One of the bits of "common knowledge" about James T. Kirk is that he was a maverick who'd constantly disobey orders. This reputation comes mostly from the movies and has seeped into the popular consciousness. But how many times did Kirk actually disobey or disregard an order from a higher authority? I'd argue that it was a lot fewer than the myth would suggest. I thought I'd try to come up with a definitive list of Kirk disobeying orders, using TOS and the movies (for the purposes of this exercise, I won't be including any examples from the Kelvin timeline, as those feature a very different James T. Kirk with a very different personal history.) "The Galileo Seven" Kirk definitely creatively interprets his orders here and stretches them to the breaking point, but he doesn't disobey them. He continues his search for Spock and the Galileo 7 shuttle until the last possible second, and when he's required to leave the system to deliver the medical supplies he has to, he departs at the slowest possible speed. Kirk violates orders in "A Taste of Armageddon," but only at the insistence of Ambassador Fox: In "Amok Time," Kirk doesn't hesitate to defy orders once he knows that Spock's life is in danger. Of course, Kirk's actions are retroactively excused, thanks to T'Pau: "Mirror, Mirror" Kirk definitely defies orders here, but since they were orders to destroy the Halkan planet, I think we can forgive this one. Kirk definitely alters the course of this universe's natural development at the end of this episode, but I suppose it's a matter of interpretation as to whether or not the Prime Directive applies to parallel universes. I'd imagine that Kirk would argue that the Empire itself was the anomaly. Kirk is rather insubordinate to Nils Baris in "The Trouble With Tribbles," not bothering to hide his disdain for the man and his interpretation of Federation orders. Kirk unquestionably violates his orders in "A Private Little War," even noting it in his log: There are other TOS episodes where you could argue that Kirk defied the Prime Directive of non-interference, but those usually contained some bit of dialogue about how the planet in question was the victim of outside interference, and Kirk was actually restoring the normal state of development. There are also a few episodes like "Where No Man Has Gone Before" or "Metamorphosis" that imply that Kirk left out pertinent details in his log. I discussed those over in this thread. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was the first film to really hit the "Kirk is a rule breaker" thing hard, as it was a post-Watergate, post Vietnam era, and rebellious heroes were much more in vogue. Kirk starts out by taking the Enterprise on a training cruise before his inspection is officially finished: He later ignores regulations in favor of his own instincts, despite the protestations of Lt. Saavik: An exchange later in the movie implies that Kirk's been a rule breaker since the Academy: Star Trek III: The Search For Spock contains the biggest instance of Kirk disobeying orders. According to STIV, he violates nine Starfleet regulations, even though they only mention six during his trial: It seems that STIII was the movie that really cemented Kirk's reputation as a maverick and a rule breaker. By the time of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Kirk is so casual about violating orders that he goes over the speed limit in Spacedock seeming for the hell of it: Kirk also keeps a cache of illegal Romulan Ale aboard, against regulations: At the trial of Kirk & McCoy, General Chang cites Kirk's supposedly long record of violating orders: Sulu also violates orders in this movie, giving the coordinates of the Khitomer Conference to Kirk and the Enterprise. He's apparently following Kirk's example: In a deleted scene when a crewman accuses him of treason, Sulu quotes from E.M. Forster: "If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope that I should have the guts to betray my country." And the tag of the movie has Spock encouraging Kirk & the crew to violate Starfleet orders in order to take one last spin in the Enterprise: The Voyager episode "Flashback" has Sulu defying orders again, implying that it's the norm for Captains in the 23rd Century, who aren't nearly as proper as the more enlightened officers of the 24th Century: Those are about the only examples I could think of. Any others I'm overlooking? What do you think? Is Kirk's reputation as a rule breaker exaggerated?
Don't forget, he violated the Prime Directive to save the Pelosians from extinction (according to Star Trek: Voyager), and he violated seventeen different temporal regulations during his career (according to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine).
