War will do that for ya. Compare the US navy in 1934 to 1944.
How big are Star trek fleets?
- Thread starter El Amigo Carlos
- Start date
War will do that for ya. Compare the US navy in 1934 to 1944.
Depends on easy those older designs were able to be upgraded to the latest weapons/tech.
And also on whether there was any catching up to be done. Did tech really improve between TOS and TNG? If so, why? The member species of the Federation are millennia old, technology-wise - why should one century see any significant advance, and why didn't it already happen a thousand years earlier?
But they still had equal trouble scraping together the ships in DS9. To defend the station against Klingon or Dominion aggression before the big war, Starfleet could dispatch just six or nine ships, respectively, and those took their sweet time arriving.
The thousands probably were always there - it just happens that "there" meant "several months or years away from action", so that a proper war took a long time to set up.
Mind you, Trek ever since the TOS movies or at least TNG has made a big effort to suggest that Starfleet is very large and that the pitiful few ships the producers can afford to actually show on screen at a time are not a credible warfleet. Direct dialogue to this effect can be found in "Redemption", say: the show could only afford to show four ships at a time, but Okudagrams indicated dozens, and the Romulans were flabbergasted at why the Federation was sending so few.
Timo Saloniemi
But they still had equal trouble scraping together the ships in DS9. To defend the station against Klingon or Dominion aggression before the big war, Starfleet could dispatch just six or nine ships, respectively, and those took their sweet time arriving.
The thousands probably were always there - it just happens that "there" meant "several months or years away from action", so that a proper war took a long time to set up.
Mind you, Trek ever since the TOS movies or at least TNG has made a big effort to suggest that Starfleet is very large and that the pitiful few ships the producers can afford to actually show on screen at a time are not a credible warfleet. Direct dialogue to this effect can be found in "Redemption", say: the show could only afford to show four ships at a time, but Okudagrams indicated dozens, and the Romulans were flabbergasted at why the Federation was sending so few.
Timo Saloniemi
The thing is, we have far more registry numbers to go by than any other type of datapoint. Only a handful of ship classes were ever mentioned, there were just a dozen or so launch dates ever shown (counting out-of-focus dedication plaques), and most ships were just mentions rather than visuals. But Okudagrams, including in-focus ones, overflow with registries, and whenever we do see a ship, we tend to get to see a registry as well.
Most early ships have low registries. Most late ships have high registries. There is little reason to think that this should be by coincidence or complex formula when the "registries get higher as time goes by" interpretation is so trivially attractive.
Really, what's there not to love?
Timo Saloniemi
Most early ships have low registries. Most late ships have high registries. There is little reason to think that this should be by coincidence or complex formula when the "registries get higher as time goes by" interpretation is so trivially attractive.
Really, what's there not to love?
Timo Saloniemi
But that one year might represent an increase in Starfleet's already heavy ship building schedule, trying to find a way to squeeze out a additional 39 ships on top of (maybe) 500 ships a year.
What does "We will have the fleet back up in less than a year" really mean? That it will be a struggle to get the 39th ship finished on Day 365? That there were going to be new ships anyway and the 39th will be delived around Day 153 if the schedule doesn't get altered? That it takes 90 days to complete a ship and 39 dockyards can be at it simultaneously, but normally Starfleet would build zero ships within the next ten years, there already being plenty enough, so Shelby better round it out and up to "less than a year" with all the long lead time resources and reshufflings and whatnot?
All we really learn here is that the loss of 39 ships is not particularly relevant, even if it is shocking and horrible and all that. Ships are commodities to be expended and can be more or less trivially be replaced. And never mind that we never see such replacement actually take place during the Dominion War, the Sao Paulo notwithstanding.
Timo Saloniemi
All we really learn here is that the loss of 39 ships is not particularly relevant, even if it is shocking and horrible and all that. Ships are commodities to be expended and can be more or less trivially be replaced. And never mind that we never see such replacement actually take place during the Dominion War, the Sao Paulo notwithstanding.
Timo Saloniemi
In the TNG technical manual they write, that 12 galaxy class starships were initially planned, with only six finished and six more stored as unfinished space frames for later use.
I think it came up in DS9 somewhere, that they did so with a lot of other classes and then hurried those space frames to rudimentary completion without holodecks, hydroponics, family quarters and so on, leaving large areas of the ships inside empty and mostly being just big flying weapon carriers.
