Rank in Starfleet
- Thread starter Nyotarules
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Was Kira wearing her Commander's Starfleet uniform at the time?
Well, the novels certainly go with the idea he was Captain of the Defiant, and indeed we see him take it out on missions without Sisko many times, in fact that's what he was doing in First Contact also.
Even following off that, Sisko was never referred to as "Captain Sisko" when on the Defiant in season 3, despite the fact that naval tradition that Starfleet does follow means he should have been.
No, Tears of the Prophets is the finale of season 6, Kira didn't begin wearing her Starfleet uniform with Commander's rank until When it Rains, the 21st episode of season 7.
Well that's fine, but it's not clear from Deep Space Nine that he was ever officially the CO of the ship, as opposed to being merely delegated to command the ship in Sisko's stead. Indeed Sisko tells him his actions in Rules of Engagement would specifically preclude the possibility of him getting a command of his own, clearly suggesting he didn't have one at the time. Meanwhile, there is abundant evidence that Sisko was captain of the Defiant.
Supposedly follows! In practice it depends on the writer. I can't think of any other examples of Starfleet officers being referred to as "captain" without holding the rank, except in the verbal sense of "captaining" a ship.
It's only because Ron Moore made a thing out of it in that scene with O'Brien and Nog that we're even talking about it. It wouldn't be the first time he introduced some element of naval minutiae which had previously been contradicted - like O'Brien's rank.
Yes and no, as I understand it. If being addressed/introduced (especially by an equal or superior), he would still be "Commander (Benjamin Lafayette) Sisko, Commanding Officer DS9 and USS Defiant." However use of "Captain" alone as a salutation (similar to the generic sir or ma'am) would be in keeping with modern tradition.
Change of Heart, actually.
Well, there's the Abrams movies, though they completely screw up things by having whoever is left in command of the bridge being called "Captain."
No, the tradition is is that as long as they are aboard their ships, the CO is identified as "Captain" by everyone aboard, regardless the CO's actual rank or the rank of the person addressing him.
The first is dumb - although possibly justified in a 'this is a potential suicide mission into hostile territory so I'm naming who should take over as Captain if I don't come back' kind of way (Pike to Spock in Star Trek, Kirk to Sulu in Into Darkness)?
I was under the impression that "Captain" in the case of substantive Commanders, Lieutenant Commanders and (occassionally?) Lieuteant assigned as "Officer Commanding" of a ship was that "Captain" may be used in place of 'sir' (or ma'am), but their rank remains the lower one and it is acceptable to refer to them as such. (For instance, someone would say. "Lieutenant X, reporting for duty, Captain.", whereas the captain in question might say. "I am Lieutenant Commander Y, Captain of the Z). Or is that tv/movies getting it wrong?
Except, it wasn't a suicide mission in STID, the whole point of the mission was to capture and extract Khan. Kirk obviously felt certain he'd be returning, otherwise he likely would have gone ahead with his orders and launched the torpedoes.
Regardless, a deleted scene from Beyond actually has the Enterprise's night watch officer being addressed as "Captain" by Kirk himself.
Well, yes, their rank still remains the same, they still wear their actual rank insignia, and so on, but it is only in strictly formal situations they use their actual rank. The rest of the time, they are addressed as "Captain" especially when they are on board their ship. One good example is from the Destroyermen novels, a series set aboard a Navy destroyer during WWII commanded by a Lt. Commander. In the first book, there's an Army officer aboard who keeps referring to the CO as "Commander" only to be reminded quite irritably by the crew at every turn that while on board his boat he's "Captain" and nothing else. Indeed, the series has gone on for over ten books now, and the only other time his actual rank of Lt. Commander is used is when he gets married (off-ship, at that).
There's also the TV show The Last Ship, there the Captain (at least in the first two seasons) was a Commander. And although the first few episodes do tend to have him referred to as both Captain and Commander, they very quickly settle on Captain, and he as addressed as such by everyone else from there on, by enemy combatants, US politicians and even the US President. The matter becomes moot in the third season when he is promoted to O6 Captain.
Which is quite clearly nonsense and it's probably for the best that the WO being "Captain" was deleted. Sulu could still technically be "Acting Captain" (which is how he refered to himself to the crew) as the most senior officer in the chain of command still present on Enterprise.
Although there might be a certain fridge logic to that, as in Army terminology a 'captain' is a fairly junior officer whereas 'commander' is largely 'rank neutral' as it is applied at various levels, so depending on what rank the Army officer is he might (mistakenly) think that he's actually respecting the LCDR more by using his rank rather than his title.
The Army officer is himself a Captain, and the book makes it quite clear he's an asshole. The implication throughout, and indeed an opinion held by all the Navy personnel is that he knows the naval tradition about calling a CO Captain regardless his rank, he's just being intentionally disrespectful.
Yeah, reading some online summaries, I definately got that impression.
Kind of a special case, and it was just a one time thing, but after Hobson realizes Data is capable despite being an android he specifically calls Data Captain
Kind of besides the point, I know, but I liked RDM Battlestar Galactica's ranking system. It was a hybrid of Naval and Marine ranks. I've always wished Starfleet had something like that, especially since the MACOs got absorbed into Starfleet at some point. I guess you can make an argument that they DO have a hybrid ranking system since there there was a Colonel West in STVI, but still...
Here's those BSG ranks: http://en.battlestarwiki.org/wiki/Military_Ranks_(RDM)
Here's those BSG ranks: http://en.battlestarwiki.org/wiki/Military_Ranks_(RDM)
^ I dunno, it makes sense. A ship that flies in space is still a ship, so it makes sense that a space service like Starfleet would have naval ranks.
The rank structure in the new BSG is based on that from the classic, which was a result of Glen Larson knowing nothing about military, indeed he purposely arranged the ranks in the order of Captain, Colonel, Commander because that was how they went alphabetically. For the new series, Ron Moore considered going with a more realistic naval rank structure, but decided to go with the classic series rank structure for nostalgia sake.
Today (as in the past) it not unusual to refer to a aircraft as a ship.
AFAIK, only gunships (ie specialist attack helos) are ever refered to as ships. The general term is usually aircraft.
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Usually a craft (as in aircraft), or tub for something large and ponderous. A few pilots that see themselves as captains of the air do go by ship, though these tend to be airline pilots who have historically taken over the role filled for a few decades by the airships (mostly Zeppelin style airships) but also supplemented and surpassed that of the passenger liner for most voyages that were not simply pleasure cruises.
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