Spoilers ST: Khan by K. Beyer, D. Mack & N. Meyer Review Thread

[JD]

. Her opinion was that somethings had been classified beforehand, and then afterward when Kirk died, everything from his logs just automatically became classified because that is what Star fleet does when captains die. (???)

This seems kind of weird to me, I thought with this kind of stuff it was usually declassified once the person died, not the other way around.

So maybe the concept is that following Space Seed, the records did reflect that Khan Noonien-Singh and his followers had been found, but the pertinent details as to what happened to them, which might allow anyone with an axe to grind to extrapolate where they had been dropped off (since again, that was an unprotected, unpatrolled area for no apparent reason, given all that canon has built up around the concept by this point) were kept secret to protect Khan and the Augments (again, rather than any kind of active observation of patrol that would also serve to keep tabs on them...) This would either assume that Starfleet has a very low opinion of its officers, or that they expect unclassified Starfleet logs to just be open to the general public. So there are still holes in the theory. But it, at least, makes a bit of sense with the reference to 'Chekov and an NDA' and all of that. Even if the automatic classification of logs for the dead part is still a head-scratcher, and the concept of Starfleet both classifying the logs because they are in some way concerned with the Augments, and ignoring Ceti Alpha V, seem mutually exclusive to one-another.

Another possibility just occurred to me, maybe they were afraid if a ship stopped there Khan would steal it and use it against Kirk or the rest of the Federation and Starfleet. So basically what happened in the Wrath of Khan.

 

[David Mack]

They did reference that they did the research so that real science underpined each of these concepts, though they weren't specific (that I can recall) in the terminology.

They were basically saying that it was the kind of concept that you really needed someone standing next to a screen with an animation to demonstrate to correctly. Which, along with the fact that it would just be straight exposition that would kill the pacing, was why they decided to cut it.

^ Correct. The research I was talking about dealt specifically with planets existing in paired "horseshoe" orbits. I pictured something like this in the Ceti Alpha system, with V and VI bouncing off each other and flipping from inside to outside track with each bounce (which I’m sure made for some fun seismic activity). Then, when six was lost, five remained trapped in the outer track, no longer having another celestial body close enough to bump it back to the inner track.

Constellations of co-orbital planets – planetplanet

 

[David Mack]

This seems kind of weird to me, I thought with this kind of stuff it was usually declassified once the person died, not the other way around.

Another possibility just occurred to me, maybe they were afraid if a ship stopped there Khan would steal it and use it against Kirk or the rest of the Federation and Starfleet. So basically what happened in the Wrath of Khan.

Now you’re getting it. Keep Khan's exile secret so that those who might be sympathetic to him don’t go looking for him; keep the system interdicted to try to prevent accidental interlopers who might end up having their ship captured by Khan et al.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

And so those who might hate augments wouldn't go all "the wrath of Herbert" on the fledgeling colony.

 

[Miami Vice Admiral]

Personally I had no trouble with Kirk’s logs being classified because if the population knew all the crazy stuff he encountered every week there’d be mass hysteria. Same with all the series captains. Is there any real world examples even close to Kirk in terms of and individual encountering world ending stuff and narrowly avoiding apocalypses while in the military?

I believe Sulu says something about the logs being classified to protect an officer’s legacy after death, but honestly if the logs were publicly available the level of hero worship would be insane. It’d be like how we treat Washington in the states times 100

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

Personally I had no trouble with Kirk’s logs being classified because if the population knew all the crazy stuff he encountered every week there’d be mass hysteria.

No wonder so many colonists are woefully unprepared, if all they have to go on are unclassified stories from the ones who came back. Anything else they hear is dismissed as fantastic legends or outright lies.

 

[JD]

I just remembered something I've been meaning to ask. Were any of the supporting Augment characters, like Ursula, and Ivan, meant to be specific Augments we saw with Khan in Space Seed?
I don't have a problem with it if they're not, I was just curious.

 

[David Mack]

I just remembered something I've been meaning to ask. Were any of the supporting Augment characters, like Ursula, and Ivan, meant to be specific Augments we saw with Khan in Space Seed?
I don't have a problem with it if they're not, I was just curious.

Not that I know of, other than Joaquin, who Khan addresses by name in that episode. We chose to create a familial link between Joaquin and ST2:TWOK’s Joachim because of the similarity of their names.

 

[JD]

Ok. Yeah the Joachim Joaquin thing makes sense.

 

[Christopher]

^ Correct. The research I was talking about dealt specifically with planets existing in paired "horseshoe" orbits. I pictured something like this in the Ceti Alpha system, with V and VI bouncing off each other and flipping from inside to outside track with each bounce (which I’m sure made for some fun seismic activity). Then, when six was lost, five remained trapped in the outer track, no longer having another celestial body close enough to bump it back to the inner track.