I think it came up in DS9 somewhere, that they did so with a lot of other classes and then hurried those space frames to rudimentary completion without holodecks, hydroponics, family quarters and so on, leaving large areas of the ships inside empty and mostly being just big flying weapon carriers.
Six to eight months? That would be less than a year.
And there probably more involved than just building the ships. There would be "sea" trials, a shake down cruise, and the training up of the first crew so that they would mesh.
The actual building of the ship might be the least time consuming part of the overall process.
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My estimates (similar to others I have seen out there) are in the range of 9,000-10,000 ship in DS9. Based on "elements" of two fleets (an "element" could be 1/2 a fleet, but more likely 1/3) being 600, thus 10 fleets = 9,000 ships. It fits ok with the potential size ranges of the Federation, enough ships for patrol and defense and exploration, but not too many that there are just ships everywhere.
As for training up the personnel, I don't have my estimates on me, but I figure a lot of the crews of new starships/ replacement starships during wartime come from planet-side or starbase crews (Starfleet probably has at least a million+ personnel). They are already academy graduates or enlisted, they have experience, they just need time to combine as starship crews - not as long of a process as starting from trainees.
As for training up the personnel, I don't have my estimates on me, but I figure a lot of the crews of new starships/ replacement starships during wartime come from planet-side or starbase crews (Starfleet probably has at least a million+ personnel). They are already academy graduates or enlisted, they have experience, they just need time to combine as starship crews - not as long of a process as starting from trainees.
A starship can no doubt be flown (that is, not just made to travel from A to B but also successfully put through combat maneuvers) by a bunch of very distracted children if need be - there's plenty of automation available. What wartime escalation would require is personnel trained in field-repairing the bits that the Jem'Hadar shoot to smaller bits. How long does it take to train those people? How many of Kirk's lazy A&A officers would have been capable of joining Scotty's combat repair teams, say? If a private skipper like Cyrano Jones or Carter Winston wanted to enlist, would he be help or hindrance?
It generally doesn't take all that many days to turn civilians into soldiers - nowadays, just giving them an automatic weapon and telling them to listen to the guy with the biggest chevrons will pretty much do, and the edge from a couple of hundred days of extra training or even years of professional practice will not be that significant. But such eager conscripts can't keep a starship flying, unless 24th century civilians can be assumed to automatically be technologically savvy by basic and universal training. Perhaps that's not a bad assumption, though - a very short time ago, it would have been just as incredible to assume that most people enlisting would know how to read or write.
Timo Saloniemi
It generally doesn't take all that many days to turn civilians into soldiers - nowadays, just giving them an automatic weapon and telling them to listen to the guy with the biggest chevrons will pretty much do, and the edge from a couple of hundred days of extra training or even years of professional practice will not be that significant. But such eager conscripts can't keep a starship flying, unless 24th century civilians can be assumed to automatically be technologically savvy by basic and universal training. Perhaps that's not a bad assumption, though - a very short time ago, it would have been just as incredible to assume that most people enlisting would know how to read or write.
Timo Saloniemi
Given that the Federation population is in the trillions (during Statisical Probablities they were looking at Federation casualties in the region of nine hundred billion as recoverable, even under Dominion rule), even if only 0.03% of the population is in Starfleet (equivalent to 1/10 of USCG, PHSC and NOAA Corps only) then that would give a 'pool' of at least 300 million personnel.
Which would seem to support the idea of a large potential fleet if needed and with sufficient notice as I doubt more than two-thirds of Starfleet personnel are assigned to 'starbase duty' at any one time, which leaves enough for over 6,000 packed Galaxy-class (at 15,000 each). Although, I'm not sure if this jibes with the fact that 9% of Academy graduates c. 2368 were being assigned to Galaxy-class vessels (per Menage a Troi).
Which would seem to support the idea of a large potential fleet if needed and with sufficient notice as I doubt more than two-thirds of Starfleet personnel are assigned to 'starbase duty' at any one time, which leaves enough for over 6,000 packed Galaxy-class (at 15,000 each). Although, I'm not sure if this jibes with the fact that 9% of Academy graduates c. 2368 were being assigned to Galaxy-class vessels (per Menage a Troi).
How likely is it that people would join Starfleet in apparent "excess" numbers? The armed forces today get personnel because they pay for the labor, and they won't pay for labor they don't need. If Starfleet doesn't have extra Galaxy class ships to fill with surplus millions, it won't go after said millions with incentives, and will probably slam the door on any volunteers, too.
