No. It's dependent on every member of the Federation--different races from completely different worlds with completely different social and political histories and completely different moral and religious traditions--all addopting wholesale the Earth concept of military/exploratory missions,
No it isn't - that is what Starfleet DOES, and what any space-based military in the trekverse seems to do. Granted in the real world it makes little sense that aliens would be anything like us in any way, but in the trekverse they all are. They give a few explanations for it but basically its budget, however it is what you are left with. Most aliens are a lot like us really and so they play nice on the same ships in the same fleet.
not to mention addopting Earth customs, Earth ranks heirarchies, Earth technology, Earth architecture and Earth atmosphere and gravity conditions for their own.
Not necessarily - after all it is established on-screen that there are ships largely crewed by one species in Starfleet and it is never established that this is not the norm, explains our rather human hero crews rather neatly IMHO.
That humans place a premium in galactic exploration is justifiable because we--being humans--know this about ourselves, but how in the world does one justify this assumption that the differing species on 150 different worlds would all think exactly like us?
Well Trek fundamentally makes that assumption - all the races really just act like one or other aspect of humanity. How realistic is it that there is only ONE Klingon culture we see, or ONE Romulan culture, there are dozens here on Earth why not on those worlds? That is Star Trek for you though and its a natural compromise of trying to write a big highly-populated universe for TV and a TV budget.
Hell, even humans didn't all think alike in the years before Trek time (meaning "Now") and to assume that all sentient life in the Federation would be pliable enough to submit to what is essentially a human-invented and human-centric worldview is more than a little arrogant.
Well don't assume that then. Just because all the ships in the Federation capable of military operations are subordinate to Starfleet does not mean that they are all mixed-crewed or all submit to a human-centric worldview, it is just a necessity to win wars. Just as it is unlikely that the allies would have won WW2 had all three powers done their own thing without consulting each other there is no way that Starfleet would have beaten the Dominion without the resources and manpower of 150 worlds to throw at them.
Consider, for example, if the Klingons really WERE Federation members (some day they will be, so this is a pretty relevant question isn't it?). Klingon society and culture is so different from humans that the concept of exploration and warfare are fundamentally different. War, for Klingons, is an activity, not a situation; they think of mortal combat the way most humans think of sports, and their word for "exploration" probably has connotations similar to what humans would call "hunting." For this reason, the only Klingons who ever join Starfleet are Klingons who were RAISED BY HUMANS,
Not really fair - Worf was no less a Klingon than Martok, and no less a warrior. He just understood humanity better as he had lived among them. Klingons would never join the Federation while the majority of their population considered them big softies, but after fighting alongside them in the Dominion War would believe them honourable warriors, same goes for Vulcans, Andorians and Betazoids presumably.
There seem to be plenty of opportunities for an honourable death in Starfleet, there is no reason Klingons would not join on that basis.
Even minor differences between species can create a fairly large degree of friction (as a certain Benzite exchange officer found out the hard way) and these differences are not typically tolerated precisely for the reason that Starfleet expects its members to make themselves accustomed to the Human way of doing things.
Well one would assume there is actually not a human but a Starfleet way of doing things, and that like joining any other large organisation yes you have to adapt to that. That said I imagine there are significant regional differences and where the Enterprise is a human-centric largely human crewed version one would imagine that the USS T'Kumbra is more Vulcan-centric.
It is like saying the US army and Chinese Army could not work together - they undoubtedly could, the US and British armies have managed it for almost 100 years and the cultures are incredibly different.
Even take the most extreme example: Worf gets chewed out by Picard for killing Duras, an action that, under the circumstances, no Klingon in the universe finds even slightly objectionable. And yet Picard shows his anger at Worf for not doing things the "Starfleet way," which is, by definition (and as frequently lampooned by his renegade counterparts) the "human way."
Well Picard has no choice does he? Worf knows that as a Starfleet officer killing foreign dignitaries is a bit off. That is not the human way specifically its a bit logical. He was wearing a Starfleet uniform at the time and it could be used by some Klingons as an excuse for attacking Federation planets. The Klingons might pretend to be honourable but they can be sleazy political animals as much as humans.