Good point. Although I'd personally put those more into the category of retcons, where later Trek writers were writing more to the myth of Kirk than the guy we actually saw during TOS.
In the case of Kirk's Time Travel violations,I wonder if they are applyin current 24th century standards to Kirk's record when it comes to time travel. After all wasn't it sort of implied in TOS that Time Travel such as a sling shot around a star was a new idea. And Time Travel not that common.
That sounds very plausible to me, And it sort of ties in with what the Trek sequel shows were doing--judging Kirk's exploits by the standards of the present day instead of in the context of their time.
I think the 17 violations might all stem from the actions around Star Trek IV, which were pretty reckless and could've been avoided (especially by such a seasoned time traveller as Kirk). I don't think he'd be at fault for Tomorrow is Yesterday or TCOTEOF, although maybe a violation or two in Assignment: Earth (which was a sanctioned, observed historical mission), and perhaps, as Captain, he was reprimanded for Spock's actions in Yesteryear. But other than that, I can see him committing over a dozen violations that may have been written prior to Star Trek IV in the intervening years. He wouldn't be charged with them (he only had nine infractions, apparently, that resulted in his demotion), but the fledgling DTI would likely use the incident as a teaching moment for future crews and temporal investigators on how *not* to handle a temporal crisis. "Now, Admiral Kirk and his crew did this, this, and this wrong. How would we, today in the 24th century, better solve this situation?" Changing clothes, leaving your communicator behind, maybe not mention that you're from outer space during a dinner outing...
Well unless there was a specific rule about not reprograming the simulator (TWOK) he can't be accused of breaking a rule. Sure some might say he cheated but if we take him at his word he was rewarded for his creative solution (I supect after that theyhad a rule about not reprogamming the simmulator). In TSFS you could perhaps count each assult on a Federation Officer as a sperate offense. (So that's at least 3 the two guards and Mr. Adventure) and he disobyed two orders from the CnC one not to go to Genesis and two surrender the Enterprise whilst he was stealing it.
Kirk's disobeying orders was a necessary career move -- so he did so, often. Even in STARFLEET, you have to screw up to move up!
Do you really think so? The entire point of this thread is that he really DIDN'T do it as much as the popular myth suggests, at least not until the movies. Nice theory. Good, simple explanation. I wonder if that was the intent or if the different numbers were just a screenwriting glitch.
Regarding Gillian Taylor, now that the bubble had been burst, he brought her along. They could have simply downloaded/copied all available knowledge about humpback whales (including Taylor's records), but you get a person who knows these whales and probably has tons of little things she never wrote down in her mind. Spock could have melded with her while she was sleeping and extracted all the info from her mind, planning to pass it on to a Vulcan marine biologist via another meld when they came back to the 23rd century. Then Taylor'd just be one more weirdo who claims aliens visited her in the night, and that her whales were taken by them, as they disappeared not long after her close encounter. She'd wind up in an asylum instead of being the capable scientist she is.
One wonders what loopholes apply to time travel. Today's lawyers wouldn't have much truck with alleged crimes committed centuries before they were defined as crimes! Timo Saloniemi
Whatever Kirk did, whenever he did it, he was the Federation representative on the front line and it was his call, regardless of what others in the back ranks might say or think. That is always the case. Afterwards, like all who disobey orders, you either get busted or maybe you get a medal or even a promotion. Only once did get Kirk get busted, and even there, he got what he really wanted - to be captain of his own starship once again. So every time he did it, he felt he had good reason or justification, and his superiors eventually agreed. I thought that sort of thing was well demonstrated in TNG when Data disobeyed Picard's direct orders to fall back and regroup. Like Kirk, Data knew he would have to face the possible consequences, but he was willing to do so, for the good of the service, his ship or crew, or the good of another culture, he put his career on the line much as a soldier puts his/her life on the line all the time. And Kirk, like Data, was right to do so, and his superiors agreed.