In general, I could well see an extremely low percentage of the UFP population doing work of any sort. It's not as if there would be a need, after all. People wanting to die horribly in exciting environs could form a significant percentage of these bored masses, but only a trickle would both wish to let Starfleet do the killing and be accepted into the organization as productive and trustworthy individuals.
Come war, what would and could change? The suicidal-homicidal maniacs among the population would still wish to enlist, but would now be joined by eager patriots. But the machinery would be geared for the small peacetime intake, and optimized for keeping people out (if Wesley Crusher can't get in, underage or not, then "0.03% of the population" is not a realistic estimate for people capable of getting in - 0.000003% might still be optimistic).
To teach more people the basics of good Starfleeting, Starfleet would first need to get a lot more teachers, meaning a wartime drain of manpower when a surge is needed. Would the 2-year delaying action in DS9 between the discovery of the Dominion threat and the first real military response perhaps support this sort of scenario? Was there in fact a major call to arms two years before the episode by that name?
Timo Saloniemi
In general, I could well see an extremely low percentage of the UFP population doing work of any sort. It's not as if there would be a need, after all. People wanting to die horribly in exciting environs could form a significant percentage of these bored masses, but only a trickle would both wish to let Starfleet do the killing and be accepted into the organization as productive and trustworthy individuals.
Come war, what would and could change? The suicidal-homicidal maniacs among the population would still wish to enlist, but would now be joined by eager patriots. But the machinery would be geared for the small peacetime intake, and optimized for keeping people out (if Wesley Crusher can't get in, underage or not, then "0.03% of the population" is not a realistic estimate for people capable of getting in - 0.000003% might still be optimistic).
To teach more people the basics of good Starfleeting, Starfleet would first need to get a lot more teachers, meaning a wartime drain of manpower when a surge is needed. Would the 2-year delaying action in DS9 between the discovery of the Dominion threat and the first real military response perhaps support this sort of scenario? Was there in fact a major call to arms two years before the episode by that name?
Timo Saloniemi
During the second world war in America, while there was a war time draft and the military was paid, the lines "around the block" at recruitment offices wasn't owing to either one of those.
Would the civilian population of the federation be smart enough to realize that their civilization was in a fight for it's existance?
Your figure (0.000003%) only allows for 300,000 personnel, with a conservative estimate of 850 starbases (SB 4077 and 4112 are probably errors) then I think they need at least 1,000-10,000 personnel each (leading to 850,000 to 8,500,000 personnel), and even a relatively small peacetime fleet of 400 starships (20,000 to 400,000), then I'd say a conservative peacetime minimum of 900,000 might be doable but I would suggest that the true figure is perhaps a median of 4,000,000?
But only during the war. The 0.03% figure was presented as referring to the peacetime military, or a slightly ridiculous underestimation thereof. I very much doubt the UFP would have the will or the means to support a military 0.03% of its total population, or even 0.001% of its fighting-age population - there would never be enough ships or even guns for that many people, from what we have seen.
It would still follow that the UFP would have a military well in excess of the combined total of Earth militaries today, no worries about that.
The real question is, would they be smart enough to realize they cannot enlist lest they beggar the UFP military and cause its downfall?
...Yet is based on the fact that Wes Crusher wasn't allowed to join. If he cannot get in under the young supergenius quota in which Starfleet obviously had a great interest, then there isn't much chance of anybody else being allowed in under any of the other quotas (brainless cannonfodder, superb brawler, lightning-fast drawer, born ace pilot, whatever), either.
Obviously, Starfleet does let people in at somewhat greater numbers than implied by "Coming of Age". But there's clearly a lot of effort put into keeping people out.
It's too bad we get such a narrow view of Starfleet - we may well estimate the number of combat ships from the DS9 fleet figures, and even put an upper limit on ships in general through the registry numbers (and the observation that the same NCC range covers very diverse ship types, including minor auxiliaries), but we also observe that Starfleet does a lot more than any military today (including apparently being the exclusive law enforcement agency) yet get no real handle on the manpower needs involved.
I could easily buy a sum total figure in a few dozen millions or below for the ships, bases and myriad small outposts and the support services required. I cannot imagine how much people Starfleet's law enforcement, terraforming or general research efforts might tie down, though.
Timo Saloniemi
The Federation doesn't appear to spend a great deal of time "at peace."
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