Drago-Kazov
Fleet Captain
There cold easily be Starfleet Marines, we just had not seen them.
I don't see if the Marine Corps would be integrated into some space fleet, why would they stop calling themselves marines?
Starfleet Marine Corps
- Thread starter Danlav05
- Start date
There cold easily be Starfleet Marines, we just had not seen them.
Because it is not the United States Marine Corps or the Royal Marines being intergrated infto Starfleet. It is some kind of international armyy/space air force being forced to join or be ceremonial palace guards. And when you get around to it there are just as many airborne units in nations unable to drop airborne battalions as there are marine units in nations unable to afford water landing craft all calling themselves the elite of their armies
...Clearly, all other parts of the United States defense establishment have abandoned their traditional names and most of the other pertaining traditions as well in the founding of this Starfleet thing. Probably in stages, so that Archer's Starfleet may have absorbed a couple of earlier United Earth defense branches, which in turn have absorbed the national defense branches, in an unholy mess that left the Royal Navy survive long enough to be the employer of Reed's dad.
Something of the British naval tradition survives, though, including the rank scheme. And it appears to survive through its brief stint as the US naval tradition, so we have lieutenants rather than leftenants there... But generally, there doesn't seem to be any sort of national pride or unit pride that would have made the transition from 20th century fractured Earth to the 23rd century United Federation of Planets, or even to the 22nd century United Earth.
Remember that the question was solely about what the futuro-space-jarheads ought to be called. One side advocated "United Federation Marine Corps" for the sake of tradition, the other ridiculed this because the use of the prefix "United Federation" is not part of the Star Trek culture in any context. It would be odd to the extreme for one sub-organization to use UF when others exclusively use either UFP or just F.
On the other hand, the use of "Corps" in the title has some canon precedent from the Starfleet Engineering Corps mentioned in ST2:TWok...
Timo Saloniemi
Something of the British naval tradition survives, though, including the rank scheme. And it appears to survive through its brief stint as the US naval tradition, so we have lieutenants rather than leftenants there... But generally, there doesn't seem to be any sort of national pride or unit pride that would have made the transition from 20th century fractured Earth to the 23rd century United Federation of Planets, or even to the 22nd century United Earth.
There's nothing to suggest that these forces would be separate from Starfleet in any way, or even predominantly (or at all!) crewed by Vulcans or Betazoids. As far as we can tell, they just happen to be those parts of the overall force that at that time are engaged in defending the respective worlds. In "Unification", the E-D would be part of the force of Vulcan defense vessels spoken of; in "Take Me In The Holosuite, Hard", the Vulcan vessel USS T'Kumbra was part of Starfleet and would have been part of the Bajoran defense force had said force come under attack during the events.
The only one that matters?
Remember that the question was solely about what the futuro-space-jarheads ought to be called. One side advocated "United Federation Marine Corps" for the sake of tradition, the other ridiculed this because the use of the prefix "United Federation" is not part of the Star Trek culture in any context. It would be odd to the extreme for one sub-organization to use UF when others exclusively use either UFP or just F.
On the other hand, the use of "Corps" in the title has some canon precedent from the Starfleet Engineering Corps mentioned in ST2:TWok...
Timo Saloniemi
I personally think any Starfleet force primarily composed of sentient beings that serve as security / tactical personnel should be labeled "Soldier" or "Soldiers" for simplicity.
Whether they serve on land on some random planet, in/on the sea on some planet, within the confines of a space vessel or facility, or even falling through the sky / space to land on a target, they all come down to the same fundamental skill sets, job goals, and duties that can be easily cross trained and learned.
That one term "Soldier" encompasses what they do without associating them with any specific branch of the US military that has ground forces like the US Army, Marines, and Navy SEALs.
As far as the overall group term, they all belong to "Starfleet". They just happen to fall under the "Soldier" division of "Starfleet" which serves the "United Federation of Planets".
I personally think this kind of terminology would be acceptable and show less favoritism towards any one branch of the US military.
The term "Starfleet" implies a organization whose domain is amongst the 'Stars' and has a fleet of vessel's / facilities to facilitate their operation amonst the 'Stars'.
Ergo, my idea for any future personnel force should be "Soldier" and they have it's own division within Starfleet just like there is the "Science" / "Command" / "Operations" division. They could also be a sub division of "Operations" and that would make perfect sense too.
I never said anything about a constitution, or a treaty. Although the member world governments would likely have had to ratify the charter at some point.
