posted
You know, I'm watching the Dominion War episodes ... and I'm hearing references to "troops" and "troopships" ... and you know, the explanation from "AR-45whatever" that they're Starfleet SECURITY doesn't fly with me at all.
Security people are trained to provide security. That means breaking up domestic fights on Starships with families, etc. Look, they're Starfleet's cops, ok? They've got cool weapons, they're really trained weapons ... but I doubt Starfleet would fight a ground war with Security people.
Does Starfleet have a Marine Corps?
There is VERY striking evidence ... Rene Auberjonis played an officer in Star Trek VI ... do you remember him presenting plans to the CIC and Admiral Cartwright? Do you remember how they addressed him? "Colonel." Colonel? Why would they call someon a Colonel unless he WAS a Colonel?!
This is how I picture it: during peacetime, Starfleet maintains a small Marine Corps. This means a handful Generals, some officers, maybe a couple thousand troops, who are used primarily in peace keeping missions (i.e.: a member world experiences a famine, the Marines move in to provide security for the relief effort).
Also during peacetime, Starfleet naval personnel can select to recieve additional training in Marine Officer School for Naval officers, and Troop/Infantry School for the enlisted ranks. Upon graduation, they would recieve a commission to go into effect during war only as a Marine officer/soldier. In a time of war, these personnel will be transferred to the Marine Corps and their ranks switched to Marine ranks. I.E. -an ensign would be switched to the Marines and become a 2nd Lt. A Lt. Commander would become a Major and so on. Starfleet would maintain enough of a permenant Marine Corps that the assimilation of these "Navy/Marine" officers/troops would provide only little hardship (perhaps a Reserve program would be run, you serve 6 weeks a year training with other Navy/Marine units?)
This is the best explanation I have. I look forward to hearing all of your thoughts.
posted
You know, I'm going off on a tangent here, but I was reading some other topics earlier, and I remember someone bringing up the question of how many people Starfleet had in it ...
The Federation has 150 Member Worlds (give or take). Most of those member worlds have colonies. Shall we say a total of 6 or 700 colonies? Earth, for example, would probably have fifty or more colonies, Andor might have a couple dozen, etcetra.
The populations of these worlds would vary from a few million to, possibly, a couple billion. The population of the UFP would be ... I don't know, shall we guess? Several hundred billion.
How many of those would be intereasted in joining Starfleet? I mean, DAMN! Even just 1% would be a LOT of personnel, don't you think? I mean, we're talking a Naval fleet with potentially over a billion people in it!!!! And 1% isn't an unreasonable number, either. How many people did you go to school with join the military?
Starfleet would need a HELL of a lot of places to train these people. I can easily imagine Starfleet Academy, San Francisco; Starfleet Academy, Andor Prime; Starfleet Academy, Rigel IV, etc, etc. In addition to that, of course, you'd have OCS - Officer Command School- (to commission regular college/university graduates & qualified enlisted personnel as Starfleet Officers), OIS - Officer Indoctrination School (to train staff officers ... JAG lawyers, doctors, etcetra, in the proper etiquette of Starfleet service), and how many enlisted training facilities? How many ships would you need to TRAIN all these people? Good lord!
I'm really going off on a tangent. Please, shoot me now.
Now, you've got the various missions of Starfleet. Exploration, humanitarian aid, interdiction, etc. You've got hundreds of Starbases and outposts established to support Federation and Allied shipping, as well as providing for the maintenance of the fleet. You've got countless shipyards, repair docks, supply facilities. You've got communication relays, sensor posts, listening posts, and so on and so on.
At any given time, the Starfleet Corps of Engineers might be helping build a Starport on a Member World, while a half-dozen medical ships are assisting at a disaster on a colony world half-way off the beaten shipping track, and a detachment of security personnel (or Marines?!) are providing security for a relief team on a colony which is experiencing a famine.
Anyway, while there's evidence for a section of Starfleet that is dedicated towards more traditional ground combat roles, there's nothing to suggest they're called "Marines", though that would be the obvious choice, or even that they're under a seperate command.
posted
I think there has been strong enough evidence over the years that Starfleet does have marine corps, whether they are called that or not. As heavily steeped as SF is in Earth Naval traditions, though, Marines seems like an appropriate name.
I doubt the line dividing duties is that clear though (Starfleet personel on ships, Marines on planetside assignments) since we have seen SF officers on planetside starbases and we saw the Enterprise crew go on relief missions all the time.
The kicker for me was when they introduced new uniforms in "Nor the Battle to the Strong". And what's more, you saw those new "marine uniforms" and the regular DS9 style uni's serving together, almost like there were two...different...groups...hmmm.
------------------ "A gathering of Angels appeared above my head. They sang to me this song of hope, and this is what they said..." -Styx
posted
Yes, these black uniforms (with only a department stripe over chest) struck me as odd! There must be some kind of marines in Starfleet. It is impossible to wage a war only with Security-Officers.
And i think in a DS9 Episode it was mentioned that the Defiant had patrol duty to do (I don't recall the episode at the moment)and protect a Starfleet Troop Carrier.
So i think there is a seperate Department in Starfleet (Marine Corps) just doing this kind of war things and wearing these black uniforms.
I think something like this was explained in one of the LastUnicorn RPG books, although they are not canon.
