Nemesis continuity error? Not so much.

[ntypical]

I am sure that a lot of you know of Spike’s Star trek Page. Well in their uniform section under uniform errors I found what may be an error. Here http://www.st-spike.org/pages/uniforms/errors/errors.htm. The caption reads as follows.

“...Kathryn Janeway's uniform in Star Trek: Nemesis?
It was barely visible, but Janeway wore the rank insignia of a Vice Admiral. Since U.S.S. Voyager returned at the end of the year 2377, and Star Trek: Nemesis was set in the second half of 2379, Janeway would have been promoted three times within 22 months, which is just ridiculous.”

I have attempted to contact him, but for some reason I can not post on his forum. Anyway yeah his explanation would make sense to a lot of people. But it simply is not ridiculous.

You see, when you reach the general/admiral grade officer ranks promotions do not fall inline the way the rest do. When you are that high up you tend to be promoted by billet.

Lets say (I am using USMC billeting as that is easiest for me) you are a Commanding General for a Marine Division. You may be a one or two star, and you can go someplace else pretty quickly depending on the needs of the Corps (or in Janeway’s case needs of SF). So lets say you are holding a one star billet and they decide that they need you at a different command, but that command requires a three star, they are likely to just shoot you right past the two star rank.

Yes I know that it was probably an error in the costume, but it is not totally unreasonable to see a one star go to a four star in as little as three to four years. I have had Commanding Generals that completely bypassed the two star rank (Well kind of, they were promoted to two star, then three star the next day so it was still legal).

Does anyone here know what is up with his forum?

 

[Timo]

It worked fine for me the day before yesterday...

We have precedent for this sort of thing, of course. Kirk was promoted to what appeared to be Rear Admiral, right past Commodore, between TOS and TMP. The shortest possible interval for that would be 2.5 years, the longest about 8 years, depending on when one thinks TMP took place.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[ntypical]

It worked fine for me the day before yesterday...

I have been a member there for several months now, and every time I try to post it says that I do not have the permissions required, and that the admin may wish to review all members before permissions are allowed.

And thanks. But how did you come up with this precedent?

 

[Timo]

Umm, the rank thing is just what is seen on screen in TMP; calling it "precedent" is my personal bias. Kirk in the movie is called "Admiral", not "Commodore", although we know he was previously of Captain rank and we also hear in background chatter that Commodore continues to exist as a rank and a form of address at the time of TMP. Thus, two steps up in rank. Two consecutive promotions in 2.5 years is plenty, especially if Kirk only made Captain at the beginning of his 5-yr mission, and also is very young for flag rank. But a double promotion to fit the Chief of SF Operations billet is sensible, especially if Kirk is a celebrity promotee.

OTOH, two consecutive promotions in 8 years would not be too much, billet or no billet. But most chronological interpretations today seem to favor a fairly short period between TOS and TMP.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[ntypical]

Ok, baring everything we saw in TMP because we don’t know an exact timeframe (Do we? My knowledge of that era is limited).

So in the Nemisis era. Janeway went from Capt to Vice Admiral in 22 months. By others way of thinking it is unreasonable. But once you apply real life knowledge it is not so unreasonable. For example.

I understand that we are talking about a fictional universe and everything, but because fiction of this type tends to have some basis in real life. One of our past Commandants went from, Colonel to General in just over three years. That is four promotions. For all intents and purposes he completely bypassed Major general (but was promoted and held the rank.

Also the Commanding Officer of SOCOM Went from Rear Admiral LH to Admiral in 3 years 8 months. It all depends on the career path and what billets (positions) they are required to fill.

And about the whole Commodore thing. Was it ever stated that it was a rank, and not just a title.

In some militaries of the past Commodore was nothing more than a title given to someone who temporarily had command of more than one ship at one time. And IIRC Janeway had at one point said she even held the rank of Commodore at one point. But she was a Captain when she said it, giving credence to thinking that Commodore is nothing more than what I stated above.

 

[Peach Wookiee]

Well, maybe there were a lot of admirals that died in the Dominion War...

 

[cardinal biggles]

Starfleet obviously follows the Dilbert Principle.

 

[Peach Wookiee]

Maybe...

 

[Maestro]

I'd like to know exactly what post she holds that, by statute or regulation, grants the postholder the rank of Vice Admiral.

I don't know what the real Navy JAG requires, but on the television show, the JAG was, by statute, a 2-star Flag Officer. When Rear Admiral (upper half) Chegwidden retired, a Marine Colonel replaced him. By statute, that Colonel was promoted right to 2-star General.

The Surgeon General of the US is, by law, a three star Admiral's position in the US Navy. Whomever is named to that position by the President, upon confimation, is comissioned as a Vice Admiral, even if they have no prior military experience.

With Admiral Kirk, one could conclude that Chief of Starfleet Operations carried with it a promotion, by Starfleet regs, to at least Rear Admiral. Thus, Kirk was promoted in rank to match his position.

What position does Janeway hold that allowed her to be promoted to Vice Admiral?

 

[Turbo]

Superintendent of Starfleet Academy, perhaps?

 

[cynical dreamer]

Finding continuity errors in Star Trek is like finding bikinis at the beach. Open your eyes, there they are.