![".gif](http://static.glitx.com/gtg/13/".gif)
Well, I wouldn't use the word shitMeaning at this point you're just making
up.
Like it or not Sci, twice the Federation was blatantly referred to as a alliance. Despite your efforts to dismiss that, and attempts to explain it away. And in over seven hundred episodes and near dozen movies, the Federation was never once explicitly named as "a state."
So by canon it is one, and not the other.
We all get it, you personally WANT the Federation to be a liberal democracy sovereign state, you've been pushing this theory for years. It's an idea that has been advanced in the novels. The Federation Council certainly has some of the same internal organizations as a government of some sort, but only bits and pieces. I've (also for years) have held that the alliance does have a central organization for interstellar matters, speaking with a single voice and common defense. But I maintain that it still isn't a "state" in the usual meaning, it's a collection of sovereign states.
I have my two obvious canon quotes, and you don't have the word "state."
Sci, you're too quick to dismiss EU as an analogy. It is exactly the kind of nebulous more than an alliance, less than a state that Federation seems to be. And even though EU will become somewhat more unified in the future, I certainly do not see it becoming a true sovereign state.
No, I agree with Sci. There are some similarities between the Federation and the EU (and it's very probable the Federation was EU-like at some point in it's development, with some remnants to the "present day") but the Federation also has some fundamentally state-like characteristics that the EU simply does not have. The EU doesn't have it's own military. The EU can't place it's member states under martial law. And if the EU ever gained these traits it would for all intents and purposes become a state.
Regarding ranks, it should be noted that there are some real-world militaries that use branch-neutral ranks for all of their services (Korea, for example) and that we have seen some Star Trek races that apparently do the same thing (Cardassians, I think). A number of such races are probably Federation members and any distinction between land and naval ranks would be meaningless to them when translated to their languages - which might have contributed to the Federation choosing to go with just one unified rank system for it's unified military. And since space-naval warfare is seemingly totally dominant in the Trek universe (and space-naval forces were also probably the first to be placed under unified Federation command), in those languages that have branch specific ranks Starfleet chooses to use the naval rank system for it's unified ranks. Personally, I just like the idea because it adds flavor and uniqueness to Starfleet.
The thing is, Kirk considers himself a soldier ("Errand of Mercy"). He's not from a branch or force or division dedicated to ground fighting or personal fighting, but he is from a branch or force or division that practices ship-based fighting among other things. So we already have one way Starfleet personnel use the word "soldier" here. Doesn't mean they couldn't use it in other, different ways as well, of course.
We also know Starfleet uses the term "troops", these being shipped around in the DS9 war episodes. This appears different from starship crews, although unfortunately we lack further information about the personnel or their mission or organization.
Since both the words are extremely rarely used, and OTOH Federation infantry is extremely rarely seen, there aren't major obstacles to saying that Federation infantry refers to itself as soldiers or troopers. That doesn't tell us whether said Federation infantry is part of Starfleet, and if so, which sort of part, but at least it's an option open to us.
Timo Saloniemi
The derivation of words hundreds of years ago has nothing to do with their suitability today or in the future. The earlier claim that it doesn't make sense for admirals to command ground troops takes a limited interpretation of the word, and ignores the fact that admirals (and other "naval ranks") have commanded ground troops in the past and are doing so today.
There is no reason to believe that rank titles will not continue to evolve in ways that we might not predict. A good example is the Royal Ar Force. A "squadron leader" does not command a squadron today, it has just become the term for that particular rank. It's been around for almost a hundred years now and causes no confusion or difficulty, everyone is used to it.
Justin
Got to love that rank inflation where Group Captains command wings, Wing Commanders command squadrons and Squadron Leaders lead flights. I remember a series when there was only one "captain" on a ship so the Marine detachment commander became Major while on board and Captain ashore on a mission. And today a supercarrier has four or more Navy Captains and should a USMC squadron be afloat, the mind boggles.
I'm trying to remember the name of the episode(s) where we see these guys. Do you have a picture / screen capture of them.
I feel a little rusty. Who is Colonel West?
Colonel West was the Scooby-Doo assassin in TUC. And never mind his uniform. The costume department didn't pay much attention to detail in that particular movie. One female officer at the Starfleet HQ briefing is addressed as "captain" even though she's wearing an admiral's uniform. And Valeris' uniform is one big mess: 3 different department colours (and none befitting the ship's helmsman) and incorrect rank insignia.
