What was the Admiral's plan?
- Thread starter mahler
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Marcus saw an inevitable war with the Klingons. Whether the threat was real or imagined, he intended to launch a pre-emptive strike with the ship and the super torps that "Harrison" designed. The resulting war would, in his mind, be easily won. He didn't anticipate Harrison's betrayal and retaliation, or Kirk's eventual change of heart to capture Harrison and bring him back for trial.
I hope we see the aftermath in the next movie, i.e. the Klingons' reaction to being "attacked" and a diplomatic resolution. After a lot of shoot 'em up space battles, of course.
I hope we see the aftermath in the next movie, i.e. the Klingons' reaction to being "attacked" and a diplomatic resolution. After a lot of shoot 'em up space battles, of course.
I don't think the torps were ever intended to achieve anything significantly destructive. After all, Kirk was going to fire all of them at a desert of no strategic value. Also, all 72 of them together would supposedly not create more destruction than absolutely necessary to eliminate "Harrison" - so a few stray ones (or ones sabotaged to go off course) would achieve little even if detonating inside big Klingon cities.
On a more fundamental level, if an attack by a single starship could destroy entire star empires, the Trek universe would look very different! If the one attack really sufficed, there'd be no point in sabotaging Kirk's ship, or in sending Kirk out there in the first place - Marcus himself could and would have conducted the attack that both started and ended the greatest war in history.
No, the attack would just piss off the Klingons and prompt them to destroy the conveniently sabotaged Enterprise, providing casus belli for the Federation... Which would be secretly armed with super-weapons designed with Khan's consultation and would wipe the table with the Klingons.
Apparently, the plan of Admiral Marcus and the plan of Khan ran parallel until the point where Kirk was supposed to fire the torps. Even beyond that point, the plan served the purposes of both the villains, despite the fact that the villains also wanted to destroy each other. Evil plans with that much redundancy and robustness are a good thing for a plot...
Timo Saloniemi
On a more fundamental level, if an attack by a single starship could destroy entire star empires, the Trek universe would look very different! If the one attack really sufficed, there'd be no point in sabotaging Kirk's ship, or in sending Kirk out there in the first place - Marcus himself could and would have conducted the attack that both started and ended the greatest war in history.
No, the attack would just piss off the Klingons and prompt them to destroy the conveniently sabotaged Enterprise, providing casus belli for the Federation... Which would be secretly armed with super-weapons designed with Khan's consultation and would wipe the table with the Klingons.
Apparently, the plan of Admiral Marcus and the plan of Khan ran parallel until the point where Kirk was supposed to fire the torps. Even beyond that point, the plan served the purposes of both the villains, despite the fact that the villains also wanted to destroy each other. Evil plans with that much redundancy and robustness are a good thing for a plot...
Timo Saloniemi
That is what I got from the movie as well.
I'd agree except that what we saw unfold was Marcus's Plan B. We never saw Plan A, which was probably to arm the Vengeance with the missiles as part of a larger plan for war.
In Plan A, Marcus either believed war was inevitable sooner rather than later, or he had a way of inciting one when he was ready that we'll never know. The only way Khan's plan to save his people makes sense is if Khan knew all the missiles were to go onto the Vengeance. Once his people were secretly on board, he could unthaw them, take over the ship, and probably use the Vengeance to take over even more of the weapons systems Khan had designed for Marcus's war. Could've worked, too if Marcus hadn't found out about the people in the missiles. When Marcus realized what Khan had done, he needed a Plan B, which was conveniently inspired by Kirk's need for revenge.
Marcus's Plan B wouldn't have happened if Kirk hadn't first offered to go after Khan. When Kirk did that, a light bulb probably went off over Marcus' head, and Plan B became pretty much what was described by Timo and what we saw on screen. The Enterprise was sent off to be a catalyst for war similar to the loss of the Maine in 1898, or the Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964.
Some believe there was a conspiracy to allow the Maine to be destroyed as a way to get American support for a war with Spain. It's been mostly debunked over time, but that kind of interpretation of events seems like something that would be intriguing to Orci (if he was paying attention in his Post-Civil War 19th Century US History class in high school or college).
Remember the Enterprise!
Not sure about that Plan A/B thing. Khan was nominally working for Marcus - why not assume that all he did was in accordance with Marcus' plan A?
Being superficially loyal to Marcus would be the only way for Khan the underdog to execute any secret plans of his own and get his crew to where he wanted them. Khan can't order a specific starship to be loaded with specific weapons, but he can certainly manipulate his boss into giving such an order.
In turn, using an agent to commit brutal mass murder is right down Admiral Marcus' alley - indeed, that's what he sent Kirk out to do in the first place. So quite possibly Marcus ordered "Harrison" to go rogue, very rogue, and thus send Starfleet top brass into the penthouse where they could be eliminated and Marcus would become the uncontested military leader, first of the territories around Earth (since all the local starship bosses were dead and others were too far away to interfere) and then of all the Federation (when his war really got into motion).