I gave up long ago caring about continuity in terms of things like costumes/ranks.

Though I have to say, to the person that found this. Good eye.... and... you have way too much time on your hands

 

[Timo]

And about the whole Commodore thing. Was it ever stated that it was a rank, and not just a title.

In TOS, it carried its own specific rank braid distinct from Captain and from the single unspecified Admiral rank seen. The braid was suggestive of "lowest flag rank" because it featured one broad piece of material, while the Admiral seen had narrow "standard" stripes accompanying that broad piece.

In TMP, Kirk carried one broad stripe (made of three narrow braids) and one narrow one, suggesting "second flag rank"; his form of address was Admiral while another unseen person was called Commodore. So I'd say Commodore was a distinct rank (apparently O-7) during TOS and TMP. There was also a corresponding rank pin in the later TOS movies, but the people wearing it were never addressed as Commodore or anything else on screen.

In TNG and related shows, the lowest witnessed flag rank has featured two pips in a box, and been explicated as Rear Admiral (apparently O-8). But the whole system would imply the existence of one pip in a box, now wouldn't it? The existence and designation of this rank is conjecture, though.

Superintendent of Starfleet Academy, perhaps?

Admiral in charge of dispatching starships to diplomatic missions to Romulus, apparently.

We've seen the Superintendent/Commandant as a two-pip rank in "Paradise Lost". OTOH, we have seen that the likeliest rank for a flag officer that assigns Picard to a politically delicate mission on the Romulan front is three pips / Vice Admiral. We could well argue that Janeway inherited the job of Admiral Haden, Picard's Romulan affairs boss from episodes like "The Defector". In today's terms, the job title might be something like CinCRom... There being corresponding billets of CinCKlin and CinCCard and so forth.

Starfleet may also generally believe in Sector Commanders, Vice Admirals ruling over a specific sector from a starbase. Ross could have been one of those for DS9. Janeway might have gotten the sector that includes the stretch of Romulan border closest to their homeworld.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Nebusj]

To be honest, I've never known: were the various Admiral Insignias ever established by direct dialogue, so that it's not just people reading what the magazines said the scheme were regardless of whether they were followed? I know in The Next Generation they worked up completely new and sillier Admiral uniforms every time an Admiral appeared for the first couple seasons, but I lost track after that.

 

[Timo]

There are relatively few "anchorpoints", but they are there for the TNG era. Not so for TOS or the TOS movies...

We have heard Vice Admiral explicitly connected with two pips (say, with Ross), and Rear Admiral with two (say, Pressman). We have seen four-pippers who have been addressed simply as Admiral, so at least there is no contradiction to the idea that their exact rank would indeed be Admiral, just like in today's USN/RN system.

Alas, we have also heard Fleet Admiral applied to three different three-pippers, but we could explain that away as signifying position rather than rank in the TNG timeframe. There are no other contradictions in TNG era flag rank terminology that I'm aware of.

The TOS movie flag rank system beyond TMP is well established by the person who created the system, but never explicated on screen. Then again, it's never really contradicted on screen, either (unless we count "Colonel West" with his Vice Admiral insignia).

As for TOS flag ranks, Commodore is established, the rest is conjecture. ENT has a seemingly similar system for which only Commodore (Forrest in his youth) is explicitly fixed.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[ntypical]

Ok thank you all. So it is not ridiculous. Got it. How do I submit for a change to that page?

 

[Nebusj]

Timo said:
We have heard Vice Admiral explicitly connected with two pips (say, with Ross), and Rear Admiral with two (say, Pressman).

Dumb question part II: Do we have it established that Pressman was a rear admiral? The apparently-final shooting script on twiztv just lists him as ``Admiral'', but there's many a slip between the script and the broadcast. (I don't have ``The Pegasus'' on DVD and would rather not watch it again anyway as I try avoiding programs where I want to slap all the participants.)

Part II-A: Are there people established to be Rear Admirals by direct description on-screen as opposed to the highly amusing efforts to make sense of neck braids?

 

[Unicron]

Didn't Ross have three pips?

 

[Timo]

Yeah. And he got one of those explicit Vice Admiral references, too.

As for Pressman, I think the aired episode uses the word "Rear" (and is the only instance of Star Trek to do so). I don't have it on tape, though...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Deks]

A lot can happen over the course of 2 years.
It's possible that Janeway accelerated through the ranks of admiralty due to circumstances we are not familiar with.

In truth, we don't know the canon explanation of what Janeway was up to for those 2 years while in the Alpha Quadrant.

Her promotion to the rank of Admiral from Captain could have happened the first week after Voyager got back from the DQ.
Bringing back future techs could have placed her in a position to examine those techs and work on a way to devise a way to make the assimilated armor once again as impervious to Borg weapons like before, study the remainder of technologies and find a way for speedy deployment into the rest of the fleet within a specific time frame.
Which she might have accomplished and got a second promotion, with the third one being right before she contacted Picard.

there are multiple possibilities that could have happened.
Novels aside, we don't know them, but it's possible as SF had a tendency of accelerating promotions for some people.
Janewy definitely falls within that category taking into consideration her actions in the DQ (not withstanding the joke about her promotion being deliberate to remove her from space because she breached the PD).

Other SF captains breached both the PD and the TPD on multiple occasions.