Vulcan Starfleet officers. DS9's Rules of Engagement has a Vulcan admiral presiding over Worf's cout martial.
Why the Resistance to Starfleet as a Military?
- Thread starter Vincent Law
- Start date
Vulcan Starfleet officers. DS9's Rules of Engagement has a Vulcan admiral presiding over Worf's cout martial.
I think we're trying to apply our current day terminology to something that doesn't have an exact current-day amalgam. Starfleet clearly has military aspects. It clearly does loads of stuff that are beyond the purview of any current-day military. Can't we conceive of something that is actually beyond what we currently understand to be the military?
DS9, "Rules of Engagement."
On what basis? The United Earth Starfleet exists to serve United Earth; that can't just change. There's a United Earth Starfleet Charter already in effect (ENT: "Affliction"/"Divergence"). There would need to be a new charter in order for the Federation to have its own starfleet, and a new charter means it's a new organization.
And that also dovetails nicely with DS9's "Inquisition," which refers to the "original Starfleet Charter," implying the existence of multiple charters.
There's also basic logic. Why would the Federation continue the United Earth Starfleet but discontinue the more advanced Vulcan, Andorian, and Tellarite space forces? Logically, it would make much more sense to found a new organization and transfer the pre-existing ships under the new organization's umbrella.
Yes, it does.
And they weren't militaries, because they were not the organizations created by the state to engage in self-defense. They were, essentially, private contractors -- the equivalent of today's Blackwater.
ETA:
The problem with this is now we're presuming the existence of "secret knowledge" -- we're trying to justify calling Starfleet something whose definition it fits just fine by presuming that there's some sort of complication out there that's never been explained.
There's no reason to do that. Starfleet's a military. It's been called a military, canonically. It fits the legal definition of a military. The preponderance of evidence is that Starfleet is a military, and there's only been one instance of it not being called a military.
Well, the High Command was dissolved at the end of ENT: "Awakening." Though we know that Vulcan's intelligence service continued into the 24th Century (TNG: "Gambit").
For whatever it's worth, in the DS9 Relaunch novels, the Bajoran Militia continued to exist and to function within Bajoran territory after Bajor joined the Federation.
Is the idea that a military would take on additional scientific and diplomatic roles really out of the realm of belief, especially since Starfleet as portrayed on screen is not all that different from modern militaries?
Too be fair, while still fulfilling the role of their societies military, Starfleet does participate in activities that are outside of anything any military organization, part or present, has ever engaged in. But those are purview's that have simply been added on
Gene Roddenberry could have depicted Starfleet as pure civilian organization. A non-governmental private group of adventurers roaming the stars (an interesting possibility). History is full of such groups, but that possibility simply can't be reconciled with what we've seen on screen.
Gene Roddenberry could have depicted Starfleet as pure civilian organization. A non-governmental private group of adventurers roaming the stars (an interesting possibility). History is full of such groups, but that possibility simply can't be reconciled with what we've seen on screen.
This thread wouldn't be nowhere near this long if everyone was happy with that idea..
I think a lot of people (real life and in trek universe) would like the idea of joining an organization where you get to have rank, wear a uniform and do something important, without having to face actual warfare.
Because it sounds like fun and you get to follow your career at the same time.
On the other hand from some of the types we see in the episodes don't always look like they're really ready to fight, as if they joined never really thinking they would end up in a battle situation.
Mostly scientist and explorers first, diplomats second, and finally soldiers if necessary.
Because it sounds like fun and you get to follow your career at the same time.
On the other hand from some of the types we see in the episodes don't always look like they're really ready to fight, as if they joined never really thinking they would end up in a battle situation.
Mostly scientist and explorers first, diplomats second, and finally soldiers if necessary.
Okay, go ahead. Why don't you get a bit creative and describe it for us. Most of us (not all) have reasonable open minds.
Yes they do, well into the 24th century. In the second part of Unifcation when the Romulan troop carriers cross the neutral zone and enter Federation space, it is Vulcan defense forces who first respond. Even before Starfleet does.
Given that they are responding to a invasion force, that implies that the vulcan ships are armed and prepared to do something themselves about the incursion.
I don't think that's exceptional to Starfleet, I'm sure there are people in today's militaries in a similar situation. Though anyone who joins Starfleet wanting to explore the unknown and to go where no one has gone before but expecting never to face combat in the process should definitely rethink that position. Space is dangerous and Starfleet knows that.
As a matter of general ethos of Starfleet, yes, but in practice I'd say it very much depends on the individual Starfleet member. Someone in the science division or with a science background will most probably see himself as an explorer first. OTOH, the guy manning the tactical console or a redshirt drilling to repell enemy boardings is much more likely to have a soldier mindset.
How many people, when asked why they joined the military, have ever said that they joined to fight? I think most of them would give the rather generic, "to serve my country," answer, which can really be seen in any way given the many different career areas available in the military. I'm sure you might still get a few, "to see the world," answers as well, because that actually was a recruiting point not all that terribly long ago.
Sometimes it seems as if the Federation commissioned a space force of mainly explorers with knowledge of how to operate phasers and torpedoes.
