Sisko and Starfleet?

[Sisko4Life]

Just watched "For the Uniform" again. Sisko is pretty consistent with not informing Starfleet of his dirty work but the ends always justify the means.

Is poisoning every Maquis Colony in the DMZ in response to the Ambush of USS Malinche "acceptable" course of action? Would Starfleet condemn Sisko?

We all know what he did in "In the Pale Moonlight" but I REALLY wonder what Starfleet would do if they found out Sisko actually engineered the whole plan.. Theyd obviously not tell the Rommies :-P

 

[Farrens]

I was always shocked that sisko wasn't busted down after "For the Uniform". As for "In the Pale Moonlight" I think they would ignore the whole thing, if they punished sisko it might lead to questions like, "Why?".

 

[indolover]

It probably was against Federation law, but Starfleet may have overlooked poisoning the planet.

As for tricking the Romulans into the war, well Starfleet was in on the plan.

 

[toughlittleship]

Also, the planet was only made uninhabitable to Human life; the Cardassians were not affected and so there was a resettlement of the planets.

 

[T'Girl]

And the "poisoning" was of limited duration.

it was more like the FBI tossing in some tear gas.

 

[Sisko4Life]

Was it ever said that Starfleet was in on the plan to bring the Romulans into the war?

 

[Caretaker]

Yes, Starfleet was in on the plan, at least as far as it was originally designed (the fake holographic recording). They just didn't know about the other things that happened (such as the murders).

 

[Eric Cheung]

Yes Starfleet was in on the plan to get the Romulans into the war, but even Sisko didn't know about the murders. I guess they trusted Sisko's judgment in choosing Garak to author the plan.

I imagine For the Uniform actually makes Sisko's hands dirtier from Starfleet's point of view. But the episode doesn't seem to think so since Sisko and Dax are playfully joking about it at the end. They must have known Starfleet would ultimately approve his tactics.

Hmm...

 

[G2309]

And the "poisoning" was of limited duration.

it was more like the FBI tossing in some tear gas.

Agreed and he knew they were able to evacuate so unlike bombing it wasn't costing lives.

 

[doubleohfive]

The other thing (and it's a little too convenient, I think, to depend on this entirely as an excuse) is that Section 31 had a vital interest in DS9 and its staff. They tried recruiting Bashir more than once and were obviously very familiar with the rest of the crew on the station, so they probably had been watching Sisko and monitoring Starfleet regarding DS9 and Sisko, and were in somewhat of a position to "redirect" orders and traffic and things like that to keep Sisko, Bashir, et al out of trouble, regardless of what they were up to.

 

[indolover]

The DS9 crew discovered the Founders and essentially wrote the book on the Dominion. So it makes sense for S31 to focus on them given the Dominion was the Federation's greatest threat at the time.

 

[G2309]

It's a shame we didn't get to see section 31 earlier in the series. Although I don't think they were needed them for protection.

 

[Darth Duck]

Who says we didn't see Section 31 earlier? They're secretive. They could've been anyone.

 

[G2309]

Well yeh but the writers hadnt created them o no hint could be made of their influence. You could retcon idea. I liked the idea of the admiral from the tng episode Pegasus was part of section 31

 

[Yevetha]

I was always shocked that sisko wasn't busted down after "For the Uniform". As for "In the Pale Moonlight" I think they would ignore the whole thing, if they punished sisko it might lead to questions like, "Why?".

They would probably send him to an irrelevant post to avoid attention and punish him at the same time.

 

[Timo]

he knew they were able to evacuate

That never made much sense to me.

The agent released into the atmosphere was said to make the planet "uninhabitable", meaning it must be rather potent stuff. We don't know if it's immediately lethal or only harmful in the long term, though.

However, consider this. Even though Sisko did tell Eddington to start preparing for evacuation, it's rather certain Eddington did no such thing. Yet the very minute the trilithium is released, the Maquis (or the people Sisko claims are Maquis) start scrambling off their planet. Why?

Did they detect trilithium in the atmosphere with their sensors? Rather unlikely that they would have such sensors in readiness in the first place. Did they listen to Eddington's chat with Sisko? Rather unlikely that Eddington would have been transmitting anything forth to the planet. So why scramble?

It seems to be that the only reason an entire planetful of persistent and brave people would abandon their world is if they saw and felt the effects of the trilithium, and that those effects were really serious and obvious to the layman. Which more or less means that it was already too late for the first victims.

Sisko had picked the nearest "Maquis colony", not a special colony that would have some a priori reason to stand in readiness to evacuate. How realistic is it for an entire planetful of people (hundreds of thousands by Eddington's possible but unlikely hyperbole) to be within a few minutes of their starships? Or even within facilities that will protect them from atmospheric contamination until they can be taken to starships?

It doesn't convince me in the slightest. If Sisko only threw "tear gas", the colonists would stay put, hold their breaths and start firing back with whatever they had. If Sisko threw the counterpart of Eddington's deadly nerve gas, then he by necessity murdered thousands. Yet the way the episode pans out, it seems that neither of these happened.

...How?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[DanCPA]

Would Starfleet condemn Sisko?

During normal peace time, yes.
During war, certain acts are "forgiven."