The very different uniforms for different branches of the same service is an odd choice. The first thing a uniform should do is let the members of the service identify each other as friendly immediately. Branch of the service should be a badge or a stripe or a collar, while the main part of the uniform is uniform throughout the service. But I guess the different colors give something for the costume designers to play with.
Why dose Starfleet medical and science share a common uniform configuration?
- Thread starter SS.Scientific
- Start date
What?????
Your training isn't specific to being a member of star fleet. Regardless of your training you could be replaced by a civilian equivalent tomorrow and no one would bat an eyelash.
Contrast that with operations, you can swap them with people experienced working on ships. However if you take an ops officer off a ship, and it's as if they've joined a completely different branch of service. I.e. look at O'brien on DS9.
Command on the other hand has to be academy trained aware of starfleet mission protocols etc.
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The thing is they aren't exactly the same service.
Operations is very much like the traditional Navy. Blue is very much like Nasa. While red is very much like the Air Force/intelligence agencies/space force etc.
We see bridge officers overlapping in their roles, but that isn't the case for rank and file crewman. It's not unlike how an elite member of the Army can join the Navy Seals, they can do so because they are elite not at all the norm.
If you wear gold you probably aren't doing too much research if any, your 9-5 routine is maintenance etc.
Regardless of whether or not you're a doctor or a lab technician working on genetic samples from a mission, your primary task is research.
We forget that the volume of medical staff has never reflected the needs of ships personal and is routinely an extension of exobiologist research etc.
Command is like it suggests, they don't focus on mundane operations or mundane research, they're the strategists/diplomats/lawyers/navigators etc. They're big picture people, they delegate the minor tasks down the chain of command. They're far closer to a modern day CIA/Homeland Security etc.
Most officers attend the Academy and all members of Starfleet are trained in mission protocols.
Swapping a scientist wouldn't be all that different than swapping a engineer. So I fail to see the “contrast”.
As seen in TOS Science and Operations personnel can be cross trained in Command.
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Huh, and to think, the XO (the ship's second in command) in TOS was "basically a civilian."
All the services have different jobs, My father was in the USAF for 20 years. He was a technician, Basically in “Operations” to use Starfleet parlance My sister also served as a dental technician, so “Sciences”. Her husband was in HVAC, another “Operations” airman.
I guess you never met Lt. Leslie, who’s been everything from a med tech to a helmsman.
I’m willing to be there is some research being done in the Engineering Dept.
It isn't about jobs, it's about goal-operational role.
Operations job is operations of ships, Science is researching things, Command is more like the CIA.
These aren't jobs these are tasks your division is responsible for.
And in real life you have rank and file who do drift between navy-marines etc.
But it's rare and pointing to TOS to prove the point is telling.
And the Marine corp has an Air Force of its own. But that isn't its job.
No, just no. Command is nothing like the CIA. Intelligence is a totally different thing.
How do you figure that? Intelligence and Command appear to be pretty much inseparable in most of what we've seen.
intelligence, isn't spies and covert operations.
CIA is more like an organization dedicated to cataloging information and coming up with ways to use that information.
Which is largely what Command seems to be focused on.
The fact that Worf goes from Gold/security to Red strategic operations is good evidence of this.
No it’s not. Intelligence gathering is specific task with in the military and government assigned to specific individuals and groups. As mentioned, up thread my father was a technician in the USAF. His unit was an intelligence unit tasked to monitor activity in the Soviet Union and China. His unit was commanded by a Captain. The base we were on was Commanded by Colonel. Both of them may be said to be in “Command” positions. But the unit as a whole was Intelligence, The base contained a variety of units, including a fighter squadron, medical personal (an entire hospital) and a motor pool. All with their own command hierarchy.
“Command” in Star Trek is about leadership. They run the ship and make the big calls. They may be assigned an intelligence task ( such as in the Enterprise Incident) but its not their main job.
Which isn't part of the CIA. The CIA figures out what to do with that information and leads policy using that information.
You're conflating intelligence gathering with a dedicated intelligence organization. My point isn't that the reds are doing recon work, my point is they're trying to figure what to do with recon work.
It's a bad form of comparison because the 3 colors are so different from a modern military.
Yes "leadership" but leadership of what exactly?
EDIT: It seems very much like Command is focused on where we go and why, with the how being done by blue/ops. Seems like a massive part of that is figuring out what to do with gathered information. Keeping in mind, the CIA's primary source of information isn't spies, it's getting textbooks from foreign country and finding multi lingual individuals who can help decipher what is in those records.
Command isn't an officer class or people who are up the command hierarchy. If that were the case all the department heads would be wearing read(while obviously many have at some point))
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Their ship and it's mission. They manage the department heads to complete that task.
Yes and "their ship" is almost entirely in the hands of operations/science.
Which would mean we agree that it is almost entirely the mission, which would be heavily based around intelligence.
I'd say more executive based.
In TNG, Starfleet JAG officers wore command red, and if they're anything remotely like today's JAG officers, their duties fall more in line with personnel support, internal affairs, human(oid) resources, and anything else that isn't a part of the mission and daily operations of a starship/starbase. It's possible that there are senior JAG officers with the rank of commander or even captain, but they are not included in a ship's normal chain of command (unless they took and passed the Bridge Officer's Test perhaps).
I'd suspect command officers are more similar to JAg officers, due to their line of work, than they are anyone else in the navy.
We've never seen a on board legal expert in trek, seems far more likely that most legal issues are done by command staff.
Remember Riker had to step in as prosecutor in measure of a man.
Seems like the separation between diplomacy, interpreting the prime directive, etc, is inseparable between being a lawyer and command level officer.
STARFLEET's JAG corps should really not be used as an example of anything. It's very bass ackward.
But if you recall, that was only because the nearby starbase was new and that Captain Louvois had no staff at her JAG office yet. Riker having to be a fill-in prosecutor implies that JAG officers aren't part of a starship's regular crew.
My point was exactly that.
You have a crew of 1,000 people stumbling along between random worlds, and you don't have one suitable legal expert?
Given the missions they are on they'd need to have a full legal council on board, if command officers weren't trained in law.
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