What is the Federation now?

[Shim]

In the threads about what people would like to see in the sequels, there is a fair bit of talk about the new villain/danger being a threat from within the Federation. This reminded me of one of the (very few) problems I had with the new film - the nature of the UFP.

In the bar scene, where Pike is trying to get Kirk to enlist, he says something along the lines of "You know what the Federation is, don't you?" and then goes on to describe it as (what sounded to me like) a kind of interstellar peacekeeping force.

It just seemed to me that they were trying to steer us away from the idea of the UFP as the unified political entity we are used to, esp. in DS9, towards a view that the UFP/Starfleet are more like a galactic blue-beret society. Anyone else get this vibe?

 

[clint g]

Yeah I thought it was a little strange, but as of now nothing has really been shown on screen to confirm that the Federation isnt the unified political force that it is in the prime time line

 

[RoJoHen]

I thought it was weird that he used the term "armada" to describe Starfleet.

 

[Shim]

I thought it was weird that he used the term "armada" to describe Starfleet.

Yeah, agreed. Makes it sound like their scientific-exploratory function is now their secondary focus.

And yeah, I hear people saying "maybe the Narada changed the way Starfleet designed it's ships' etc. but it stretches my willing suspension of disbelief to suggest that one run in with a badass Romulan would force Starfleet to reorient itself so dramatically. Other ships would've met other badasses all the time.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

A Badass romulan from 150 years in the future. The Narada versus the Kelvin was basically a case of F-22 versus Sopwith Camel.

 

[Trekker4747]

Pike says Starfleet -not the Federation- is a humanitarian organization. Which is mostly correctly.

And the closing narration has Spock doing the old "explore strange, new, worlds..." thing. So it would seem that Starfleet's focus hasn't changed.

 

[btflash]

i thought the portrayal of the federation in this movie was much more militaristic than we have seen before.

 

[All Seeing Eye]

Starfleet IS a peacekeeping force, that is their role, exploration and peacekeeping. Some ships are built more specifically for exploration (Oberth Class) and some more specifically for peacekeeping (Constitution Class) but they all do the same thing.

 

[Deks]

i thought the portrayal of the federation in this movie was much more militaristic than we have seen before.

That is because they were facing a threat that wiped out Vulcan and of course threatened Earth.
We saw SF in it's more militaristic way whenever a large threat ensued, so this is nothing unusual because we were mostly seeing events as they were happening during a time of crisis.

And I don't see why SF wouldn't try to upgrade their technology as much as possible and have extreme changes in the visual department as a result of Kelvin's destruction.
They knew a ship with highly advanced weaponry destroyed the Kelvin, and they also knew it was Romulan.
I don't see how this incident couldn't change SF.
Remember that in this time, SF was a bit more cautious (even in the 'prime timeline').
Ever since TNG and despite numerous encounters with enemies more powerful than them, SF was usually caught off-guard (main characters/captains and their ships not withstanding because they tried warning SF in time).
I liked the premise of TNG and everything, but SF was more than once caught off guard despite numerous warnings from multiple SF captains.
We usually contributed that to writers completely portraying higher ranks of SF thinking they are indestructible/arrogant ... a flawed premise which was corrected somewhat in this movie.

 

[btflash]

i thought the portrayal of the federation in this movie was much more militaristic than we have seen before.

That is because they were facing a threat that wiped out Vulcan and of course threatened Earth.

i got the distinct feeling it was more militaristic prior to the destruction of vulcan.i dont think the destruction of one ship, the kelvin by an unknown vessel that then vanished some years before would necessitate a huge militaristic buildup of starfleet. that would seem like overkill to me. just my opinion.

 

[Gotham Central]

i thought the portrayal of the federation in this movie was much more militaristic than we have seen before.

That is because they were facing a threat that wiped out Vulcan and of course threatened Earth.

i got the distinct feeling it was more militaristic prior to the destruction of vulcan.i dont think the destruction of one ship, the kelvin by an unknown vessel that then vanished some years before would necessitate a huge militaristic buildup of starfleet. that would seem like overkill to me. just my opinion.

Actually you're forgetting that they knew (via the survivors) that the ship was Romulan in origin. Given that the RSE is a hostile power that Earth has been in conflict with before, it seems perfectly reasonable that the revelation of a powerful Romulan warship would prompt the Federation to change its security priorities.

 

[Lt. Trull]

you mean hugh powerful Romulan warship; that gave the federation starship envy and made they shipbuilding designs hugh also.

 

[Lt Cmdr Tyler]

'HUGE' not HUGH!!!

 

[Lt Cmdr Tyler]

It is definately possible though that the UFP went in a different direction with ship design. For example:

Who knows what other hostile Alien races attempted to go head to head with SF since the destruction of the Kelvin?

Yesterdays Enterprise's timeline changed all because of one ship disappearing decades before.

That could actually would have also had a similar effect this time round!

 

[JewelsNeeJulian]

and in TOS-Prime, Kirk did describe himself as a military man more than once, and Starfleet felt like a military organization. so if anything, they are going back to the Pre-TNG material

 

[btflash]

That is because they were facing a threat that wiped out Vulcan and of course threatened Earth.

i got the distinct feeling it was more militaristic prior to the destruction of vulcan.i dont think the destruction of one ship, the kelvin by an unknown vessel that then vanished some years before would necessitate a huge militaristic buildup of starfleet. that would seem like overkill to me. just my opinion.

Actually you're forgetting that they knew (via the survivors) that the ship was Romulan in origin. Given that the RSE is a hostile power that Earth has been in conflict with before, it seems perfectly reasonable that the revelation of a powerful Romulan warship would prompt the Federation to change its security priorities.

well, if starfleet knew that a starship had been attacked and destroyed by a romulan ship, admitedly a hostile power wouldnt that have been a breach of the romulan /earth treaty,and why wasnt all out war declared?

 

[Lt. Trull]

wouldn't that be a intersting message... "Do you happen to look like this."
but then he did disavow that he was part of the romulan star empire...

 

[btflash]

That is because they were facing a threat that wiped out Vulcan and of course threatened Earth.

i got the distinct feeling it was more militaristic prior to the destruction of vulcan.i dont think the destruction of one ship, the kelvin by an unknown vessel that then vanished some years before would necessitate a huge militaristic buildup of starfleet. that would seem like overkill to me. just my opinion.

Actually you're forgetting that they knew (via the survivors) that the ship was Romulan in origin. Given that the RSE is a hostile power that Earth has been in conflict with before, it seems perfectly reasonable that the revelation of a powerful Romulan warship would prompt the Federation to change its security priorities.

the survivors also knew that the narada was apparently disabled by the impact of the kelvin which is why they managed to escape in the shuttles without being destroyed by it. it was never heard from again for untold years prior to the attack on vulcan. so the natural assumption would have been that the sacrifice of the kelvin may have in fact destroyed the narada as it dissapeared and henseforth it no longer posed a threat to starfleet and no escalation to a heavily military organization would have been necessary!

 

[Vance]

As of the movie.. the Federation is now one planet lighter and six-billion less populated...

 

[skep155]

As of the movie.. the Federation is now one planet lighter and six-billion less populated...

It shouldn't make that much difference if the Federation spans thousands of lightyears with dozens of members species. Whats a few billion Vulcans if the total population of the Federation is hundreds of billions with thousands of colonies?