Understanding Hoshi's Rank

[Timo]

We don't really learn anything approaching the "Kirk standard" of career data on any of the other skippers. Sisko is as much a blank slate as Archer, jumping from engineer to space station command (and almost back) without appreciable filling of gaps. Picard's youth between "Tapestry" and the Stargazer command is covered by two remarks by Q in the aforementioned episode, one dealing with away team heroics at unknown rank or age or time, another dealing with that taking-over-the-bridge incident again at unknown rank or age or time. And Janeway's past is as spelled out by odO_ital.

So it is exactly as said: "much like the other captains". Archer is no more or less an unknown quantity - it's merely that we have an exceptional wealth of information on the career of Kirk and Kirk alone.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Crazy Eddie]

From what I can remember, Hoshi:

• earned a degree with honors from a university independently of SF training,
• went through SF academy,
• held a university professorship (meaning she probably published in her field),
• was an expert in a field that SF desperately needed experts,
• programmed a piece of machinery that SF depended on.

Adding all that up, Hoshi should have been a lieutenant, first class, at the very least. I suspect that for the Beebs, calling her an ensign was merely a way of saying that she was green. (Unless there's a different explanation ...)

Much has been said about the nature of her responsibilities on board the ship, which -- while fairly important to the mission itself -- are actually very limited in SCOPE. She simply doesn't have enough to do for her to rate that kind of rank; she needs to be an officer, but there's no reason for her to ever tell anyone what to do because she is a linguist and a translator and not much else.

The broader issue is that whatever Starfleet's later incarnations might be, Earth Starfleet is DEFINITELY not a military entity and by "Broken Bow" is basically the NOAA of space exploration. The only reason ANY of them have a rank is related to pay grade and responsibility and probably have nothing at all to do with merit.

Archer is perhaps the ultimate example. He has no deep space experience and by all accounts has never even been outside of the solar system. The only reason he's in command of the ship AT ALL is because he is familiar with the design and piloted the NX-Alpha prototype. Meanwhile, Travis -- who HAS practical deep space experience on an active starship and, unlike Archer, even has hands-on experience dealing with alien cultures -- holds the rank of Ensign, because his only job on the ship is that of helm officer (and like Hoshii, he isn't in charge of anyone else and his rank reflects this).