Colonel West is also the only character ever in Star Trek to hold a non-naval rank, if we discount American soldiers from the 20th century time travel episodes.
There's some semantic reason to assume that we aren't witnessing a Colonel this time around, either, and in fact the guy's surname just happens to be Cornell-West... Namely, the UFP President addressing this man as "Colonel West" or "Cornell-West" very pointedly addresses all others with their surnames or even their given names, rather than with their rank-plus-surname.
Two episodes... "Nor the Battle to the Strong" is the first to feature both these uniforms and the more common DS9/VOY style ones on the various ground-fighting guest stars, while "The Siege of AR-558" repeats the performance; it seems that the people in "regular" uniforms might be more like support types while the people with the thin stripes are the gunslingers.
This is Lieutenant Burke from the first episode:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/5x04/northebattletothe174.jpg
This is one of his colleagues, with a yellow stripe:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/5x04/northebattletothe255.jpg
The second episode is very dimly lit for the most part. This is a non-regulation way to wear the special uniform, I guess:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_264.jpg
A rear view:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_318.jpg
Lots of wear and tear on this one:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_346.jpg
The reinforcements wear regular uniforms:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_389.jpg
A last look at the special uniform, with prominent layering (a phaser-resistant configuration?), plus a few Jem'hadar Ketracel tubes for trophies...
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_393.jpg
Timo Saloniemi
There's some semantic reason to assume that we aren't witnessing a Colonel this time around, either, and in fact the guy's surname just happens to be Cornell-West... Namely, the UFP President addressing this man as "Colonel West" or "Cornell-West" very pointedly addresses all others with their surnames or even their given names, rather than with their rank-plus-surname.
Two episodes... "Nor the Battle to the Strong" is the first to feature both these uniforms and the more common DS9/VOY style ones on the various ground-fighting guest stars, while "The Siege of AR-558" repeats the performance; it seems that the people in "regular" uniforms might be more like support types while the people with the thin stripes are the gunslingers.
This is Lieutenant Burke from the first episode:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/5x04/northebattletothe174.jpg
This is one of his colleagues, with a yellow stripe:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/5x04/northebattletothe255.jpg
The second episode is very dimly lit for the most part. This is a non-regulation way to wear the special uniform, I guess:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_264.jpg
A rear view:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_318.jpg
Lots of wear and tear on this one:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_346.jpg
The reinforcements wear regular uniforms:
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_389.jpg
A last look at the special uniform, with prominent layering (a phaser-resistant configuration?), plus a few Jem'hadar Ketracel tubes for trophies...
http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/7x08/ar558_393.jpg
Timo Saloniemi
"I knew I shouldn't have had that three-bean salad!"
That's what I was intending, too. Don't call it a "Starfleet Marine Corps", as such, just have the ground troops division be yet another sub-division with its own uniform color, but still be Starfleet. You can even give it ground ranks and call it even. (There may be a sizable number of fans who just expect to see ground ranks used for ground troops.)
As for Colonel West's uniform: I just thought they didn't bother to give him a unique one to wear because we knew we'd never be seeing these characters again. No sense going to all that work dreaming up a new uniform style which would then never be worn again after that one character in one film. (As for why he's a Colonel when it doesn't seem to fit with Starfleet's structure: Remember who he was named after - Oliver North. West, North. Get it? So obviously he's going to be a colonel, since North also was.)
Or for a society whose flagship carries her crew's children something like Security might just do, since Peacekeepers belong to another franchise.
That's what I was intending, too. Don't call it a "Starfleet Marine Corps", as such, just have the ground troops division be yet another sub-division with its own uniform color, but still be Starfleet. You can even give it ground ranks and it would still fit. (There may be a sizable number of fans who just expect to see ground ranks used for ground troops.)
And I still think that black would be a good uniform color to use.
I do seem to remember Gene Roddenberry himself once suggesting that in TOS, the Enterprise carried a platoon of marines. Not surprising they didn't show it though.
If you don't like black, though, what color would you suggest?
If you don't like black, though, what color would you suggest?
And up until very recently those small detachments of Marines aboard USN/RN ships performed security and gun crew duties most of the time while spearheading a landing party made up of sailors mostly an additional duty. That seems like the life description of your basic Starfleet Security Red Shirt to me
A darker green similar to USMC forestry green or RM Lovat green would seem appropriate.
Justin
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