Basically Picard gave him a bollocking he probably could see coming, but all he got was a slapped wrist.
I just don't see 150 different alien worlds adopting the Human Way. I see Starfleet as an Earth organization that takes volunteers from anywhere and doesn't discriminate, but you have to learn to do things the Starfleet way first.
It probably was more a core organisation in Kirk's time but does not seem this way in the 24th Century. I rather see it as a much more egalitarian operation, where technology and support is provided in exchange for a unified command. There might well be local militias that provide local defense but it makes more sense to exchange officers etc along the lines of any large organisation.
There are two ways to see big organisations, either as mushed massive blobs which absorb everything and return an unimaginative straight down the middle response or as large collaborative efforts.
If race X joins the Federation they get an ambassador, they get votes in the presidential election and they get their military absorbed into Starfleet, so presumably get an allocation of new-and-used starships and seats on the Admiralty board, or whatever Starfleet has.
They therefore get a strong say from Day One, why assume Starfleet comes along and says "Right sunshine, drop your uniqueness we claim to value and do things our way"? It is not very Trek is it?
The WHOLE POINT of Star Trek's philosophy is that although we are diverse we can work together and that diversity makes us stronger. A quite enlightened belief from a show made in a nation that in some places still features maps with the USA in the middle and nothing else except big blue text saying "Here There Be Dragons..."
I doubt that very much. Starfleet might protect them, sure, but in an egalitarian outfit like the Federation it makes no sense that one of the key perks of joining would be someone else's military administering your borders. That's not the "United Federation of Planets," that's the "Friendly and Polite Earth Empire."
Why not if that organisation are the good guys and you have a say in how they are run and how they behave? Europe has been defended by NATO for years, only the French have ever had a problem with it.
I'd rather have my own military funded by the Federation in a mutual defense program, and something tells me you won't find many heads of state on any world who would prefer otherwise. Nobody in their right mind would ever place the defense of their home planet in the hands of an alien government hundreds of light years away that they do not control and is not accountable to them... unless they don't have a choice, because that government actually conquered them and it is better to go along with them than face their wrath.
That is 21st century human belief - we know races in the 24th Century are different.
Besides if you think all these things it is highly unlikely your "race" would join the Federation, maybe ally and trade with it but not JOIN it.
And what do you know? It turns out Starfleet really isn't all that good at protecting its members, since several key Federation worlds were actually captured by the Dominion during the war while the core worlds--Earth, Vulcan, Andor, etc--remained heavily defended with very large fleets of ships. This either happened because Starfleet just didn't care much about these "minor" worlds and focussed on defending more important members first, or it happened because Starfleet is primarily an Earth and Vulcan organization and whatever Betazed had for its own defense wasn't up to the job.
Betazed WAS defended by a large fleet, it was outmanoeuvered. In a War with a major power you will take heavy losses. If Starfleet had managed to defend every single world then the war would have ended pretty quickly with an embarassed massive Dominion fleet retreating with it's tail between it's legs - would not make great TV would it?
nothing undermines self-determination more than the ability to defend ones self with ones own hands.
21st century attitude - and also something completely ridiculous in the 21st century as only alliances of centrally commanded military powers have proven effective and destroying aggression on Earth in the last century.
Here's a thought: when Worf was considering resigning from Starfleet, he thought about joining the Nybrite alliance. Want to bet the Nybrite Alliance is also a Federation member?
I'd say not - I'd say it is a loose alliance of planets friendly to the Federation somewhere very distant from DS9.
I have never seen ANY on-screen evidence that suggests that Starfleet is not a massive organisation of 15,000 odd starships responsible primarily for the defense of the Federation. I also agree with the novels conjecture that large portions of a planet's military are absorbed into Starfleet when a planet joins.
That said there are doubtless local forces that remain independent for largely local purposes. The Vulcans have small ships that obviously serve some purpose (in "Unification") but are also completely integrated into Starfleet as of the 24th century (we see so many of them).