Khan is a superb marksman, as demonstrated at the Ketha ruins. He could easily have assassinated Chris Pike for the specific purpose of making the young and foolish Kirk suitably angry, while making sure neither Kirk nor Marcus was hurt in the seemingly undiscriminating massacre.
The two villains have opposite aims (the world domination angle aside), so when their plans mesh so well together, we're much better off assuming it's by design than by coincidence...
Timo Saloniemi
Being superficially loyal to Marcus would be the only way for Khan the underdog to execute any secret plans of his own and get his crew to where he wanted them. Khan can't order a specific starship to be loaded with specific weapons, but he can certainly manipulate his boss into giving such an order.
In turn, using an agent to commit brutal mass murder is right down Admiral Marcus' alley - indeed, that's what he sent Kirk out to do in the first place. So quite possibly Marcus ordered "Harrison" to go rogue, very rogue, and thus send Starfleet top brass into the penthouse where they could be eliminated and Marcus would become the uncontested military leader, first of the territories around Earth (since all the local starship bosses were dead and others were too far away to interfere) and then of all the Federation (when his war really got into motion).
Khan is a superb marksman, as demonstrated at the Ketha ruins. He could easily have assassinated Chris Pike for the specific purpose of making the young and foolish Kirk suitably angry, while making sure neither Kirk nor Marcus was hurt in the seemingly undiscriminating massacre.
The two villains have opposite aims (the world domination angle aside), so when their plans mesh so well together, we're much better off assuming it's by design than by coincidence...
Timo Saloniemi
This.
I hope we see the aftermath in the next movie, i.e. the Klingons' reaction to being "attacked" and a diplomatic resolution. After a lot of shoot 'em up space battles, of course.
Just watch Star Trek VI instead
He was merely the top man of Starfleet. Nothing uncontested about that if he started acting like a madman...
Slaughter a dozen closest rivals first, though, and create an interstellar emergency, and suddenly it becomes all right for the top man to start shooting at fellow starships in the name of security and freedom.
Mind you, Marcus' position was never precarious or anything. He had authority, and he had resources to burn, as indicated by him so callously sacrificing the second-biggest and second-newest starship known to the audience. But in order to pull off what he wanted to pull off, he needed to be an absolute ruler, and in the orderly and democratic Federation, he could only be that amidst chaos.
Timo Saloniemi
Slaughter a dozen closest rivals first, though, and create an interstellar emergency, and suddenly it becomes all right for the top man to start shooting at fellow starships in the name of security and freedom.
Mind you, Marcus' position was never precarious or anything. He had authority, and he had resources to burn, as indicated by him so callously sacrificing the second-biggest and second-newest starship known to the audience. But in order to pull off what he wanted to pull off, he needed to be an absolute ruler, and in the orderly and democratic Federation, he could only be that amidst chaos.
Timo Saloniemi
I hope we see the aftermath in the next movie, i.e. the Klingons' reaction to being "attacked" and a diplomatic resolution. After a lot of shoot 'em up space battles, of course.
The end of the movie was a year later and still no reaction from the Klingons, I doubt if there'll be an aftermath in the next movie.
I hope we see the aftermath in the next movie, i.e. the Klingons' reaction to being "attacked" and a diplomatic resolution. After a lot of shoot 'em up space battles, of course.
The end of the movie was a year later and still no reaction from the Klingons, I doubt if there'll be an aftermath in the next movie.
We don't know because it is not explicitly stated where the Klingons are at in a year's time. They could be in negotiations with the Federation and just not mentioned.
I don't see any reason why a Klingon War or any aftermath wouldn't make it in to the next film.
I'm thinking that those torpedoes were never super torpedoes at all (Vengeance had the real versions of those--if they ever existed.)
The goal was getting Khan to design a ship of war using his aggression and superior intellect--then strand the augments so they and the Klingons kill each other.
Vengeance then finishes off the homeworld, after their stuxnet virus already caused the Praxis blast--if that shattered moon is any evidence.
In the no Abrams movies, Praxis might have been one of Cartwright's moves, not Marcus--and that happened later in the prime timeline.
The goal was getting Khan to design a ship of war using his aggression and superior intellect--then strand the augments so they and the Klingons kill each other.
Vengeance then finishes off the homeworld, after their stuxnet virus already caused the Praxis blast--if that shattered moon is any evidence.
In the no Abrams movies, Praxis might have been one of Cartwright's moves, not Marcus--and that happened later in the prime timeline.
A torpedo that would do no useful damage on a Klingon planet might still be enough to cripple a starship when detonated inside her hangar bay. And it does seem that the torps were incapable of their intended mission - their fuel had been left ashore, after all!
We may interpret this in two ways:
1) Khan told Marcus it would be cool to have some stupid young skipper fire these long range torps at Klingons and then die for his sins, and if Khan were Marcus, he'd also give those torps good stealth so that Marcus could deny any torps were ever fired and Klingons would be the aggressors. All this solely to create a means of smuggling the cryopods to a location where Khan could access them but Marcus could not - in Klingon space and in the hands of a stupid young skipper who will believe anything.