------------------ This is how i prefer the borg... in pieces!!! -- Janeway in Dark Frontier
posted
The episode was "Waltz" ... the Defiant was taking its time to go guard these ships b/c it was looking for Sisko.
------------------ Did you hear the one about the $30,000 Ford Explorer, the dog, and the lit stick of dynamite? Suffice to say, the dude's still gotta make 4 years worth of car payemnts and his dog is scattered all over the place to boot
posted
Well, what I mean by having the dual commissioning, is that these Naval officers who qualify as Marines would only be called into duty by a War or such. Presumably, the Federation Council would have to give the "ok" to authorize this, at which time those officers and enlisted would become Marines, go by Marine ranks, wear Marine uniforms, etcetra. Simply being on a planet wouldn't suddenly mean they'd be called by their Marines ranks.
There would be a very small existing Marine Corps already ... maybe no more than 4,000. This would barely be enough to preform more than one relief operation, and they would probably only go in if it was going to be an extended mission. When the ENTERPRISE does a relief mission, she's usually the first ship on the scene, and has a large enough crew to handle things herself.
(i.e.: the Enterprise goes in first, then the other supply ships arrive, along with a Marine detachment, who set up security for the relief effort, and relieve the Enterprise of the duty, which is then freed up to go back to "boldly going")
If that makes any sense.
------------------ Did you hear the one about the $30,000 Ford Explorer, the dog, and the lit stick of dynamite? Suffice to say, the dude's still gotta make 4 years worth of car payemnts and his dog is scattered all over the place to boot
posted
a message in two parts: part One i agree that Starfleet has Ground combat Specialists. According to DS9, there must be thousands of them. What they are called is never established. I agree that the logical thing to call them is "marines", because a Marine is " one of a class of soldiers serving on shipboard or in close association with a naval force". I have found that many people in other parts of the world, intelligent and orherwise rational people, equate the word "marine" with a ruthless mindless killing machine that will rape and kill civilians when no enemy is convenient, and they cannot be disuaded from this definition.
Part two:
as time marches on, the economy changes. As the economy changes, the society can support a larger percentage of the population in the peacetime armed forces. since the Industrial Revolution or so, western industrialized nations could support a peace-time army of 1% their population. So, completely discounting Starfleet's scientific role (and budget, and the people thus supported), their military budget can support 1% the population of the Federation (or more). 150 member worlds with an average population of 6 billion (sheer conjecture based on the current and future population of Earth), give one 9 billion people in Starfleet.
------------------ You're a Starfleet Officer. "Weird" is part of the job.
posted
Ok, given an estimated size of Starfleet at 9 billion, we're talking a HUGE institution here. How many starships, starbases, outposts, relay posts, research facilities, ground facilities, training facilities, etcetra would it take to give 9 billion people something to do?
------------------ How stupid do you have to be to play Russian roulette with a semi-automatic?
posted
So lets say Starfleet's got 800 Starbases dedicated to the minor repair of her fleets, and to serving as bases of economic development for the Federation. These starbases' officer/crew/civilian compliment varies widely, from 300 aboard DS9 (number given in the early seasons, before it got "popular" with the Dominion), to say 10,000 aboard those really big stations we saw in almost EVERY one of the TOS films.
Then, of course, you've got the shipyards and drydocks. I don't even want to GUESS how many of these there are. Each would probably be fairly well staffed by the Starfleet Corps of Engineers, and could conceivably staff upwards of 60,000 or A LOT MORE officers and crew there depending on how many ships are being constructed at any one time.
You've got the little posts. The communications relays (with maybe 2 people aboard, tops), the defense nets (lightly crewed, if even), listening posts, etcetra, etcetra. You've got research facilities for science, medical, weapons, anything you can name. Hell, you've probably got Starfleet personnel running around the Federation doing pro-bono work!
Then you've got the Starships. A Galaxy-Class with a crew of nearly 1,000 (including non-Starfleet personnel, but I doubt very many of them, not more than 150 or so), down to an Oberth- with maybe 20 aboard.
Good lord this organization is huge. I'm imaging the titles on the doors of Starfleet Command's Operation Division:
Admiral In Charge Of Starfleet Operations Admiral In Charge Of Supplying Outposts Admiral In Charge of Supplying Starbases Admiral In Charge of Supplying Sol System Starships Admiral In Charge of Supplying Vulcan System Starships Admiral In Charge of Supplying Correct Sized Condoms
and so on, and so on
------------------ You wouldn't understand ... it's a Jeep thing
posted
I like to think that the Marine division is composed mainly of enlisted men. Marine officers would be security officers that chose the Marine division instead of transfering to the Command division.
I also like to think for the most part the marines is a laughably small division,which explains why most security officers eventually transfer to command. For all we know the Marines could have been dispanded after STVI. Hell... I could see enlisted marines being discharged , and marine officers either returning to command, security, or intellegence branches.
posted
Well, the only example I can remember of a unit of what I consider to be Starfleet Marines was in the Siege of AR-558 or whatever the number was. There we had a group of black uniforms with a female CO in a regular Starfleet uniform. I believe she stated that the Captain had been killed, so here we have a captian in charge of the unit. A command officer, not a security or tactical officer. There were also several other regular uniforms walking around, though they were probably the group of scientists repairing the facility that was being held by the Marine unit.
------------------ "A gathering of Angels appeared above my head. They sang to me this song of hope, and this is what they said..." -Styx
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