posted
We're often presented in Trek with the notion that one starship is all there is available for many light years around. Sure, space is vast, and you don't need a huge fleet to protect all that emptiness. But with all the hemming and hawing over how large people think Starfleet is or ought to be, what's the justification for it?
I'm taking all the fun we've been having with the "You're the Admiral!" scenarios (Dan's soon to batter up!). People are justifying why they need one, a dozen, or more starships in order to safely patrol a volume of space of one sector, or up to 8000 cubic light years of territory. Okay, given any threat forces or strategic / political assets in a given area, lots of ships could be justified.
But what about the fact that for the most part, a given Trek hero ship is the only one available for many light years around. This is fine for story purposes, but how does this work in a practical sense? Does anyone in the Federation feel safe when the nearest help can be many days away?
Maybe it's the modern-day institutionalized paranoia speaking here, but even if in the Trek universse everything is pretty much optimistic, happy and fun 99% of the time, would millions of people volunteer to go out among the stars in transport ships unprotected? To set up colonies and trading outposts without a military or patrol force within crisis range? How big would Starfleet be if made using today's dangerous world as a context?
posted
Well in terms of practicality, it would be careless to have just 1 ship patrolling a huge area of space. Especially during the TOS era, with Klingons and all. In fact, I was watching a little bit of "Arena" the other day and there's a scene in which Kirk postulates that the attack on the colony of Cestus III(spelling?) was an attempt to lure the Enterprise into a trap to destroy it, leaving the Federation open to invasion. It seems Kirk would have us believe that the only line of defense the Federation has is the Enterprise yet this is sort of disproven by the fact that we see other Connies later on.
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posted
Starfleet doesn't operate like the U.S. Navy. Trek ships are pretty much self sufficient while current naval vessels are not. Yes, U.S. cruisers and destroyers will make port calls to other nations by themselves, but the carriers go nowhere without a support group of a half dozen vessels or more, and the carriers go where the greatest potential for trouble is.
You wouldn't want to send a Miranda as a first responder to a Romulan border incursion and you wouldn't want a Sovereign doing menial tasks far from operational theaters. Below is a current disposition of the U.S. fleet as of November 1, 2006. Only half are actually underway.
Deployable Battle Force Ships: 279
Ships Underway (away from homeport): 140 ships (50% of total)
On deployment: 104 ships (37% of total)
Attack submarines underway (away from homeport): 22 submarines (40%)
On deployment: 10 submarines (19%) Ships Underway
Carriers: USS Kitty Hawk (CV 63) - East China Sea USS Enterprise (CVN 65) - Mediterranean Sea USS Nimitz (CVN 68) - Pacific Ocean USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) - Red Sea
Iwo Jima Expeditionary Strike Group (ESG): USS Iwo Jima (LHD 7) - North Arabian Sea USS Nashville (LPD 13) - North Arabian Sea USS Whidbey Island (LSD 41) - North Arabian Sea
Boxer Expeditionary Strike Group (ESG): USS Boxer (LHD 4) - port visit, Mumbai, India USS Dubuque (LPD 8) - Indian Ocean USS Comstock (LSD 45) - Persian Gulf
Essex Expeditionary Strike Group (ESG): USS Essex (LHD 2) - port visit, Subic Bay, R.P. USS Juneau (LPD 10) - port visit, Subic Bay, R.P. USS Harpers Ferry (LSD 49) - port visit, Subic Bay, R.P.
Amphibious Warfare Ships: USS Tarawa (LHA 1) - Pacific Ocean USS Saipan (LHA 2) - Persian Gulf USS Wasp (LHD 1) - Atlantic Ocean USS Bataan (LHD 5) - Atlantic Ocean USS Cleveland (LPD 7) - Pacific Ocean USS Shreveport (LPD 12) - Atlantic Ocean USS San Antonio (LPD 17) - Atlantic Ocean USS Rushmore (LSD 7) - Pacific Ocean USS Gunston Hall (LSD 44) - Atlantic Ocean USS Ashland (LSD 48) - Atlantic Ocean
Aircraft (operational): 4000+
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posted
No, trek is supposed to be more like the age of sail. Horatio Hornblower in space. As such, we see in Gene's series (TOS) that the E acts most like a sail frigate, generally off on her own.
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posted
True, but even in the age of sail, one ship could never be in two places at the same time, and could still be outgunned when attacked by two enemy ships. The problem is strategic coverage and providing adequate defense.
In Shik's current scenario, it provides one of the examples where an enemy markedly inferior in terms of firepower and technology can still mount a credible offense simply from the sheer force of numbers.
However, we rarely saw the Enterprise patrolling the immediate border of Federation space (sometimes referred to as the "Federation Defense Perimeter"), but instead defending far-flung colonies and trade routes. And in those few instances where they were supposed to be critical to Federation defense (like MNW referencing "Arena"), I'd rationalize it as meaning that the Big-E was the linchpin of the sector defenses, rather than the ONLY defense.
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