Starfleet - war criminals? (Sisko and Starfleet Command)

I suppose so.

 

I don't think that is difficult to answer, but to assume some feeling causes problems means that it always does so. Nationalism is often blamed for war, yet it also has been a force for democratic empowerment (as in the Eed Plebnista).

 

I don't think it is difficult to answer either, nor do I blame certain feelings. I'm more looking at it in the way that TNG forward has framed humanity. It's a weird incongruence that humanity has evolved but yet it hasn't changed. That the Maquis are reacting from a human emotional attachment, yet humanity has supposed to grow.

It's a terrible situation regardless, but that's something that I'm struggling with from a story standpoint.

 

Even during TNG, albeit more as Roddenberry's influence waned, the writers tried to have their cake and eat it too. They liked writing in the ST universe, but as one poster put it (it may have been you), they wanted to write good episodes. They may have been interested in how humanity evolves, but they wanted to explore how we get there. The dialogue from Troi that I quoted probably would have been stricken from the dialogue by GR in the early seasons, but it perfectly reflects the more moderated position that dominated the second half of the series. We also see a crew that is itself adventurous, willing to wander the universe or relocate to new locations, but it seems like they come from families that are, more or less, rooted in place, perhaps only experiencing limited space travel.

Yet, as we write about the Maquis, I realize that DS9 is far less Earth-centric than the other series. Assuming AGT shows something of his future, Picard will likely go back to farm the fields of his forefathers. The DS9 crew doesn't go around saving Earth from aliens or pining to return home (save Keiko). They and the Maquis have loosed themselves from one set of attachments and made others.

ETA: And I hate to be a broken record on this, but Roddenberry's evolved humanity would prevent future humans from interfering in genocide. I think his viewpoint was questionable.

 

I agree that GR's view is quite questionable, but I also know that it informed, at least partially, some of the writing choices made.

I also think that regarding the Maquis as attached to their homes makes them even more morally complacent in that they are aware of the risks, take them anyway, then blame the Federation when it all goes down hill. So, it's the lack of greater awareness of the potential impact to the larger Federation that makes me less sympathetic to the Maquis, and more inclined towards the Federation, even if it isn't a perfectly black and white situation.

Which, I have a feeling, is how the writers wanted it to be.

 

Me, too.

 

They wouldn't be the cause of an interstellar war if they armed themselves due to being attacked!

The Federation could no longer afford the war; so they, and the Cardassians made peace, and signed a treaty. The Cardassians however, didn't sign the treaty in good faith.

As far as we know, the Federation did nothing to stop the Cardassians from willfully sideskirting the treaty. There were no ultimatums mentioned, no negotiation. Hell, they didn't even try to pay them off. They only tried to get the Maquis to stop fighting them.

This makes the Federation look particularly weak, and could only invite further aggression from the militaristic Cardassians. It's probably the reason they launched attacks on the Federation colonies in the first place. They knew the Feds were so worried about the conflict resuming, that they'd be willing to look the other way, as we saw Picard do in "The Wounded."

 

They didn't even know what the Cardassians were DOING in the DMZ until the Maquis had already appeared on the scene.

And IIRC, it was left undecided whether the actual Cardassian government was involved in arming its own colonists, or if it was a rogue faction. I'm inclined to believe the latter. What would have been the point for all of Cardassia to be in on it? Those colonies were now their territory, so it's not like there was anything left to take over.

 

The Central Command admitted that Cardassians were smuggling weapons into the DMZ. They tried to blame Dukat and said he was acting on his own. Later, Sisko and Dukat caught them red handed, and made public the evidence. So yes, they definitely were.

No, they were not. The Colonies were inside the DMZ. The DMZ was supposed to be administered jointly. This area had both Cardassian colonies, Federation colonies, and others.

 

The Cardassian government was smuggling weapons to the DMZ. DS9 left no doubt about that.

The federation never gave "their" colonists a similar amount of support. At best you had sympathetic captains and admirals deliver them through backdoor channels. A sympathetic captain might look the other way during Maquis raids or convoys. And presumably intelligence officials might covertly support the Maquis with arms, information and so on.

