How many ships in Starfleet?

[Jono]

Moreover, in the entirety of DS9, we never really saw a ship constructed during or for the war. All the vessels appearing on screen had registries lower than the known prewar Voyager. So perhaps we should argue the exact opposite of the above: perhaps it is impossible with 24th century technology to build a starship in anything shorter than four years?

The USS San Paulo's registry was higher then Voyagers by a difference of nearly 1,000.

Given the number of ships we saw take part a vast majority of them were unnamed. Of the ones that were named the bulk would be of older designs the we know for sure predate the Defiant. Most of the possibly newer craft such as the Akiras, Sabres, Steamrunners and more modern vessels such as the Galaxies and Nebulas we have no idea what their registries were to judge when they might have been built.

 

[USS Triumphant]

So Starfleet having a manpower shortage need not be caused by people not wanting to get off their butts, but rather competition for qualified personnel is hell.

That makes sense.

The USS San Paulo's registry was higher then Voyagers by a difference of nearly 1,000.

As has been mentioned before, NCC = Naval Constuction Contract. If Starfleet commissions a new class with 13 ships in the initial build, and later decides they want 10 more, there's no reason the contract numbers might not be immediately consecutive, or fifty thousand apart. It would be based entirely on how many ships of any class were contracted for in between.

For all we really know, there are 20,000 ships with registries ranging from 20000 to 40000 that were contracted for, but never made it past paper due to budget constraints or other problems after they were contracted for. Now there's a crappy idea for a series - Star Trek: Bureaucracy.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

As has been mentioned before, NCC = Naval Constuction Contract.

Only in the minds of a few fans. Officially, it stands for nothing at all. Just a bunch of made up letters. It means *nothing*.

So are starship registry numbers and stardates, really. They're completely random. They don't mean anything either.

 

[USS Triumphant]

Only in the minds of a few fans. Officially, it stands for nothing at all. Just a bunch of made up letters. It means *nothing*.

So are starship registry numbers and stardates, really. They're completely random. They don't mean anything either.

Well, if you want to go that route, none of it means anything - it's just a few TV shows, books, and movies. But if we're going to have fun with it (my preference), then we fill in the details, and play like there's a rationale behind it all, and it means something.

Why're you harshin' mah mellow, eh?

And they aren't completely random, or they wouldn't all be three and four digit in TOS, and five digit in TNG era. :P

 

[C.E. Evans]

I've actually given up determining the specific number of ships in Starfleet awhile ago. These days, I tend to say there are "thousands of ships in the fleet" and leave it at that. I buy as much stock in Starfleet hull registries as I do in warp factors being accurate.

Personally, I don't think it's remotely possible for any galactic government to adequately defend its borders. Space is just too vast (especially when you consider attacks from multiple different angles in a 3D environment). I think it's a case of Starfleet needing to have just enough ships to protect the Federation's core systems--which could be a considerable number in itself--while the outer reaches may have only one ship to patrol several sectors. In the event the Federation's borders are breached by a hostile force, the call goes out to rally every available ship to intercept. And Starfleet seems to be able to mobilize a large number of ships to a given area fairly quickly, IMO...

I also think there are both manned and unmanned monitor outposts all along the Federation's borders to spot an approaching hostile force. Starfleet might not be able to stop an enemy from slipping past the Federation's borders, but I would gather the same is true for the Klingons, the Romulans, the Cardassians, etc. I think the thing is to keep an enemy from reaching one's homeworld (which an overtaxed Starfleet couldn't do during the Dominion War).

 

[Timo]

One might compare this to the age of sail or early steam, just after the invention of the telegraph. There are large fleets in existence that can clash with each other if they happen in the same place at the same time. But they are way too slow and too few in number to be everywhere. There are sensors and communications that can be used to inform a fleet at Portsmouth that Ceylon is being raided by the French, but there aren't sensors yet that could tell a British flotilla at the Maledives that the French are at it in the general neighborhood.

So the trick is in guessing right, in anticipating the enemy moves. That sort of reliance on seamanship/spacemanship makes for excellent drama in every respect, and allows for all sorts of military triumph or disaster that heighten the drama on the background while the heroes do their small part on the foreground.

The evidence from non-DS9 and DS9 alike is a good match for this: Starfleet isn't everywhere, and can never hope to be, be it peace or war - but Starfleet can guess right and bring decisive numbers to bear on a specific location at a specific time.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[3D Master]

As has been mentioned before, NCC = Naval Constuction Contract.

Only in the minds of a few fans. Officially, it stands for nothing at all. Just a bunch of made up letters. It means *nothing*.

No, not in the minds of a few fans, in the minds of anyone who read the TOS Enterprise technical manual. So there's a lot more going on than "just a few fans", there IS an official documented source for it. The screen just never confirmed it.

As for the size of the fleet; it's the problem with the writers completely not understanding just how BIG space, and the galaxy, really is, and yet, just how BIG 8,000 lightyears really is. Hundreds of millions to over a billion star systems are within Federation borders, and with it, all the resources found in them. There's enough there to warrant a million ships and many many more without a strain on the resources or economy.