Marcus then smoothly lied that he knew about what Khan did, just as he smoothly lied to Kirk about everything else. Why admit to ignorance and thus show weakness?
2) Khan did the above. Marcus did find out. Marcus allowed Khan to proceed nevertheless - stealthy torps fired at Klingons would be one way to achieve deniability, but dud torps that had no fuel would be an even better way to martyrize Kirk and make Klingons look bad. Plus it would be great fun to know that Khan would agonize whether Kirk fired the torps and killed the corpsicles or not.
End result in both cases: dud torps that would have live warheads but no tactical value. Although Khan would probably make damn sure the warheads would not explode without his explicit permission, which means that
a) McCoy's life was never in jeopardy and
b) Spock was more clever than Khan by half and overrode the secret safety
If there were more than 72 of the torps in existence, Khan could not be sure the right ones got deployed. He must have engineered things so that no matter what, only the 72 proper ones would go to the Enterprise - which probably means that the ones blown up below London were all that existed, besides the rigged ones.
Timo Saloniemi
We may interpret this in two ways:
1) Khan told Marcus it would be cool to have some stupid young skipper fire these long range torps at Klingons and then die for his sins, and if Khan were Marcus, he'd also give those torps good stealth so that Marcus could deny any torps were ever fired and Klingons would be the aggressors. All this solely to create a means of smuggling the cryopods to a location where Khan could access them but Marcus could not - in Klingon space and in the hands of a stupid young skipper who will believe anything.
Marcus then smoothly lied that he knew about what Khan did, just as he smoothly lied to Kirk about everything else. Why admit to ignorance and thus show weakness?
2) Khan did the above. Marcus did find out. Marcus allowed Khan to proceed nevertheless - stealthy torps fired at Klingons would be one way to achieve deniability, but dud torps that had no fuel would be an even better way to martyrize Kirk and make Klingons look bad. Plus it would be great fun to know that Khan would agonize whether Kirk fired the torps and killed the corpsicles or not.
End result in both cases: dud torps that would have live warheads but no tactical value. Although Khan would probably make damn sure the warheads would not explode without his explicit permission, which means that
a) McCoy's life was never in jeopardy and
b) Spock was more clever than Khan by half and overrode the secret safety
If there were more than 72 of the torps in existence, Khan could not be sure the right ones got deployed. He must have engineered things so that no matter what, only the 72 proper ones would go to the Enterprise - which probably means that the ones blown up below London were all that existed, besides the rigged ones.
Timo Saloniemi
The ongoing comic series from IDW shows Section 31's Plan C:
Section 31 allied itself with the Romulan Star Empire and gave them Vengeance-debuted technology to upgrade their warships with. The Romulans then massacred the under-construction Klingon colony at Khitomer, prompting most of the Klingon military to deploy to the outer reaches of the Klingon Empire. So Section 31 (which has its own cloak-capable warships) and the Romulans proceeded to Qo'noS and fired on the surface as well as fought the Klingons' Narada-style warships in orbit. The Romulans then captured the Klingon High Council and tried to use the remaining salvaged red matter to destroy Qo'noS, at which point Section 31 double-crossed the them, seizing the red matter and remote-detonating the Romulan warships. So, as the Section 31 leader explained to Kirk, Section 31 possessed the red matter to ward off anyone from attacking the Federation and successfully cut the Klingons and Romulans' most advanced warships to pieces.
Funny thing: the Section 31 leader admits to Kirk that Marcus was a madman and that Marcus's actions had been a setback to Section 31's purpose of protecting the Federation.
Funny thing: the Section 31 leader admits to Kirk that Marcus was a madman and that Marcus's actions had been a setback to Section 31's purpose of protecting the Federation.
Timo said:
No. As Orci's statement makes clear, Marcus intended the torpedoes to work, and he was in control of them by the time they were given to Kirk. He would know whether or not they were capable of performing their intended purpose.
If the film had intended to convey the message that the torpedoes were rendered nonfunctional by the inclusion of the augments, it failed to do so. In fact, in several ways the content of the film argues otherwise. For one thing, when Marcus shows up, Kirk asks if he is to fire the torpedoes at the Klingons and end the augments' lives. Though not actually a forthright entreaty, this question becomes utterly nonsensical in the event that Kirk thinks the torpedoes don't actually have fuel.
If the film had really meant to convey the idea that the torpedoes were deprived of fuel by the inclusion of the augments, Carol's dialogue could have been simply "the fuel container has been removed to make room for this cryotube". But the actual dialogue is "This fuel container's been removed from the torpedo and retrofitted to hide this cryotube." This is significant. A somewhat different story is being told. It indicates that the torpedoes still have fuel despite the augments. Which would incidentally have to be the case for Orci's statement or Marcus' behavior to make sense.
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