducted by a civilian-looking shady character than by being beamed away by a Starfleet patrol...
Also, he's the only police officer in all of Star Trek to deal with civilian crime.
Crimes within the UFP have been investigated by Starfeet in all preceding and following Star Trek. But they have also arguably involved Starfleet characters as suspects or victims, or dealt with "space crime" where civilian organizations arguably might lack jurisdiction. The underage ward of a supposed civilian wrecking a car in a Riverside quarry is our first and AFAIK only example of the total absence of such elements in a crime.
But whose law, if any, he actually upholds is an open question. We never see Odo being given, much less obeying, direct orders by his supposed Bajoran superiors. Then again, no other sort of superior manages that, either! Odo's formal allegiance is as transient as that pseudo-uniform he fakes.
Or then it implies that law enforcement is unheard of in New Orleans. A civilian police organization might have no presence on the streets in what pretty much alleges to be a post-crime society; having a beat cop visible would put the lie to that, um, lie.
OTOH, when the organization does have to admit to there still being crime to solve, sending armed people in brightly colored uniforms might be the best policy, putting all due emphasis on the fact that this first instance of pickpocketing in 78 years is a national emergency that is being taken extremely seriously.
Timo Saloniemi
Last edited:
I came across a quote about the 1890s British Mediterranean Fleet recently that reminded me of this kind of discussion:
I don't think we thought very much about war with a big W. We looked on the Navy more as a World Police Force than as a warlike institution. We considered that our job was to safeguard law and order throughout the world — safeguard civilization, put out out fires on shore, and act as guide, philosopher, and friend to merchant ships of all nations.
–Vice Admiral Humphrey Smith, RN ret. quoted in The Anatomy of British Sea Power by Arthur Marder.
So the Federation is a border line military, semidemocratic state, they are the smiling Borg
Not a fan.
Your supposition makes absolutely no sense based on the context of my quotes post. Kindly elaborate.
I am being sarcastic. The way the Federation combines different planets armed forces/law enforcement agencies into Starfleet, reminds me of Eddington's view of the Federation. They assimilate species and they do not even realise it. Considering how Terrancentric Starfleet is presented on screen there is some truth to what he said.
The Federation should be more IDIC and less Absorption
That Eddington speech really does make more and more sense the deeper you analyse the Trek franchise.
When you watch ENT the United Earth state has been assimilated by the North American alliance or whatever future USA is called. ENT's Starfleet admiralty looks like 22nd century NASA plus the US Navy.
Your post becomes funnier when you take into account the mission control scene in the episode First Flight had actual US Navy personnel (from the aircraft carrier Enterprise) as background extras.
Odo's law.
