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In Mirror, Mirror assassination is a valid method of rank advancement in the Terran Empire. Its chances of success against captains and officers who don't agree with the Empire's policies (presumably "To seek out new intelligent life, and enslave them") rise due to the crew not giving a damn if they die due to loyalty to Imperial code.

However, there seems to be a brainbug that has caused assassination to become the only way to advance in the Mirror Universe. In a lot of mirrorverse stories you have assassination being the principal (if not the only) way to get ahead. While I can understand that this is to make the Empire's ships far more brutal in regimentation than their Fed counterparts, this is a completely idiotic decision in real life. Nazi Germany, the Empire's spiritual predicessor, utilized assassination of rivals within its multiple redundant security services to weed out the weaklings based on Hitler's policies of social darwinism. This didn't work because a guy shooting another guy is not a valid way to be the best. Consequently, if the turnover rate on Imperial ships is as to be as high as expected, then I strongly suspect that were it not for the weird-ass (and moronic) rules the ST universes follow, the real reason for the Empire's collapse by DS9 was due to everybody having low morale from being assassinated rather than Spock's reforms.

Correct me if wrong, y'know. I'm pretty sure assassination has turned into another brain bug.

Well, it's clearly not the only way to rise in power, as Mirror Archer was offered a ship and promotion once he offered the Empire the Defiant, he just went power crazy and assassinated the man trying to give it to him. Assassination also has to be cleared by the Empire for the superior not following orders, as shown in 'Mirror, Mirror'. So, advancement happens if the individual shows merit, just like in any other organization, but in circumstances of an entire ship going rogue, like in 'In a Mirror Darkly', they basically became opportunistic pirates, and in the middle of a civil war no less.

As for the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance, Mirror Garak was an untalented toady looking for his next step up the ladder, and thought assassination and boot licking were the best ways. Everyone else seemed a bit more restrained.

To be a brain bug, it would have to have escaped its episode of origin and infected the entire franchise, but assassination is mostly limited to the very first mirror universe episode and the homage two-parter on Enterprise. Anyway, the societies that used assassination widely were shown to collapse; the Terran Empire fell and the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance also was defeated.

The Klingons do have a tradition of challenging higher officers, but this only came up in a couple of episodes. Mainly it was ignored.

Eframepilot wrote:To be a brain bug, it would have to have escaped its episode of origin and infected the entire franchise, but assassination is mostly limited to the very first mirror universe episode and the homage two-parter on Enterprise. Anyway, the societies that used assassination widely were shown to collapse; the Terran Empire fell and the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance also was defeated.

The Klingons do have a tradition of challenging higher officers, but this only came up in a couple of episodes. Mainly it was ignored.

It just seemed to be a brainbug in the Mirrorverse stories that I read, but my memory's hardly trustworthy on these things.