Worst command decisions by Captain James T. Kirk
- Thread starter Gary7
- Start date
And Kirk managed more ship takeovers in three years than Picard in his seven years. If losing your ship to a takeover was a competition, then Kirk wins!
And add in: a love-struck teenager; a happy irishman; a flamboyant englishman-wannabe; mind-pulsing bigheads; a 20th century superman; mutiny via spores; and I'm still in Season 1. Kirk's wins.
Amen dude
That dreadful error ultimately ended up saving the entire planet Earth.
Think about it. If Spock isn't killed after Khan sets off the Genesis Device, then Spock doesn't implant his katra into Dr. McCoy, Kirk & crew don't steal the Enterprise to take McCoy back to the Genesis Planet. So therefore, Kirk and his crew aren't exiled to Vulcan for three months, and they aren't on their way back to Earth in a captured Klingon Bird of Prey when the Whale Probe starts wreaking havoc on Earth. Then there's no resurrected Spock to inspire Kirk to travel back in time to retrieve humpback whales from the past, and Earth dies. There's literally no other set of people who could've done it under that set of circumstances.
Kirk being a Starship Captain WAS the authorization from Starfleet.
Conversations with Starfleet HQ in the TOS era weren't the everyday events that they were on TNG and beyond. Sometimes Kirk was in communications range, sometimes he wasn't. And in those circumstances, Kirk was the representative of Federation law in his territory and was authorized to act on behalf of the Federation.
Kirk didn't go rogue in "Space Seed." Khan and McGivers' hearing at the end was an official Starfleet function. That's why they're in dress uniforms, there's the ceremonial bell, and Uhura is recording the proceedings. McCoy even says that Kirk has the authority to drop all the charges. Bones just didn't think it was a wise decision (What else is new?).
Yes, Kirk showed questionable judgement allowing Khan unfettered access to the Enterprise's record tapes, but he was completely within his authority to drop the charges and put them on Ceti Alpha V. The person who really screwed up was whoever in Starfleet Command forgot to ever check up on Khan or even explore the Ceti Alpha system again. But you can hardly blame Kirk for that.
It worked, didn't it?
Unless you're two rent a wreck BoPs full of Ferengis.
Kirk's way of commanding his ship made him about the only Captain who ever returned from the deep space voyage!!! So I'd say that right or wrong he did what he did to get his crew through the troubles of that episode! Later on people could nitpick this or that and add in some cowboy diplomacy but his adventures were the required reading I'm sure!
JB
JB
I'll go out on a limb and say Picard's Enterprise was destroyed more often than Kirk's.
No it didn't. Not at first, and not without reinforcement later in the episode. At first, all it did was make Nomad consider killing ever-body, including him.
Magic
In “Space Seed”, Kirk allows Khan and his crew, along with an Enterprise crewperson, to gain access to an entire planet for their own purposes. After seeing Khan in action, he should have gathered what a cruel power-hungry person Khan was, and put him and his followers somewhere they could be monitored. This is one time Kirk’s decision came back to haunt him.
He knew after a chat with Spock that to put Khan and his crew into a federation re-education centre would probably cause more trouble than to just let them go somewhere where they could do no harm!
JB
JB
Last edited:
I would say not killing Gary Mitchell while it was still easy - either give him a fentantyl shot while he's asleep or vaporize him while he's asleep. Kirk's Hamlet-like proscrastination cost the life Kelso, almost got himself killed and put the entire crew at risk.
"Risk. Risk is our business. That's what the starship is all about. That's why we're aboard her." - Kirk, Return to Tomorrow.
Kirk didn't have a crystal ball to scry the future. At the time, no one has been hurt, and Gary, Kirk's best friend, was still alive. Once Gary killed someone, Kirk put him in a hole.
Requesting Gary be assigned to his ship in the first place as the bad command decision.
But Spock had already given Kirk the most logical, sensible advice (no matter how painful): kill Gary Mitchell while you still can. He said something like (paraphrashing), "The doctor feels emotionally, but I know from logic." Gary Mitchell's powers and arrogance were multiplying so fast anyone could see that he would become a life-threatening problem sooner or later.
Yes, having trusted people in your command staff is bad. Based on this line of reasoning, Kirk should have transferred his entire command staff off the ship long before STII: The Wrath of Khan.
Huh? Since when did Kirk do the logical thing. While Spock was suggesting chess and Checkmate, Kirk was playing Poker and bluffing in The Corbomite Maneuver. Remember the odds of success dialog with Spock in Errand of Mercy? No, Kirk doesn't believe in a no-win scenario.
Spock, following correct logical decisions in The Galileo Seven, repeatively failed.
Last edited:
So I had a bad day. I didn't ask to have that happen to me.
Since that rock fell on me I have to say that standing on my head is a lot easier now.
Since that rock fell on me I have to say that standing on my head is a lot easier now.
