If Khan couldn't hang onto control in the 20th century, couldn't beat a handful of basic humans in the 23rd, and couldn't take out a starship in one-on-one combat... what makes one think he would somehow be able to conquer 23rd century Earth?
Is Kirk really to blame for the events in 'The Wrath of Khan'?
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If Khan couldn't hang onto control in the 20th century, couldn't beat a handful of basic humans in the 23rd, and couldn't take out a starship in one-on-one combat... what makes one think he would somehow be able to conquer 23rd century Earth?
I doubt Saavik would've brought it up if it said to just keep doing what Kirk was doing. Sometimes, you don't need it spelled out to size up the situation being presented.
What I mean is that no standard precautions available to Kirk would be of any help - Khan defeated those once already.
So fooling Khan and marooning Khan are two precautions Kirk would be well justified in trying out here.
Except not - entire inhabited worlds with populations in the millions can blow up at their leisure, Starfleet being none the wiser. At Deneva, the only source for information on a year of silence was Ham Kirk's sam radio...
Timo Saloniemi
Oh, since two top officers dismissed Saavik's quoting, and even chided her for it, I see every reason to think it indeed was redundant and irrelevant. Probably the GO just said "exercise caution", which Kirk did.
(Doesn't mean Kirk would have been doing it before Saavik's prompting. Only means he would start doing it at that point, pretending that he had always planned on doing so. The end result would still be the same.)
Timo Saloniemi
Yes, but the Denevans seemed to be the classic way-out-there settlers who may not have felt comfortable with Starfleet monitoring their every move, which would be different from a government-issue subspace monitor that could be accessed by journalists/historians.
As I said, Khan and company would figure out a way to get past Earth defenses by 'cloaking' (using available Starfleet tech modified by Khan to get past sensors) or by actually creating a cloaking device, installing it on the captured Starfleet ship, and then getting past Earth's outer sensor net, or whatever Starfleet has that's like SOSUS or the current IUSS. Then, it would be too late for Starfleet to do anything, as Khan and company show up and hold Earth hostage with the threat of using said starship's weaponry on most major cities.
You're giving Khan a lot of credit considering he was incompetent at best.
If Khan was so incompetent as you say, then how would've he been able to take over the Enterprise in Space Seed?
Just don’t let him read any tech manuals.
Because he caught them off guard, and also had an accomplice in Marla McGivers.
Khan was responsible for what Khan did. As for the shields--why did they automatically go up in the series, but not here?
Yes, Kirk should have put up the shields, but he ended up putting down a significant threat. Sometimes you get sucker punched.
Yes, Kirk should have put up the shields, but he ended up putting down a significant threat. Sometimes you get sucker punched.
I did not say that. I was talking about Khan being discussed among the Enterprise crew who lived through his attempt to take over the ship and the Starfleet brass who received Kirk's official report. You were talking about Khan's return becoming public knowledge to everyone in the 23rd Century. Not the same thing.
Saavik literally quotes the regulation.
Under the authority granted to him by Starfleet.
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Khan never said he wanted to conquer Earth. That's one of the reasons why he left in the first place. If he could not rule a world's population, he would create a new one. And if any assumption were to be made with regards to what Khan would do with the Genesis device, it wouldn't be to conquer Earth. The Genesis Device offered way too many grand possibilities for a planet that was more trouble than it's worth.
What does ruling the 23rd century actually look like?
I'm thinking that Khan would be sorely disappointing and abdicate after a week.
"Grain. They just want more grain. All I'm doing is moving one load of grain from planet to planet and then back again."
I'm thinking that Khan would be sorely disappointing and abdicate after a week.
"Grain. They just want more grain. All I'm doing is moving one load of grain from planet to planet and then back again."
Who defrosted Khan and his ilk are to blame
At best Khan came pretty close to taking over the Enterprise, but in the end failed.
As to who is to blame for the events of TWOK, obviously it's Carol Marcus.
planets don't normally explode. In fact, I'm not sure planets ever explode. Wouldn't Kirk at least have been interested that one of the planets was gone? Wouldn't someone?
If I'd been Kirk my first thought would have been that Khan had somehow destroyed his or a nearby planet trying some madman super science scheme (which in my.. shudder.. head canon.. is what happened) to escape his prison. I would have at least gotten someone to investigate.
If I'd been Kirk my first thought would have been that Khan had somehow destroyed his or a nearby planet trying some madman super science scheme (which in my.. shudder.. head canon.. is what happened) to escape his prison. I would have at least gotten someone to investigate.
That's not quite how it went. From Once Burned, by Peter David, narrated in the first person by Mackenzie Calhoun:
James Kirk wrote an autobiography, you know. Much of it was dismissed by critics as a collection of tall-tales. Some believed that Kirk had a penchant for exaggerating. Outrageous stories of planets of sorcery, or confrontations with Greek gods or Abraham Lincoln, or the removal of his first officer’s brain (which some more waggish commentators claimed was not so extraordinary, considering that there were ostensibly any number of Starfleet officers for whom such a loss would not make any noticeable difference). Many felt that the reason Kirk’s legend was so phenomenal was that he himself took great pains to build it. Some referred to him as the Baron Münchausen of space, and the fact that his friends and officers backed him up was written off as simple personal loyalty.
I never believed that. Never believed it for a minute. Because space is vast and unknowable, and it’s the height of presumption to consider any aspect of it and toss it aside as unbelievable.
I never believed that. Never believed it for a minute. Because space is vast and unknowable, and it’s the height of presumption to consider any aspect of it and toss it aside as unbelievable.
He offered the world ORDER!!!!
You're right. Obviously the Botany Bay's ship computer is at fault here.
Well, then she's also repsonsible for the world being saved. Because if the events of TWOK hadn't happened, then Kirk & his crew wouldn't have risked everything to resurrect Spock, then they wouldn't spent three months in exile on Vulcan, then they wouldn't have been in the right place and right time to travel back to the 20th Century and get two humpback whales, and so the Earth gets destroyed by an alien probe.
Sure, if he'd heard about it. As someone involved in the making of TWOK said (I forget who): "Khan stayed awake at night thinking about Kirk. Kirk didn't stay awake at night thinking about Khan."
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