Neither confirm nor deny doesn't mean "doesn't exist."
What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?
- Thread starter Amasov
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In Abrams and Kurtman's hands, Section 31 became a lockpick to disregard much of the concepts and lore of the franchise.
Bashir wasn't a dullard teenager. he was an augment with an extensive education. he would have known.
^And even non-augments are supposed to be beyond us. They apparently do calculus at age 8-9 or so.
(On the other hand, Sisko seems to be better acquainted with history (e.g. of the Bell Riots) than Bashir).
(On the other hand, Sisko seems to be better acquainted with history (e.g. of the Bell Riots) than Bashir).
That shows you how well data manipulation and hiding of info is during the 24th century.
If Bashir, a Genius Augment, didn't learn about it until Section 31 confronted him in person; imagine what the average UFP Citizen or StarFleet would know.
no. it was just bad writing.
I like Discovery but they made some poor choices in its execution. I suspect CBS was driving those choices, or the desire to please CBS, at least. CBS loves police procedurals and dark government conspiracy stuff, and didn't have a clue what to do with Star Trek. When someone told them Star Trek had a spy agency, they went apeshit and ran with it. You can see the same thing with every season of Picard being riddled with conspiracies. It's all they know. They've somehow managed to avoid it for the most part with SNW, but we'll see.
It's so difficult to retcon what they did its better to just not bother and accept it as one of those giant green space hand things that doesn't make sense but you have roll with it. You won't agree because you have a tome you've written that works it all out, etc, and that's great, but I for me it doesn't work, and it doesn't stop me enjoying Star Trek. but I could have enjoyed it more if it hadn't sucked as much.
Considering how easy it is today to alter information electronically, it's easy to see Section 31 being an unknown entity to the vast majority of people.
Couple that with medical technology to alter or erase memories and telepathic methods, like Vulcan mind melds with 'forget', Section 31 can easily erase all their traces.
(Sloan said to Bashir while inside his head that there is no physical Section 31 headquarters or office, which makes tracking them down even MORE difficult.)
Couple that with medical technology to alter or erase memories and telepathic methods, like Vulcan mind melds with 'forget', Section 31 can easily erase all their traces.
(Sloan said to Bashir while inside his head that there is no physical Section 31 headquarters or office, which makes tracking them down even MORE difficult.)
They're actually a dark charcoal gray.
Or so I've been told...
Or so I've been told...
He's a doctor, not a historian.
He's a doctor, not a historian.
True. But neither is Sisko. (I guess a command officer should know a general outline of history, though.)
Section 31 are quite different from the FBI, CIA, and NSA. The FBI is a law enforcement agency, solving crimes and referring the evidence to civilian prosecutors to take to court. The FBI's counterintelligence works against foreign spies operating inside the United States. The CIA collects intelligence from many sources, about things happening outside the United States. They have in the past conducting dirty tricks against foreign government, though not so much in the last 50 years or so, and always with the knowledge and approval of the civilian U.S. government. The NSA breaks foreign cyphers and prepares cyphers for U.S. secret operations that would be very difficult for any foreign power to break. Why are there three agencies when Section 31 seems to do all of those things? (Plus Department of Defense Intelligence and Intelligence Agencies of each of the armed services...) Balance of power between agencies with defined roles, not having one over-powerful agency able to do everything.
I'm not sure such a superpowerful spying and dirty tricks agency is really necessary. They don't even have to report to the Federation president or anyone in the president's cabinet? That's not a good way to design an intelligence service. Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The Obsidian Order seems to be more like the spy service of an Eastern Block country, devoting most of its energy to knowing what all the civilians are up to and keeping them in line, not working against foreign powers. And when they did decide to cooperate with the Tal Shiar against the Dominion - not exactly a rousing success.
At least in ENT no one except a small handful of people knowing what Section 31 is makes sense. The Federation doesn't yet exist and except for the Xindi attack Earth has yet to fight a major interstellar conflict against an enemy power. For Archer and most others to be baffled and surprised by the agency's existence tracks. Malcolm and Agent Harris seem to be two of the select few who are even cognizant of S31's existence.
Next thing you'll tell me that Omega doesn't print MI6 agent numbers on their watches
Even on base. If they have uniforms, the opposition will learn what they look like and can put one of their agents in a uniform to evade detection.
Bad Writing or Not, it affects all of us since it's now part of "Established Canon" that Section 31 was a legal lawful Government Entity underneath StarFleet Intelligence.
While Section 31 may not exist as a lawful government entity past when the USS Discovery went to the future / faked it's demise
Their existence has just gone "Under Ground" and they operate closer to a hidden Secret Society/Organization and operate like a distributed Terrorist Cell with independent sub units that don't know other members.
We can clearly see in the Section 31 movie that most of their gear / vessels aren't StarFleet looking, which fits just fine since they shouldn't be.
Badges are also easier to destroy / hide than an entire StarShip.
Is this the reason why StarFleet constantly changes uniforms?
To fool the enemies who would try to change into one of their uniforms?
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it's remarkable how non-affected I am .
Starfleet changes uniforms so often because it's the central organization in a franchise which is constantly creating new merchandising opportunities. It's no coincidence the era which has largely been unexplored onscreen is the era where there was no significant uniform changes for decades.
I've said it before, but I would absolute watch a serious spy show about Starfleet Intelligence officers hunting down and arresting Section 31 operatives before they can carry out one of their plans. You could have actual spy work, gun fights, spaceship chases, a mole in the team they have to flush out, proper moral ambiguity. Make it the closest thing to Star Trek: Andor (except the folks in the intelligence organisation are the good guys and the other guys doing assassinations are the bad guys).
I dunno, maybe it's the wrong time for that kind of series.
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