It all goes back to how Capt Picard reacted with disdain about Starfleet being referred to as the military even though he knows that's exactly the role it will have to fill from time to time.
It reminds me of throwaway statement by Capt Sisko about the Defiant being built to fight the Borg;
They were going to build an entire fleet of them, but the Borg threat became "less urgent" so they scrapped the project.
I know some of the viewers thought, "whaaat??"
One single cube destroyed an entire fleet the first time, and there were definitely more of them.
That decision backfired twice on them when the Borg attacked them again and nearly destroyed the Federation.
Captain Jericho was more militant, but he had to seriously argue with the Enterprise crew to get his plan into action.
They questioned everything and seemed more ready to negotiate.
Granted Jericho was rash and jerk-like, but in the end, was he right?
Depend on which century or ship you're talking about. The crew aboard Kirk's Enterprise, with few exceptions, seemed fully aware of the possibilities of combat as part of their duties. The crew aboard Sisko's Defiant as well.
Your post made me think of the SG1 character Col. Samantha Carter. She definitely was a talented military scientist, who moved into the role of a special forces soldier (a Air Force Para). As such she engaged in diplomatic, exploration, research, humanitarian and combat missions.
While not Star Trek of course, it does illustrate that (fictional) military personnel can "do it all."
My younger brother joined the US Army immediately following September eleventh, and not for the educational benefits (although he has used them). He pushed for a combat assignment.
They scrapped the Defiant project yes, but they didn't scrap the development of other more battle-oriented vessels capable of fighting the Borg. That's where they got the Sovereign, Akira, Norway, Steamrunner, Sabre and Prometheus classes.
So it was less "We don't need Warships" and more "The Defiant class had engineering problems while these other classes don't."
Wonder what Picard thought Starfleet was when he obliterated the Ferengi vessel from The Battle?
A thought I have on this matter, perhaps one of the reasons why certain Starfleet officers deny Starfleet being a military has something to do with propaganda. Imagine if you will what the recruitment ads for Starfleet are probably like: showing happy officers on a survey mission on an idealistic paradise planet, making friends with the peaceful native aliens, and the like. That's what people sign up for Starfleet to do. Then they end up fighting Cardassians on Setlik III or in the trenches defending the captured communications outpost of AR-558. Starfleet officers want to think of themselves as the adventurous explorers scoring alien tale, not the grunts playing a game of vaoprize or be vaporized with scaly gray-skinned aliens.
Yeah, sure. Why not? In a utopia paradise, anyone can leave their job whenever the hell they want to.
Why not? Joining the Federation means a partial surrender of sovereignty, doesn't it? Wouldn't direct control of ones interplanetary space agencies be part of the deal?
Semantics, in that case; essentially the same organization reopened under new management.
There's no direct evidence either way, but I personally doubt that they did.
I'm not sure I agree. Earth has consistently been the seat of power of both the Federation Council and the Presidency for nearly two hundred years. There has to be a specific reason for that other than sheer astrographic convenience. It's possible that United Earth was the only government willing to put its space program entirely at the Federation's disposal, and therefore other races felt comfortable considering Earth as a neutral site (the ambassadors in "Babel" certainly seemed to think of Starfleet as a neutral party to transport them all to the conference).
The other possibility, often overlooked, is that the Federation formed under the auspices of the Coalition of Planets in the first place, which was largely forged by the efforts of Earth Starfleet. We may be looking at a sort of chicken-egg situation, where United Earth amended its own laws to place Starfleet at the disposal of the coalition (some sort of NATO-like treaty) which in turn was later codified into the Federation of Planets: The Allies beget NATO which begets the E.U.
Either way, there's no conclusive evidence that they ARE different organizations, and some circumstantial evidence that they are not.
And yet they were still legally empowered BY those states to engage in warfare; in the case of Queen Anne's War, virtually absent of any REGULAR military forces to back them up.
I guess what I'm saying is there's a progression here in terms of social/cultural development in terms of a nation's fighting forces. Earlier cultures either lacked standing armies or depended on a small corps of professional soldiers to mobilize armies of conscripts tossed into armor at the last minute. More modern cultures have specialized citizen-armies (militias) that take it upon themselves to be ready in time of war and likewise mobilize around the professionals. The most modern cultures currently have large professional militaries with very expanded capabilities and elite training, rarely fall back on conscripts and actually discourage participation by irregular fighting forces.
That's OUR state of the art. Three hundred years from now it would seem to have been supplanted by an even more elite group of which military training is only a niche aspect of their profession. By modern terms you could call that a military, but it doesn't really capture what Starfleet is.
That would seem to explain why there are so few of them in the 24th century.
As has already been pointed out, Federation member worlds are allowed to keep a certain portion of their militaries to serve purely local matters. So when Bajor, for instance, joined the Federation, the Bajoran Militia didn't simply vanish. Its members were offered positions in Starfleet, but those who chose to remain as they were, could do so.
And not just ships, and not just local matters. Cestus Three (Arena) was on the edge of the explored frontier, but it wasn't a outpost of the century old Federation (not by name), it was a Earth observation outpost and colony. So not only don't the member world not hand over all their current goodies, they continue to expand themselves outside of the Federation's purview. Which might include the size of their indigenous military.
Similar threads
