Federation Black Ops?

[A.V.I.A.F.]

Something occurred to me the other day when I was watching The Enterprise Incident again. In this episode Kirk and Spock are engaged in what by today's standards would be termed a Black Ops mission. A mission sanctioned by the government (the Federation) and/or its military arm (Starfleet) that is in essence illegal (as it requires the violation of treaties and agreements between said government and that of another).

But, I thought that the Federation was supposed to be above all of that sort of thing?

Thoughts and ideas?

 

[Timewalker]

Of course the Federation isn't above all of that sort of thing. That's why they have Section 31. But Kirk and Spock got the job in the TOS episode because Section 31 wasn't thought up by the writers until Bashir got mixed up with them in the DS9 series.

 

[A.V.I.A.F.]

Of course the Federation isn't above all of that sort of thing. That's why they have Section 31. But Kirk and Spock got the job in the TOS episode because Section 31 wasn't thought up by the writers until Bashir got mixed up with them in the DS9 series.

Right, but a big part of DS9 was to give a darker perspective to the Trek world for Gen X'ers who had difficulty relating to the uber-positive uber-enlightened world of TOS. In other words, it makes sense to have a Section 31 in DS9 but to have Section 31-like activity in TOS seems a bit out of place given TOS's overall context. You know what I mean?

 

[Nerys Myk]

Perhaps TOS wasn't as "uber-positive uber-enlightened" as GenXer's thought. (That's more the TNG thing). TOS is product of the Cold War mentality as well as the "Peace and Love" 60s. So "Black Ops" are as much a part of it background as enlightenment.

 

[7thsealord]

Always been annoyed by this notion about the Federation being w-a-y too enlightened to ever have any kind of intelligence organization.

That sounds nice, but only works only as long as everybody else plays by the exact same set of rules. It is clear that this is often not the case. Probably also the main reason why Star Fleet classifies certain files, arms its ships and gives phasers to landing parties. No matter how much one tries to wish otherwise, it is not and never had been A Perfect Galaxy.

So, would the Federation's spies "do" Black Ops and so forth?

Reasonable question. My own answer is Sort Of. They would do stuff best kept secret, but also have principles and protocols that they would have to adhere to, even in war. Absolutely no smuggling a biogenic superbomb onto Cardassia, no matter how much those Cardassian @$$hats deserve it. Sanctioning a Romulan or Klingon politician just because s/he badmouths the UFP would be a no-no, but very quietly checking that person out (for hidden agendas, etc.) would be reasonable.

Section 31? Some people here probably think they are the UFP's "Plausibly Deniable" Black Ops guys - with good reason, I grant you. Personally, I prefer to think not - that they are in fact a stand-alone organization (possibly with a friend or two in semi-high places).

Why? S31 seems to embody pretty much every Black Bag and/or paramilitary organization to have totally lost the plot thoughout Earth history. If they ARE Federation-supported, the biggest conclusion to be had is that "we" (Humanity) haven't learned a damn thing in two hundred-plus years, which is totally counter to the ideals of Star Trek (as I see them, anyhow).

As an aside, I know many here consider DS9's 'In The Pale Moonlight' to be a brilliant episode. Maybe it is. But, personally, I cannot get past it mostly being Sisko grizzling because he had to do stuff in war that he'd rather not. Boo, hoo.

 

[Wingsley]

If you read "The World of Star Trek" by David Gerrold (writer behind "The Trouble with Tribbles"), Gerrold denounced the "The Enterprise Incident" as a thinly veiled allegory on the Pueblo Incident of 1968, insisting that the United Federation of Planets would never condone such espionage.

There are contradictory messages in TOS about this subject. Obviously the Federation leadership had no problem nullifying the Prime Directive and openly engaging in espionage to confront the Eminians and Vendikans, even to the point of threatening all-out war on them. (General Order 24) Clearly, Ambassador Fox's ambition was driven by the "thousands of lives have been lost in this quadrant." He declared that he was "there to get" a peace treaty at all costs, and that included risking the Enterprise and his own safety.

Those are the actions of a Federation that is capable of bending its rules for the sake of self-preservation. They identified the Eminian star cluster as a serious security problem, and sent in one of their most brash diplomats and one of their best starships to deal with that problem, Prime Directive be damned.

The same can be said with C-111 Beta III ("Return of the Archons") and Gamma Trianguli VI ("The Apple"). The Federation sent the Enterprise so Kirk could deal with possible security problems.

Clearly, the Federation is "a nation of laws, not a nation of men", but they have crafted their interstellar code of conduct so that their non-interference policies have exceptions that allow starship captains to "take care of business" when Federation security is threatened.

 

[Captain Robert April]

The Pueblo incident certainly played into the inspiration for the episode (it was pretty recent news back then), but the big creative push was their next door neighbors on the studio lot, "Mission: Impossible". Complete with the mention that if anything went wrong, Starfleet would disavow any knowledge of their actions.

 

[Maurice]

^^^On what are you basing this assertion re Mission: Impossible?

 

[The Castellan]

I hate Black Ops organizations, I do not like any sort of group who are above the laws and rules of their world or place, who thinks thay have some god given right to do the most despicable things, in the so called name either national security or what other age old cry of the oppressor, and going by all means they feel necessary to do it, and everyone else either not knowing of their existence, and those who do are threatened with bodily harm, or worse, threatening their loved ones.

I'm sorry, but Section 31, and real life black ops are things I HATE with passion.

 

[Wingsley]

The bottom line to this thread, if I may interpret what I'm seeing develop here: is the DS9 notion of "Section 31" backward compatible with TOS? Hmmm. The waters are murky here.

