Bajoran Dead

[BillJ]

We were talking about another show in another part of the forum, when we momentarily sidetracked to the number of Bajoran dead during the Occupation.

Is there any on-screen source that gives the number? Memory Alpha has it at 15 million, Memory Beta has it at 10-15 million. Neither provides a source for those numbers. Essentially curiosity has me here.

Memory Alpha mentions 15 million Bajorans dead, Memory Beta gives the number at 10-15 million dead. Not sure what their source is for those numbers. Still seems on the low side for an occupation that spanned decades.

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Occupation_of_Bajor

https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/Occupation_of_Bajor

 

[Tosk]

It's presumably based on a line of dialogue from Rugal in Cardassians.

"Do you know how many Bajorans the Cardassians murdered during the occupation? Over ten million."

The problem with using that line is that he says murdered. The actual death toll for the entire Occupation could be...well, a hell of a lot higher.

 

[kkt]

There's a lot open to interpretation. If the Cardassians make Bajorans work 18 hours a day and provide them some rations but not enough, so they get sick, is that murder? When they capture a terrorist and execute them after a brief trial, is that murder?

But I'm not sure it matters. The point is, it was a lot, and whether it was 10 million or 20 million doesn't change that.

 

[amp]

Another data point...
When they are in the cavern in Waltz, Sisko says that Dukat was responsible for the murder of 5 million Bajorans while he was Prefect. Dukat was the prefect for 10 years and the occupation as a whole lasted 50.

 

[Timo]

It's presumably based on a line of dialogue from Rugal in Cardassians.

"Do you know how many Bajorans the Cardassians murdered during the occupation? Over ten million."

The problem with using that line is that he says murdered. The actual death toll for the entire Occupation could be...well, a hell of a lot higher.

Actually, I think it would not be. Rugal is being angry there: surely he would include every single instance of "My great-grandmother died of a broken heart in her sleep at 128 BECAUSE OF THE #¤%/& CARDASSIANS!!!!" in his estimate of those murdered.

(What Rugal might omit there is Bajorans murdered by Bajorans, either at the behest of the occupiers, or as part of the resistance. But those probably wouldn't be numerically significant contributions, since the occupiers would be the ones with the principal means.)

As far as we know, Cardassia had no genocidal aims at any point, a fact Gul Darhe'el (or his alter ego) bitterly regretted, and Dukat also retroactively came to lament. There presumably were forced labor camps, but only one is ever mentioned let alone described, and while we don't know that it would have produced anything but death, it also clearly was not supposed to produce death as its main output. In contrast, working for the overlords in every other context yielded benefits. Possibly Gallitep was a punishment camp for those who didn't agree with the conditions of the occupation?

Dukat's personal contribution to the occupation is something that clearly mutated in the minds of the writers as the seasons passed. Given "Waltz", and given how Sisko might be a tad more impartial and level-headed than Rugal (but not necessarily, not in this instance), we might think he did squeeze more than his predecessors. Because he or Cardassia simply wanted more dead for reason X, because there were greater demands on productivity towards the end, or because the resistance was having an effect and making the murders an attractive remedy? Hard to tell. The final withdrawal was under Dukat's watch - perhaps associated atrocities contributed to the five million?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Farscape One]

Given the Occupation lasted 50 years, I can't believe the total of dead Bajorans was only 15 million.

The Nazis killed 6 million Jews in the Holocaust, and that was in a period of 4 or 5 years. The Cardassian Occupation lasted 10 times as long, so I really think the number is closer to 50 or 60 million. Particularly since episodes like "DUET" and scenes about the Occupation in general throughout the show was a clear allegory to the Holocaust.

Granted, the Cardassians weren't intent on extermination quite as much as the Nazis, but just the sheer number of years of Occupation... 15 million is way low-balling the number.

 

[Jayson1]

Given the Occupation lasted 50 years, I can't believe the total of dead Bajorans was only 15 million.

The Nazis killed 6 million Jews in the Holocaust, and that was in a period of 4 or 5 years. The Cardassian Occupation lasted 10 times as long, so I really think the number is closer to 50 or 60 million. Particularly since episodes like "DUET" and scenes about the Occupation in general throughout the show was a clear allegory to the Holocaust.

Granted, the Cardassians weren't intent on extermination quite as much as the Nazis, but just the sheer number of years of Occupation... 15 million is way low-balling the number.

Your still talking like 3 to 4 million a year killed. That's lots of people to be dying ever year. Remember unlike the Nazi's the Cardassians weren't try to commit genocide. They were exploiting them as slave labor while also trying to maintain the pretense that their was still a Bajoran government and they were just allies. That's why people like that Kubus guy was not allowed to return to Bajor since he had worked for the government in season 2. Many Bajorans were also I think able to escape to the camps we saw on TNG.


Jason

 

[Farscape One]

One thing that might make things clearer in the comparisons and equations... how many Bajorans are there to begin with?

If the number is lower than a billion, then yes, I'd agree 15 million in total could be possible for the reasons you stated.

But if the population total is anything like our world now, I think 50-60 million in that timeframe is very possible.

The general masses could have been misled in how many people were actually killed while under Cardassian rule. And they likely doled out information to the Bajoran 'government' at that time in such a way that it looks like the Cardassians were doing them a favor.

