Boiled down to it's basic mission specifics, while the Enterprise is officiating a membership application follow-up on Angosia, Roga Danar escapes a maximum security prison facility by appropriating a prison transport vehicle. He is eventually apprehended by the Enterprise crew, and held, until an attempt to give him over to Angosian authorities goes wrong, and he manages to gain control over an Angosian police transport vehicle, which he then uses to wage an attack on his prison facility, whereby people are killed, and prisoners escape. These prisoners then return to Angosia with the intention of raising some kind of coop or rebellion. At this point in the situation, Capt. Picard deems that Starfleet should have no further involvement in this matter as it violates their prime directive My question is this. Is it right for him to be able to fall back on that clause at this point, when it's very likely the Enterprise crew has been instrumental in allowing Danar to gain access to the very vehicle that gave him the ability to wage the attack on the prison facility, where he acquired his invasion force? If the original prison transport had been capable of being used for the same strategy, doesn't it make sense that Danar would have done so, before being apprehended in the 1st place? The fact that he only wages his attack on the prison once he has control of a police transport might be because it is a more capable vehicle for that goal, more armaments, better shielding etc.. Furthermore, the Enterprise is solely responsible for allowing him to gain control of it. So, they'd already adversely affected this society, and now they want to walk away, without at least trying to set things back as closely as possible, to the condition that existed before they'd done so. Only a few episodes earlier they'd spent a whole episode trying to right the damage created by a mishap on their part Ultimately, they never should have gotten involved at all, by apprehending Danar in the 1st place, but they did, and made it worse. Don't they have an obligation to right their wrong as much as possible? Also, is Picard actually using the PD, only at a time it suits him, to affect change on this world as it suits his ideals? I guess if the escaped Danar had never been apprehended by Starfleet, he might have found a way to invade the prison anyhow, & the same circumstance might have resulted, but the Enterprise did sort of exacerbate the situation, right?
Perhaps. But in this case? I say, LET HIM. Picard clearly did the right thing. Danar and the rest of the veterans deserved to be heard.
& I don't necessarily disagree. For as many times as they let something go by that we'd want them to right, like Symbiosis, where they only get the small victory of denying them repair parts, here they have an opportunity to play the system, to the betterment of right, a little more effectively Mostly I'm only bringing up the legal minutia of the matter. It can be argued that they did affect change on that world by intervening, & left without even trying to correct it, but there might be some leeway in the judgement of that, given that it was a member applicant, who didn't divulge the truth about their initial request for assistance, & as I said in the OP, there's really no knowing if they'd have ever gotten their hands on Danar after the original escape, & he might have brought about the same result anyhow
Considering how resourceful Danar was in thwarting the advanced Starfleet and escaping, it would be difficult to argue he would not have achieved his goals without Starfleet's unwitting assistance. At the very most, the side trip to Picard's brig altered Danar's timetable in some minor fashion. To hold Starfleet responsible for what happened, in any sense of the word, would be rather disingenuous, then. Picard exploited the noninterference stratagem in "Symbiosis" after an at least equally severe interfering over key players and events. Surely any decision to withdraw from interference would need to be preceded by an interaction that reveals the risk of interference in some fashion? Here that interaction was Danar's day off aboard the E-D. Timo Saloniemi
The Enterprise was involved because they were led to believe they were simply assisting in the capture of a felon when in fact they were getting involved into a more nuanced political matter. They shouldn't have been involved in the first place, and it is probable their action did affect the outcome. But they couldn't undo the interference, they could only stop interfering, especially because they were in a situation where any further interference had a greater odds of creating violence than if they left.