Maybe if we use "The Enterprise Incident" as a guide, there are no Black Ops (at least, not as a super-secretive Section 31) in the TOS era. If there were, wouldn't the black-suited "31" boys have been in charge of stealing the newly improved Romulan cloaking device while a so-equipped Romulan cruiser was stopping in a home port, instead of relying on the clearly "straight" Captain Kirk to do the dirty work?

Of course, as I said, the waters are murky here. I wondered over the years about who was behind Dr. Adams and the Tantalus V "neural neutralizer" scandal. Could it have been a shady experiment by the "31" boys? After all, if the Klingons were starting to deploy their "mind scanner", wouldn't Federation Black Ops want to do the same? Maybe Adams (or someone pulling his strings) wanted to develop that technology.

Kinda creepy, huh?

 

[The Castellan]

Would not be surprised, since, to Black Ops folks, control is everything, and if a few people get destroyed in the process, so much the better for them, since they tend to be sadistic son of a bitches to begin with.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Section 31 seems to exist outside of the UFP's authority and predates it's existance (As seen in Enterprise) So I doubt they would be giving orders to Kirk or taking orders from Starfleet. Though, I could see them pressuring their operatives in Command and Intelligence to send Kirk on a mission to acquire a cloaking device.

 

[horatio83]

Section 31 is publically disavowed and is probably existing organisationally not inside but alongside the Federation but it is nonetheless an integral part of the Federation, its dark underside. Many organizations have such a dark underside.
I am hardcore Roddenberryian, I love Trek for its utopian vision but I nonetheless think that DS9's Section 31 stories have been brilliant.

I think the mission in Enterprise Incident is pretty timid in comparison and not controversial.

 

[Wingsley]

One of the dangling questions left over from "The Enterprise Incident" was how necessary was it for the Federation to risk the Enterprise being captured in order to steal a Romulan cloaking device in the first place. Did the newest revision to the Romulan stealth technology pose that great a threat to Federation interests?

In "Balance of Terror", it was revealed that a Romulan ship, so equipped, could destroy outposts along the neutral zone. But that's "along the border", in "no man's land", if I read that correctly, and the Romulan suffered from fuel exhaustion from the repeated use of the cloak and the plasma weapon. It seemed doubtful to me that a Rumulan ship, or ships, could penetrate deeply into Federation space with that handicap. And while cloaked, the Romulan ship had trouble tracking the Enterprise because of the cloak.

The only thing we learn for sure from "The Enterprise Incident" is that the newer cloak is much harder to detect, "rendering our tracking sensors useless" according to Spock. That's a tactical, but not strategic advantage. There is no indication from the ep that the Romulan's other deficiencies have changed significantly. The only thing we see is that when the flagship flies by the evasive (and newly cloaked) Enterprise, is the Romulan flagship on the bridge's main viewscreen. That doesn't really tell us much. We don't know how much the new cloak will drain the Enterprise, how effectively it can hide a ship the size of the Enterprise, for how long it will hide the Enterprise, or what the side-effects would be to the Enterprise's tracking sensors while operating under cloak. It may be reasonable to expect that a Federation cruiser under cloak could only manage Warp 3 for limited periods, and not be able to go faster because of tracking "forward visibility" or the drain on the ship's power.

Could the use of Klingon-designed starships be the wild card here? Possibly. Combining the new cloak with Klingon ships of greater range, size and firepower could add more motivation to the Federation authorizing such a mission.

Clearly, the Federation could have authorized the theft of this device just for dissecting/analysis purposes. They may want to know how it works and what its limitations would be so they can devise a defense against it. They could also desire to crack the device's vulnerabilities so it would be easier to modify scanning systems to "track a vessel so equipped". That would seem to be a prudent strategy to pursue, if still a risky one.

But would the Federation engage in this kind of mission just to steal a rival power's weapon for its own sake, as a kind of Cold War game of "it"? I still have my doubts.

TNG's "The Pegasus" seemed to suggest that if the Federation wanted to employ cloaking technology they could develop their own and it might even be superior to that of the Romulans.

 

[A.V.I.A.F.]

Could the use of Klingon-designed starships be the wild card here? Possibly. Combining the new cloak with Klingon ships of greater range, size and firepower could add more motivation to the Federation authorizing such a mission.

Yes, I think this is what made it worth the risk from the Federation's point of view. In fact, Spock refer to "intelligence reports" when Scotty exclaims that it is a Klingon ship. I am guessing that the real reason was that the producers wanted to reuse the model of the Klingon ship rather than pay for new models, but within the context of the TOS universe I think the fact that the Romulans now had access to longer range vehicles plus an improved cloaking system is what made the mission worthwhile and the Enterprise relatively expendable.

 

[Mysterion]

Perhaps TOS wasn't as "uber-positive uber-enlightened" as GenXer's thought. (That's more the TNG thing). TOS is product of the Cold War mentality as well as the "Peace and Love" 60s. So "Black Ops" are as much a part of it background as enlightenment.

This.

I wish people would quit trying to retcon TOS into a TNG clone.

 

[Captain Robert April]

^^^On what are you basing this assertion re Mission: Impossible?

I'm pretty sure Dorothy Fontana mentioned it in an interivew way back when.

Besides, they were raiding M:I's trash dumpsters on a regular basis for stuff to recycle into props, so a little plot inspiration from the same source makes sense, no?

 

[Uxi]

Perhaps TOS wasn't as "uber-positive uber-enlightened" as GenXer's thought. (That's more the TNG thing). TOS is product of the Cold War mentality as well as the "Peace and Love" 60s. So "Black Ops" are as much a part of it background as enlightenment.

This.

I wish people would quit trying to retcon TOS into a TNG clone.

Yes! I'm glad even Picard through off the hideous naievete of TNG's first couple seasons.