Constellations of co-orbital planets – planetplanet

Wow, fascinating. I never imagined there could be a plausible way to explain TWOK's nonsense about the Ceti Alpha system. And if they knew a planet had exploded but were just confused about which one, it would explain my other big objection, which is that the amount of energy required to dissociate the mass of an Earth-sized planet is on the order of the Sun's entire output for one week, so if it happened in mere minutes, the energy release would outshine the system's star and be easily detectable to the Federation's long-range sensors, or even to ordinary optical sensors once a starship came within 15 light years of the system.

 

[Zarm]

This seems kind of weird to me, I thought with this kind of stuff it was usually declassified once the person died, not the other way around.

Yeah, that was my thought as well...

 

[Zarm]

Now you’re getting it. Keep Khan's exile secret so that those who might be sympathetic to him don’t go looking for him; keep the system interdicted to try to prevent accidental interlopers who might end up having their ship captured by Khan et al.

That does make a sort of sense, but again, I feel like it really begs the question- if Khan is of concern to Starfleet, why not any observation- a probe, a long-range telescope, anything whatsoever to monitor the system, even long-term? Basically, the concern for secrecy and the total neglect seem mutually exclusive; if they were worried, you'd think they'd at least leave a buoy somewhere to alert Starfleet if the planet was approached, or something... something that might detect the destruction of a planet, the launch of the Venture, etc.

 

[Zarm]

No wonder so many colonists are woefully unprepared, if all they have to go on are unclassified stories from the ones who came back. Anything else they hear is dismissed as fantastic legends or outright lies.

That does fit with the novelverse, where Jellico (in New Frontier, I think it was?) seemed to think that half the things Kirk talked about having encountered were so outlandish that they must have been made up...

If one really wanted to stretch, it could also fit the continuity error in Where Silence Has Lease, forgetting the Immunity Syndrome (though covering up the entire destruction of the Intrepid would be quite some feat). Though there are clear instances in 90s Trek of at least some Enterprise records being available for reference...

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

They're not time-restricted. Records of a fairly benign incident might be de-classified six months later, while those of an eerie space-shattering encounter with a reclusive race may not be released for 100 years.

 

[Christopher]

It makes no sense that Starfleet missions would be automatically classified. I mean, the entire mission of these ships is to explore, to make scientific discoveries and new contacts. That means to find stuff out and tell people about it. Classifying what they discover defeats the entire purpose of Starfleet. Logically, it would only happen with matters that were militarily or politically sensitive, or discoveries too dangerous to let out (like the Guardian of Forever or Omega molecules).

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

Perhaps just long enough to decide whether and how much to release. There's probably a committee for such things.

 

[Zarm]

I think that would make sense. (And while the audio drama doesn't delve into it, it would also make sense that there's a different classified clearance level for Starfleet personnel vs. a civilian like Dr. Lear.)

But I would agree with Christopher that public transparency would be a significant thing for Starfleet- it's one of the things that separates the Federation from the Cardassians or Romulans, and their strict information controls. Some things have to be classified, but I would imagine the bare minimum necessary for security would be. (This is why, I think, people had a problem with the ending of Discovery season 2, and the massive conspiracy it seemed to be requiring in order to preserve continuity. Which has its own plot holes anyway, but I digress...)

That's where the 'automatic classification of records when a Starfleet officer dies' just seems... counter-Federation. To deliberately quarantine information that was deemed publicly available for such an arbitrary reason doesn't seem in keeping with the tenets of Starfleet. Removing the available pool of knowledge should never be their M.O. If information is safe for public consumption while a figure is alive, there seems no viable reason to suddenly decide it must be made unavailable upon their death.

 

[FredH]

Now you’re getting it. Keep Khan's exile secret so that those who might be sympathetic to him don’t go looking for him; keep the system interdicted to try to prevent accidental interlopers who might end up having their ship captured by Khan et al.

Wait — so Starfleet was keeping the system interdicted, but didn’t inform Reliant about this when they logged their flight plan?

 

[Christopher]

Perhaps just long enough to decide whether and how much to release. There's probably a committee for such things.

"Whether?" No. Making secrecy the default is anathema to science. The whole purpose of the exercise is to add to society's knowledge. It's a contradiction in terms to say that releasing the knowledge gained by an exploration mission is optional.

Wait — so Starfleet was keeping the system interdicted, but didn’t inform Reliant about this when they logged their flight plan?

I tend to figure it's a case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand was doing. Whatever division classified the rediscovery of the Botany Bay hid it from the rest of Starfleet, including the division that oversaw Project Genesis.

 

[Zarm]

Wait — so Starfleet was keeping the system interdicted, but didn’t inform Reliant about this when they logged their flight plan?

Well that's the thing, not interdicted, just classified. Like, they covered it up so that no one would know to go there - but also covered it up so that their own ships wouldn't know not to go there. And also didn't do anything to actually patrol the system or make sure nothing can get in or out. They just kind of swept it under the rug, seemingly, and assume that as long as it stayed classified no one would stumble on it by accident.

What you getting, just doesn't really check out, to me. If it's important enough to you to classify to keep people from knowing it's there, you also probably want to keep an eye on it from a distance, at the very least. Something within the span of 15 years, to check in on it.