But not the obvious and full throated support the Cardies gave their colonists. That's why the Maquis had to resort to light cruisers and exotic weapons so often.

 

Since Baxten hasn't been here in a while, I suggest we shift this thread back to its topic.

Additional points of contention:
-Federation gives the Dominion Founders an incurable disease/virus through Odo.

-Federation Starfleet Command orders Picard to use virus against the Borg, should he ever again have the opportunity.

 

Curious if the Federation would order a similar measure once Voyager got back to report about Species 8472.

 

The Maquis didn't have to resort to anything, they could have just done what they were supposed to do and moved

 

Regarding "joint adminstration", there was no mention of such. There were UFP planets there, and Cardassian planets, and those could be ruled in whichever fashion. No doubt the Cardassian ones were centrally commanded, while the Fed colonies might have been typically counterculture ones minding their own business, or loyal slaves of Earth (or Vulcan or Andor or whatever), or a mixture of those. But there was no "joint" ruling between the UFP and the CU, merely an agreement that both governments would keep their warships from entering the Zone.

So whatever the Feds did or did not do in the Zone was largely not a government matter, but a matter of individual citizens or worlds.

Timo Saloniemi

 

They had local governing authorities that belonged to the Federation. The also had representatives from Starfleet and the Cardassian military which worked together and often coordinated their efforts.

What we don't see, is them working together to stop Cardassian attacks on Federation colonies. This could by explained by the fact that Cardassian colonists that took part in this were state sponsored terrorists.

For those saying the colonists should have left, why? If Klingons or anyone else began attacking border colonies, should those colonies just be abandoned? They would simply make further inroads.

 

That was Section 31's doing, not the Federation as a whole.

 

We saw no Cardassian representatives at Federation colonies or vice versa. Sure, they may have been in speaking terms, but Cardassia had no say over what Federation colonies did or vice versa. "Joint operations" would be a different matter - the UFP can have those even with the Dominion if it wishes.

Or by the likely scenario where Cal Hudson would have been shot at sight if he poked his nose on a Cardassian colony, and Gul Evek would have been sent to therapy if he did the same on a Federation one. Cooperation on military issues might have been impossible under the terms of the treaty which probably wouldn't even acknowledge the possibility of "military issues" except as a trigger for full-scale sanctions (say, eventual bombardment of Cardassia Prime) which neither side wanted to bring to play.

The DMZ was established with specific parameters that would further the specific foreign policy the UFP wanted to conduct there. The Federation is supposedly a democratic body, so the colonists would have no say on the issue - they'd be in an insignificant minority in a foreign policy matter of galactic rather than local scope.

Colonies elsewhere might be asked to defend themselves in order to stop foes from making further inroads. But Starfleet would be helping them there. At the DMZ, Starfleet did not want any defending to take place; in this specific location, any "inroads" made by the enemy would have specific consequences through the DMZ treaty.

Timo Saloniemi

 

Section 31 is part of the UFP, and works with Starfleet

 

^ There are certain rogue elements in Starfleet who may support Section 31, but that's not the fault of the Federation or Starfleet as a whole.

Section 31 is a terrorist organization, has no right to exist, and goes against everything the Federation stands for. They don't need or want it.

Section 31 was not acting under orders from the Federation (they never do - S31 literally does whatever it wants) when devising the changeling virus. That was not official Federation policy. It was Section 31 policy. Those are completely separate things.

To put it another way: Blaming the entire Federation for what Section 31 does, is the moral equivalent of blaming the entire country of Norway for the actions of Anders Behring Breivik.

 

I was in error. Section 31 is actually a department of Starfleet.

They are Federation citizens, part of Starfleet, working on behalf of the Federation's interests. Starfleet Command will neither confirm or deny their existence, which means they are totally aware of it.

Much like the Pentagon will neither confirm nor deny the existence of the secretive CAG units like "Delta Force" or "DEVGRU" who would be considered by many as "terrorist" organizations.

Starfleet Medical didn't want Bashir developing a cure to the morphagenic virus. I'd say that makes them quite complicit.

Section 31 has been around since the founding of Starfleet, and deals with the most important threats to the Federation.