Look at how easily people are fooled on our planet. This is quite likely what happened to Bajor.

 

[Orphalesion]

I think there's a lot about the occupation that we don't really know and that seem a bit odd (keep in mind that I haven't read much about real life genocide so, I might simply be too uneducated in that subject)
But what actually happened during the occupation? We hear they strip mined the planet and forced the Bajorans into labour camps...yet aside from the "scorched earth" pettiness the Cardassians apprently did in the last few days before the Federation took over the Capital City looks very beautiful and opulent (though it might be that the Cardassians lived there? But still it was Bajroan rather than Cardassian architecture)
And there also seem to have been Bajoran scientists and artists during the occupation(though, granted that might have been "pets" of Cardassians that liked to think of themselves as merciful by sponsoring and/or protecting them). And why were there refugee camps on Bajor itself during the occupation? Was that a result of fighting with the resistance?

As for the number of the dead, well, the writers of Star Trek frequently underestimate numbers (WW III destroyed all population centres, yet only had 400 million dead. Are the numbers who died because of the Nuclear Winter that must have produced, the Post Atomic Horror and Colonel Green's action included in that number? Because then it is even more ridiculously low!)

 

[Tosk]

Actually, I think it would not be. Rugal is being angry there: surely he would include every single instance of "My great-grandmother died of a broken heart in her sleep at 128 BECAUSE OF THE #¤%/& CARDASSIANS!!!!" in his estimate of those murdered.

Rugal is a child, and while angry in the scene, he is reciting information he learned in school.

"Do you know how many Bajorans the Cardassians murdered during the occupation? Over ten million. We had a test on it in school."

He's saying a number that he knows for a fact. Assuming he is quoting the test correctly, then the test specificity isn't impacted by emotion.

That's not to say I consider it proof of anything. But when working with "facts" as spoken and what seems reasonable, any wiggle room helps inform possibilities.

 

[Timo]

Rugal would have learned the number, and the terminology to go with it, from angry Bajorans running an angry Bajoran school, still making it likely that the bias goes the other way. And conversely, a comparable Cardassian history lesson might list just 2 million Bajoran criminals lawfully executed for their crimes against Bajor, but Rugal wouldn't learn to associate the word "murder" with that number, then.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

The Holocaust was a means of eradicating those that didn't adhere to the Aryan ideals of the Nazis. The Occupation of Bajor was about strip mining a planet and using the inhabitants as a slave labour force, killing them off in the tens of hundreds of millions wasn't the objective of the Cardassian Union, and would also be mean having to draft in their own people to carry out the hard work--which I'm sure they wouldn't take issue with, but why work your own people to their early deaths when you can do that with the Bajorans.

 

[Timo]

The Nazi Germany also had a great need for slave labor, though: the Holocaust was a project facilitated by the associated elements being in place, from massive logistics to establishing of dictatorial powers and ubiquitous armed gangs and a general ruthless mentality. Perhaps a Cardassian clerk somewhere would have calculated just how many Bajorans needed to be eradicated every year to keep the mines working so that the last ton of unobtainium would be processed by the last hundred Bajorans remaining?

Apparently not, though. We never hear of genocidal achievements, and the one or two times we hear of such policies, they are but fantasies of deranged minds that lament the admitted failure to actually execute the policies. And conversely, Bajoran deaths on the one known forced labor camp are not associated with production feats.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[BillJ]

...the Capital City looks very beautiful and opulent...

A showplace where you take visitors to convince them that the Bajoran resistance is spreading lies. Think of North Korea and Pyongyang, they are okay with visitors there and a few other places as it plays into the propaganda they feed the world. They don't allow visitors outside those carefully constructed photo ops.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

There's a lot open to interpretation. If the Cardassians make Bajorans work 18 hours a day and provide them some rations but not enough, so they get sick, is that murder? When they capture a terrorist and execute them after a brief trial, is that murder?

But I'm not sure it matters. The point is, it was a lot, and whether it was 10 million or 20 million doesn't change that.

The way the Cardassians do it, it sure is murder. The Bajorans were waging a war to free their homeland, the Cardassians call them 'Terrorists', decide who they prefer to be guilty, stage a fake trial and kill them. Just because they put on a show of legitimacy for an execution doesn't make it legitimate.

Any Bajoran death that occurred as a result of the Cardassian occupation is a murder. Just like felony murder.

 

[Timo]

In light of how these things work ITRW, this is far from said. Why wouldn't resistance fighters be terrorists? Terrorizing, of kinsmen rather than invaders at that, is typically the only tactic available to freedom fighters. We aren't aware of Kira or her pals doing anything else, either: it's always the classics, assassinating collaborators, murdering bathing Guls, placing explosives and other sabotage devices at soft targets, hurting bystanders.

Not that regular soldiers would be nicer folks. But the legalese there goes that folks in uniform won't get prosecuted if they a) fight for your side, or b) win. Kira's bunch wouldn't have been in uniforms, wouldn't have won, and there would have been precious few who would have considered the resistance to be on "their" side.

Sure, it can all be called murder afterwards, after Bajorans win (even if by default). But that would hardly apply during the occupation. Back then, what Kira did would be murder instead.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Kor]

I've long felt that if we are going to compare the Cardassian occupation of Bajor to World War II, then Imperial Japan is a more apt comparison than Nazi Germany.

Kor