Tuvok would stop it first.
What makes a crew a "Starfleet" crew?
- Thread starter AuntKate
- Start date
Hmmm.
Well, in The Raven, Janeway wasn't thrilled with the route, but they were going to follow it. However, partway through, Seven went Borg, flipped out, and destroyed ships. She also had Tuvok with her. Janeway could either leave the two to rot or try and save them. She did the latter, and while she did attack ships, she did not kill anyone. She also left the B'omar well alone afterward. If anything, she was too soft on Seven for starting a damn war. If a regular crewman did that, there would be a Starfleet-issue boot planted up his backside so far it would have come out his mouth. And it wasn't the only time she was too soft on Seven for similar transgressions. That was more the problem for me than her deciding to rescue her people.
In the very beginning of YoH, they were actually in Zaal space, not Krenim space (allegedly, anyway, and the actions of the Krenim guy would seem to support this and the fact that Krenim space was greatly reduced at the time.) The Krenim were likely tooling around in someone else's territory and making "grandiose claims." Janeway simply told them where to shove it. The reason they found themselves a week into Krenim territory for the rest of the episode was because of Annorax's meddling, and the viewers are not told what happened in that timeline.
And honestly, Kirk acted like this all the time. All. The. Time.
Yeah, Tuvok would go Insurrection Alpha all over their butts. Then Janeway would join in and they'd walk around blowing off everyone's mutinous faces with their phaser rifles and wear awesome shades and...
...wait
sorry, my mind wandered.
Didn't Kirk turn against his own government, steal a starship, sabotage another starship, travel to a quarentined planet, blow up the first ship, kill a shipload of Klingons, cause a major intergalactic incident ("There will be no peace, as long as Kirk lives!") and get away with it?
Janeway forced her way through a few species' little local empires, but she meant no harm and caused as little trouble as possible.
Janeway forced her way through a few species' little local empires, but she meant no harm and caused as little trouble as possible.
To be fair, there was that time Janeway may or may not have tried to force her way across the whole Borg empire. She did prevent the 8472 from nerdraging and glassing every planet in the whole Milky Way in the process, though.
A couple of key differences:
1) Kirk was not acting in his role as captain of the Enterprise, but as a private citizen and admitted criminal. He and his coconspirators wore civilian clothes, not Starfleet uniforms, and were fully prepared to and fully expected to sacrifice their careers and possibly their freedom as a result of it. (Similarly, he was prepared to pay the price for violating orders to save Spock’s life in Amok Time.)
2) The Klingon ship in question was committing acts of aggression against the Federation in Federation space. Kirk and his Federation compatriots had the right to defend themselves against this.
I’d cut Janeway more slack if she acknowledged that she was constantly overstepping her authority as captain of Voyager, violating Starfleet regulations, Federation law, and the rights of anyone who stood in her way, that there could be consequences for that, and that she was prepared to accept those consequences.
[You can find better parallels in TUC than in TSFS: the Enterprise under Spock’s command violates Klingon space to save Kirk and McCoy, and Kirk illegally orders the use of impulse in spacedock for no better reason than to show off his arrogance. I have often complained about the TUC screenplay, and don’t see these flaws in TUC as a legitimate defense of Janeway.]
He really did.
Robert DeSoto
Lieutenant Commander
Yes it is all in the interpretation. Reminds of when the USS Yangtzee Kiang got shot down onto a penal colony and Commander Sisko offered to take the prisoners away when the USS Rio Grande arrived.
Bashir: LOL, isn't that like aiding and abetting a jail break?
Sisko (not laughing at all): I don't need you to interpret the Prime Directive for me, Doctor!
Bashir (stops laughing): ahem, umm, yes sir.
No. Janeway had her crew adhere to military discipline and procedure as they had been trained. Those Maquis who were not used to it, she trained. The Equinox crew went into survival mode and tossed away all regulations and procedures and did whatever it took no matter how far removed from what they had been taught to believe.
With all the talk of Janeway breaking the prime directive, I'd like to point out that although it's been cited numerous times, we've never actually learned the exact phrasing of the prime directive and thus we don't know how much "wiggle room" there is.
In fact the only time the prime directive has been written down is one little paragraph at the front of a non-canon FASA RPG manual.
In fact the only time the prime directive has been written down is one little paragraph at the front of a non-canon FASA RPG manual.
It sounds like it's evolved past that to some degree - it seems like they aren't really supposed to be messing with alien governments at all in the TNG era, warp capable or not.
I guess what's really unclear is if there are loopholes to allow for the rescue of crewmembers if things go awry. It certainly happened on VOY a lot. I probably wouldn't leave my crewmembers to rot either, PD or no PD, but perhaps it's flexible enough to allow for this.
I guess what's really unclear is if there are loopholes to allow for the rescue of crewmembers if things go awry. It certainly happened on VOY a lot. I probably wouldn't leave my crewmembers to rot either, PD or no PD, but perhaps it's flexible enough to allow for this.
I think it's quite obvious that while Starfleet makes grandiose claims about the Prime Directive, going so far as to say that Starfleet Captains swear to give their lives before violating it, the truth is that they know circumstances will warrant its violation and they give their officers quite a bit of latitude in its actual application.
In "The Drumhead," for example, Admiral Satie says that Picard has violated the Prime Directive a total of nine times sine he took command. At the point of that episode, he had only been in command of the Enterprise for about four years. To violate it nine times in four years is a pretty high rate of violation. And Picard seemingly confirms that he's violated it that many times when he says that his reports to Starfleet document the circumstances of those violations.
Yet Picard seems to face no negative consequences of those violations. I mean, he's still in command of the flagship of the Federation.
So it would seem that Starfleet is less than fully committed to upholding the Prime Directive in actual practice.
In "The Drumhead," for example, Admiral Satie says that Picard has violated the Prime Directive a total of nine times sine he took command. At the point of that episode, he had only been in command of the Enterprise for about four years. To violate it nine times in four years is a pretty high rate of violation. And Picard seemingly confirms that he's violated it that many times when he says that his reports to Starfleet document the circumstances of those violations.
Yet Picard seems to face no negative consequences of those violations. I mean, he's still in command of the flagship of the Federation.
So it would seem that Starfleet is less than fully committed to upholding the Prime Directive in actual practice.
